Contemporary consumers have access to millions of products. There was a time when a consumer entered a store looking for a pair of sneakers and had only two options. Those days are over. First, markets have expanded to online as well as physical locations. Second, markets are now saturated with different brands, pricing, and payment options—all competing for consumers’ attention. A present challenge for marketers is to determine what consumers want, need, and are likely to buy—both online and in physical locations. 

Since almost 90 percent of consumer purchasing decisions take place at what can be considered an “unconscious” or perhaps “subconscious” level, it has not always been easy to accurately identify the drivers of consumers’ buying behaviors—until now. Neuromarketing is a recent phenomenon that takes this observation into consideration in order to develop marketing strategies corporations can use. The term was coined in 2002 by professor Ale Smidts and refers to a practice that combines neuroscience and marketing to delve into the unconscious minds of consumers. 

Neuromarketing technology provides a starting point to understand how consumers react to marketing stimuli, how they make their decisions, and what moves them from a potential customer to a buyer. The application of neuroscience can result in “a better identification and understanding of the cerebral mechanism that fundament the consumer’s behavior.” It informs researchers of the strengths and weakness of marketing materials and tactics by measuring a person’s brain activity (Odekerken, 2018). It yields new information as compared to already-known marketing tactics. That being said, “it is not about what neuromarketing does, but what researchers, marketers, and politicians do with that information” (Odekerken, 2018). It does not force anyone to buy a product by hitting a “buy” button in your brain; it increases the compatibility of products with consumer’s preferences (Wieckowski, 2019). 

Neuromarketing technology is sub-sectioned into “functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), electroencephalography (EEG), eye tracking, positron emission tomography (PET), and magneto encephalography (MEG)” (Market Research Future, 2020). A main tool used in neuromarketing is fMRI, a technology that allows tracking the brain’s responses when exposed to different stimuli. Using an fMRI, brain activity can be recorded noninvasively, without any risks of radiation. This technology is anticipated to increase until 2023 in market share despite concerns of cost and mobility (Market Research Future, 2020). Another technology available to neuromarketers is the EEG test. EEG tests measure electrical activity within the brain and can be used with software to produce several different views of the brain. EEG tests use flashes of red and yellow to show which area of the brain is engaged by the stimuli. This is considerably useful to researchers and marketers, given that each different part of the brain correlates with a different function. In addition to fMRI and EEG tests, neuromarketing also encompasses eye-tracking and galvanic skin response (GSR) tests. Eye-tracking technology can determine exactly where a person is looking; it allows for the monitoring of pupil movement, which gives marketers a means to determine if users are having trouble locating information or navigating through a web page, or if they are failing to see information altogether. Because of its usage by media and advertising companies, eye tracking has become an emerging trend and is anticipated to gain substantial market share in neuromarketing technologies (Market Research Future, 2020). GSR tests, on the other hand, measure the degree of electrical conductance across the surface of skin and can indicate emotional responses. 

Since neuromarketing has increased in popularity, several companies have become frontrunners in the market. NeuroFocus is one of the market leaders with a team of neuroscience and marketing experts from the University of California, Berkeley, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Harvard, and Hebrew University. The company was acquired by the Nielsen Company, a worldwide leader in marketing and advertising research, and has numerous Fortune 100 clients ranging from manufacturers of automobiles and consumer packaged goods, as well as major cable television and motion picture studios. 

EmSense, another neuromarketing vendor, combines neuroscience experts from MIT, Harvard, and Stanford with marketing experience from Pepsi-Cola, Disney, and Gillette. Like NeuroFocus, EmSense has worked with large companies like Microsoft. The NeuroFocus portfolio offers solutions for advertising, in-store display, videogaming, packaging, and online marketing elements. Sands Research is a company that offers neuroscience-based research. In addition to using technology like EEG tests and eye tracking, Sands has developed its own system of scoring media, the Neuro Engagement Factor (NEF). The NEF ranks marketing elements, like advertisements, on a scale of 1 to 5 based on the level of consumer engagement. The company’s technology has attracted clients like Sam’s Club and Chevron and has also been used to conduct insightful studies on Super Bowl advertisements. 

Hyundai employed EEG technology to test consumer reactions to a 2011 test model of. Using a test group of 15 men and 15 women, Hyundai asked participants to stare at different parts of the model, while monitoring the electrical activity in their brains. A manager of brand strategy, Dean Macko, stated, “We want to know what consumers think about a car before we start manufacturing thousands of them” (Keshav, n.d.). Macko expects the company to make adjustments to the model’s exterior based on the EEG reports (Burkitt, 2009).

The Weather Channel (TWC) has also chosen to use neuroscience. In this case, TWC was looking to optimize its on-air promotions for one of its series, “When Weather Changed History.” To do this, the company teamed up with NeuroFocus and used three different neuroscience technologies for the study: EEG tests, eye-tracking technology, and GSR. These methods tested viewers’ neurological and biophysical responses to three different promotions. The study was aimed at answering four different questions: “Are the spots effective? What about each of them is more or less effective? How well do they convey the intended messages? How do we build the most effective final versions of the spots?” To answer these questions, NeuroFocus recorded metrics like attention, emotional engagement, and memory retention. Each spot was scored based on these metrics, providing valuable insights: “TWC’s marketing team welcomed this research, because the information was clear, intuitive, quantitative, and objective. It was also well received because it helped pinpoint how we could improve the effectiveness of our promos.” Uma Karmarkar, a professor of consumer psychology and behavioral economics, cites the example of junk-food giant Frito-Lay, which in 2008 hired a neuromarketing firm to look into how consumers respond to Cheetos, the top-selling brand of cheese puffs in the United States. Using EEG technology on a group of willing subjects, the firm determined that consumers respond strongly to the fact that eating Cheetos turns their fingers orange with residual cheese dust. In her background note, Karmarkar cites an article in the August 2011 issue of Fast Company, which describes how the EEG patterns indicated “a sense of giddy subversion that consumers enjoy over the messiness of the product.”....

Questions for Discussion

1. Do you believe that neuromarketing is unethical or an innovative business practice? Explain.

2. Do all or most companies that market products and services use questionable techniques to influence and persuade customers?

3. Are you personally concerned or bothered by the neuromarketing techniques described in this case? Explain.

4. What moral responsibilities, if any, should marketing companies have—especially those firms using neuromarketing techniques? Explain.