The counterintuitive magic every brand should embrace
What if I told you there was one simple shift you could make right now with your brand that could be game-changing? It’s enticing, right?
I mean, I didn’t say I was going to show you how to adjust your positioning to appeal to that part of the brain associated with the limbic system. That may sound mildly interesting. But let’s face it. It doesn’t have all the feels that that first statement has.
That’s the point here.
We default to the rational
When we think about presenting our brand to those we hope to serve, we default to the rational. We want to tell everyone about the cool features. Or about the things it can do.
Author Michael McQueen explains how we got to this kind of thinking in an article in Fast Company.
“Francis Bacon was a 17th-century scientist and philosopher who is often described as one of the founding fathers of the Enlightenment. Francis Bacon’s big idea was that humans are fundamentally rational and reasonable. As such, he suggested that to educate or influence someone to change their thinking, the key was exposing them to reliable evidence and logical arguments. This way, they’d have no option but to come to their senses and see reason.”
Turns out Francis was a bit off. The latest brain research shows us that our decision-making is not rational. It’s emotional. Here is an article from Harvard Business Review that goes into greater detail.
Getting counterintuitive
If our brand wants to win people over, we have to appeal to them. That means we need to figure out what’s important to them. And I’m pretty sure that’s not the features and functionality that we all default to. Oh, people will want to know about those things. But mostly as validation.
Resisting the rational path and embracing the emotional route is the counterintuitive move that can be game-changing.
So what’s important to them? The rational approach we see too often seems to rely on the hope that our prospects will figure out why they should care. Let’s help them understand that. And let’s not get lazy and rely on lightweight benefits like ‘the flywheel on the whatchamacallit makes it easier to maneuver’. I get it that that’s a benefit. But it’s not a game-changing thought.
We need to understand their desires and aspirations. This helps us understand their idealized selves. This is the vision they have of who they want to be. And it is very powerful.
They are working toward their idealized selves. And if they see our brand as something that can help them on that journey, then we become very dear to them. That means finding ways to show them how we serve this deeper desire.
We have to change our inclination from enumerating the rational things and thinking it’s enough to rely on the lightweight benefits. We need to help them understand the benefit of the benefit. If we can get there, we can go beyond trying to win minds (a hollow victory), and begin to win hearts.