How Neuro AI Is Reshaping Consumer Behaviour

In today's hyper-competitive world, it's not the best business that wins but the company with the best marketing. Marketers know that to create truly effective campaigns, it's essential to understand how your customer's brains work to evaluate information and make purchase decisions.

For decades, marketing has relied on market research to understand consumer behaviour. While these methods offer useful insights, they tend to gather conscious responses that are typically biassed.

However, with the introduction of Neuro AI, the way brands interact with consumers will undergo a seismic shift. Neuro AI is a rapidly developing area that uses artificial intelligence and neuroscience to examine subconscious consumer behaviours. It reveals people's subconscious emotions toward advertisements, packaging, and product design.

The global Neuro AI market is projected to reach USD 13.4 billion by 2027. Brands are beginning to leverage this tool to craft experiences that resonate with audiences on a much deeper level.

Neuro AI, a powerful combination of neuroscience and artificial intelligence, provides marketers with objective data to understand consumer behaviour better. It gathers insights through eye tracking, electroencephalography (EEG), and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).

Eye tracking detects where people gaze, exposing their visual patterns and points of interest.

EEG and FMRI examinations of brain activity reveal information about emotional states and cognitive thinking.

By analysing this data, brands can learn important information about what consumers think honestly.

Monitoring and predicting consumer behaviour is a difficult task for many brands. Humans are frequently inconsistent; what they say doesn't always reflect their thoughts.

That is particularly true when making a purchasing decision. For example, while many consumers say they compare brands and price points when purchasing, research shows this is untrue.

So, why aren't consumers honest about their purchasing intentions and feelings? The primary reason is that they are motivated by subconscious impulses, the most powerful of which is emotion.

Emotion is the primary motivation for purchase behaviour and decision-making in general. That explains why 95% of purchasing decisions are subconscious. People buy based on emotion and then justify their choices with logic.

Traditional methods usually need help capturing the emotional and subconscious responses influencing purchasing decisions. However, research has demonstrated the effectiveness of Neuro AI in anticipating consumer behaviour patterns and changing brand views.

For example, SMINT's study used both FMRI scans and surveys to compare how people reacted to their advertisements. The results showed that participants responded slowly and rationally when asked for their opinions through surveys. However, this doesn't reflect real-life situations where consumers react to ads quickly and emotionally. By using fMRI scans, SMINT was able to accurately capture the immediate emotional responses in the brain, providing a more accurate understanding of consumer reactions.

With the ability to predict emotional responses, Brands can utilise Neuro AI to create an entirely new brand experience tailored to each individual's preferences and emotions.

Since Neuro AI delivers objective data, it can avoid biases and access the subconscious, which contains real emotions and preferences. That allows brands to create tailored messaging that reflects the feelings their audience is experiencing, leading to more robust emotional engagement.

This method also enables brands to shift away from a one-size-fits-all approach and instead develop a personalised experience that connects with each individual personally.

By providing insight into what resonates emotionally with consumers, Neuro AI can optimise every touch point of the customer journey.

This optimization can take various forms, such as crafting compelling marketing content, designing user-friendly interfaces, and creating packaging eliciting positive emotions. Take, for example, the case of Phillips. To optimise the packaging of their ultra-light iron, a study using fMRI and eye tracking was conducted comparing a left-handed versus right-handed packaging design. The data clearly showed that the right-hand-friendly packaging was more favoured by the audience. **However, the reasons behind this preference deserve further consideration. **

We might straightforwardly think that the difference in packaging preference for "left-handed vs. right-handed" designs is related to "usage habits." But eye-tracking revealed that this group of testers had an emotional reaction to the left-hand packaging that was almost one of "disgust." On an emotional level, this is a much more intense and profound perceptual feedback than just "discomfort."

Furthermore, brands can use Neuro AI for real-time marketing by continually analysing consumer emotions and responses. This allows brands to adjust their marketing message based on immediate interactions, ensuring that the message resonates with people.

For example, Pepsi innovatively utilised EEG and eye-tracking technology to analyse real-time viewer responses to its Super Bowl ad campaign. This study aimed to uncover subconscious reactions and emotional engagement towards various commercials aired during the event.

The findings showed that Ads with a nostalgic theme emerged as clear winners, triggering significantly higher emotional responses than other ad types. Armed with this real-time understanding of audience reactions, Pepsi strategically tailored its subsequent ad campaigns to resonate more deeply with these emotional triggers.

Neuro AI is still in its infancy. While it offers many benefits, it also raises some concerns. How much it can aid a brand depends on the level of understanding the brand seeks to achieve. If a brand, like Philips, wants to truly understand consumer perceptions where traditional methodologies fail, Neuro AI might be a viable approach. However, if a company wants to understand its public image, traditional market research methods might be more effective and cost-efficient.

As the name suggests, Neuro AI excels in exploring the "why" and the deep emotional factors behind consumer responses. But often in the business field, "consumer responses" and "emotional factors" are not as critical.

Additionally, this technology involves significant ethical issues. Privacy is paramount since people may not fully understand what they agree to when consenting to share data for marketing purposes. There is also the risk of persuading consumers to buy things they don't need. After all, the goal of marketing is not to create demand but to meet existing needs.

Transparency is crucial when using Neuro AI. Companies must clearly explain how they use Neuro AI and what data they collect. Obtaining consumer consent and ensuring they understand the conditions and context of their agreement should become standard practice, ensuring consumers are aware of and agree to the terms of data usage. By maintaining transparency in the use of Neuro AI, companies can build positive relationships with customers and ensure the ethical and responsible use of technology.

While understanding the "why" behind consumer responses can lead to more effective marketing strategies, it is important to note that everyone and every organisation is vulnerable in the face of Neuro AI. Neuro AI can enhance customer experience and meet genuine needs, but it can also be used to manipulate desires or create false needs. Similarly, Neuro AI can help businesses better understand consumers, but it also has the potential to open Pandora's box, making businesses beholden to the subconscious demands of consumers.

Neuro AI is rapidly becoming a revolutionary tool in the field of marketing, helping brands more accurately target and reach consumers by gaining insights into subconscious emotions and behaviors. Technologies such as eye-tracking, EEG, and fMRI reveal deep emotional responses that traditional market research cannot reach, driving personalized and emotionally resonant brand experiences.

Despite its significant potential, the application of Neuro AI comes with privacy and ethical challenges. Transparency and consumer consent are crucial to ensuring the ethical and responsible use of this technology.

In the future, Neuro AI will continue to drive brand innovation, optimizing every touchpoint in the customer journey. As the technology matures and its applications expand, Neuro AI will provide brands with more opportunities to create truly heartfelt marketing strategies. Meanwhile, brands must act cautiously, balancing the advantages of technology with ethical responsibility to ensure Neuro AI plays a positive role in the business realm.