Page 188 - Marketing Management

ANALYZING CONSUMER MARKETS | CHAPTER 6 165

MEMORY PROCESSES Memory is a very constructive process, because we don’t remember
information and events completely and accurately. Often we remember bits and pieces and fill in
the rest based on whatever else we know. “Marketing Insight: Made to Stick” offers some practical
tips for how marketers can ensure their ideas—inside or outside the company—are remembered
and have impact.
Memory encoding describes how and where information gets into memory. The strength of the
resulting association depends on how much we process the information at encoding (how much we
47
think about it, for instance) and in what way. In general, the more attention we pay to the mean-
ing of information during encoding, the stronger the resulting associations in memory will be. 48
Advertising research in a field setting suggests that high levels of repetition for an uninvolving,
unpersuasive ad, for example, are unlikely to have as much sales impact as lower levels of repetition
for an involving, persuasive ad. 49
Memory retrieval is the way information gets out of memory. Three facts are important about
memory retrieval.
1. The presence of other product information in memory can produce interference effects and
cause us to either overlook or confuse new data. One marketing challenge in a category
crowded with many competitors—for example, airlines, financial services, and insurance
companies—is that consumers may mix up brands.

4. Credibility—give an idea believability. Indian overnight delivery
service Safexpress was able to overcome doubts about its
capabilities by describing to a Bollywood film studio how it had
flawlessly delivered 69,000 copies of the latest Harry Potter
Marketing InsightInsight novel to bookstores all over the country by 8 AM on the morning
g
Marketin
of its release.
5. Emotion—help people see the importance of an idea. Research
on fact-based versus appeal-to-emotion antismoking ads has
Made to Stick demonstrated that emotional appeals are more compelling and
memorable.
Picking up on a concept first introduced by Malcolm Gladwell in his 6. Stories—empower people to use an idea through narrative.
Tipping Point book, brothers Chip and Dan Heath set out to uncover Research again shows how narratives evoke mental stimulation,
what makes an idea sticky and catch on with an audience. Considering and visualization of events makes recall and further learning easier.
a wide range of ideas from diverse sources—urban legends, conspiracy The Heaths believe great ideas are made, not born, via these traits.
theories, public policy mandates, and product design—they identified One example is the Subway ad campaign starring Jared—who lost
six traits that characterize all great ideas and used the acronym 100 pounds in three months by eating two subs a day—that helped to
“SUCCES” to organize them: raise Subway’s sales 18 percent in one year. According to the Heaths,
1. Simple—find the core of any idea. Take an idea and distill it down, the idea scores high on all six dimensions of stickiness.
whittling away everything that is not essential. “Southwest Airlines
is THE low-fare airline.” 1. Simple—weight loss
2. Unexpected—grab people’s attention by surprising them. 2. Unexpected—weight loss by eating fast food
Nordstrom’s customer service is legendary because it unexpect- 3. Concrete—weight loss by eating two Subway subs daily
edly exceeds customer’s already high expectations by going 4. Credibility—a documented loss of 100 pounds
beyond helping them buy to address their personal situations— 5. Emotion—a triumph over difficult weight problems
ironing shirts before meetings, keeping cars warm while they shop,
or wrapping presents they actually bought at Macy’s. 6. Stories—a personal account of how eating two Subway Subs lead
to an incredible weight loss.
3. Concrete—make sure any idea can be easily grasped and
remembered later. Boeing successfully designed the 727 airplane Sources: Chip Heath and Dan Heath, Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and
by giving its thousands of engineers a very specific goal—the Others Die ... (New York: Random House, 2007); Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping
plane had to seat 131 passengers, be able to fly nonstop from New Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference (New York: Little, Brown and
Company, 2000); Barbara Kiviat, “Are You Sticky?” Time, October 29, 2006; Justin
York to Miami, and land on runway 4-22 at LaGuardia, which could Ewers, “Making It Stick,” U.S. News & World Report, January 21, 2007; Mike
not be used by large planes. Hofman, “Chip and Dan Heath: Marketing Made Sticky,” Inc, January 1, 2007.