We are what we love.
February 8th, 2008
Every year the advertising industry spends millions of dollars to find out how much people like something. But they’ve never stopped to ask what it means to like something in the first place. What’s the difference between like and love? How do we develop strong loyalties? Are individual preferences really coded on a linear scale in our brains?
These are the kinds of questions that the rapidly growing field of neuroscience is beginning to answer. And though the papers may be difficult to wade through, there are a lot of lessons for those of us in the business arena.
First of all, love is not just a stronger form of liking. Turns out there are some interesting differences in the way our brains process things we “love”. While both things we like and things we love activate deep reward areas in the brain tied to motivation, things we love additionally engage an area in the front of our brains that has been linked with self-knowledge.
What does that mean? It suggests that loving a person, hobby, brand, etc. involves internalizing what that brand stands for as part of your self-identity. It explains why we define ourselves by those things we love: “I am a wine enthusiast, a dog whisperer, a Demon Deacons fanatic.” And why we will defend the brands we love by tearing apart the competition, even though we have no rational basis for doing so (just ask a NASCAR fan about whether Chevy or Ford makes better cars).
So what is the lesson that marketers should take away? STOP gauging brand success as how many responses you get in the top two boxes. They’re not just quantitatively different; they’re qualitatively different. Embrace the people who love your brand. They’re willing to fall on the sword for it. They’ll overlook a bad experience from time to time. And they’ll deliver the most compelling argument for why your brand is the best because they’re not just defending your brand; they’re defending who they are.
Other posts by Justine.
Rob says:
WOW!!!! Did you guys have any clue to this info while you were doing the renaming process for Love146???? This brings it to a whole deeper level. You continually amaze us!! Now you’ve got our neurotransmitters firing doubletime!!
February 8th, 2008 at 8:28 amFI Chris says:
Fantastic first post, Justine! I can’t wait to read more! Already I’m thinking about how I identify myself in terms of the things I love. It’s amazing to imagine how much insight into people’s passions you can gain just by asking how they describe themselves. Very inspiring; keep it up!
February 8th, 2008 at 9:21 amMon says:
I like Ford cars. I love Chevy cars. Chevy cars are not manufactured for longevity sometimes…and you have to pay more to maintain their value. I think that I need to re-read this article that I like so much…Maybe I love the fact that owning a Chevy will give me a project to do or work on.Mon
February 9th, 2008 at 6:14 amolivier blanchard says:
Absolutely. With the notable exception of foodservice brands, strong brands tend to be lifestyle brands - brands that help us define who we are (to ourselves and the rest of the world). Apple. Harley Davidson. Cartier. Stetson. Leica. Yves St. Laurent. Fubu. Whatever sports team you’re into. The Wall Street Journal. Mont Blanc. Starbucks. Nike. That ubiquitous yellow Livestrong bracelet.
The questions all marketers should be asking themselves is “what does our brand carry for people? What is our brand a vessel for? What is being projected back and forth between us and our fans/users/customers?”
What most business execs still don’t understand is that “Value Proposition” only drives the purchasing decision. Desire for a product, affinity with a brand, sense of kinship with a community of users… those come from a different place altogether. Companies that take the time to inject the lifestyle gene into a brand’s DNA are still the exception rather than the rule.
Fantastic post, Justine. BoF are lucky to have you. Welcome to Greenville.
February 11th, 2008 at 7:23 amJustine says:
Thank you for the welcome Olivier! I’m enjoying getting to know Greenville - it’s a great town.
I completely agree that, despite all the talk about building relationships, most companies still market on a transactional level. Unless they have a clear purpose that elevates what they do beyond making money, and strong leadership to support it, it seems to be too easy to fall into the dynamic of doing whatever it takes to deliver against next quarter’s #s… unfortunately often at the expense of really connecting with me the consumer.
I’m curious why you called out food service brands though. Would love to hear your thoughts on this.
Sincerely,
February 12th, 2008 at 4:37 amThe girl who will drive 10 miles off the highway to get a Chick-fil-a!
olivier blanchard says:
Although Foodservice is part of our lifestyle (and yes, we are definitely defined by what we eat, where we eat, and how we eat), foodservice brands haven’t managed to become lifestyle brands the way that clothing, cars, electronics, shoes and other consumer products have.
The exceptions in the chain store category would be Starbucks, dunkin donuts, and to some extent Hard Rock Cafe.
In the SKU/ retail products, you have your soft drinks and your beers. But solid foods? Nope.
Okay… maybe SPAM, but only out of irony.
A good litmus test (at least for me) for what makes a brand a lifestyle brand (some might call them ‘love brands’) is whether or not people want to wear their logo or use their products as status indicators around other people. I have yet to see anyone feel the urge to flaunt a foodservice logo the way they would a Nike, VW, Harley Davidson, Clemson University, Disney or Livestrong logo.
Starbucks is different because it carries an extremely cool and sophisticated image. Dunkin Donuts is kind of ironic and geeky-cool, so it implies a too-cool-for-you-to-get-it subculture. Hard Rock is more about showing off that you’ve traveled to Dublin or Paris or Moscow than it is to show off the fact that you’ve had a burger at Bruce Willis’ chain of restaurants.
Coke, Mountain Dew, Budweiser, Corona and Guinness are a bit different, but they purposely seed shelves and clothing racks with t-shirts, hats, jackets and other accessories and do indicate a certain type of lifestyle one might feel like flaunting and sharing.
But that’s it. Nobody wants to show off that they eat at McDonald’s five times a week, I suppose. Or that they hang out at Sticky fingers after work. Or at restaurant ‘O’, for that matter. Or that they eat at The Slanted Door whenever they travel to San Francisco. Or that they shop at Whole Foods.
I don’t have an explanation as to why that is… Even Ice Cream and candy can’t cross the love-brand barrier, even though they clearly should. (Godiva Chocolate? Come on! Surely we’re missing something here.)
We all love food, and most of us are probably very attached to certain food products and brands… yet there is a difference between how we incorporate these brands into our little “this is who I am” outwardly drama, compared to the way we incorporate just about every other brand that we count on to help define us.
If there’s a question here that needs answering, I think it’s “why is that?” What makes foodservice brands different in that regard from brands in every other industry?
I don’t know.
PS: As i sit here thinking about this, hotels and airlines might also be left almost completely out of the lifestyle brand game. (Exceptions: Virgin Airlines and the Standard Hotel.)
I’m kind of stumped.
February 12th, 2008 at 2:47 pm