In my prior column, The Trouble with Advertising, I talked about what advertising can and cannot do. In particular, I made the point that advertising cannot persuade people.
The problem is that there are still a lot of companies out there desperately trying to use advertising to persuade people. People are being exposed to more messages than ever before. As a result, it's even harder to get your message across.
So how do you cut through the Noise?
Well, it is possible, but to understand how to do it you first have to understand how people process information.
Every human being possesses an Attentional System. This system serves two functions. First, it allows us to concentrate on what we are doing. Second, it alerts us to what is going on in the surrounding environment so that nothing bad happens to us.
It doesn't do much good to be able to focus on tying that spear point to your spear if you don't notice the lion that is sneaking up behind you. People who have Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) are very good at the second function and very bad at the first.
Our Attentional Systems have both Conscious and Unconscious components. This means that we can pay attention to and look for things both deliberately and without our realizing it.
Our Attentional Systems are also powerful but limited. We can pay attention to several things at once but not to too many things. The limits of the Conscious Attentional System appears to be around 2 or 3 things simultaneously on average. It is not clear what the upper limit of the Unconscious Attentional System is, but it appears to be greater than 10 things simultaneously. Women on average also seem have better Conscious Attentional Systems than men.
So how does this apply to advertising and marketing?
Well, when people are looking to buy a new product or service, the Attentional System comes into play.
Have you ever noticed that when you are looking for a product or service you suddenly start noticing how many ads there are for that product or service?
They were always there, but you never noticed them before.
This has happened for me with tires, dry-cleaning coupons, and many other products and services. Before, I just skipped over them but now they jump out at me. Also, when I have bought a new set of tires, I stop noticing tire ads almost as quickly as I started noticing them.
You have started noticing those ads because a need, interest, problem, or pain has led your Attentional System to start looking for information relating to those products or services. Previously, your Attentional System filtered out all of that information because it wasn't perceived as relevant. This occurs because our Attentional System has a limited capacity and it has to use relevance to filter all of the Noise that we are continually bombarded by.
An analogy for how this works is radio. Think of our Attentional System as a radio tuner. This tuner has a special property - it can monitor multiple radio frequencies at once (let's say 20, although in reality it's probably greater).
However, due to the limitations of this system only one frequency can be in focus at one time. Only one frequency can be playing the loudest. The other 19 frequencies are being monitored but are playing softly in the background. However, whenever one of those frequencies shifts from transmitting Noise to transmitting a relevant Signal, our Attentional System notices this and shifts focus to it.
We know this is generally how this works because of what we have to do to override this system. For most of us that means that we have to go somewhere quiet where we can think. Generally that means some place where the number of stimuli is minimal. That way we can focus on the one frequency and aren't interrupted by Signals from other frequencies. Similarly, when I want to generate ideas or am looking for something to do or read, I go some place where I am bombarded with different Signals. The ideas then start flowing like water.
To build on the radio analogy, think of frequencies as being associated with products. For example...
Home mortgage ads are transmitted on 97.6.
Convertible ads are transmitted on 101.1.
SUV ads are transmitted on 101.2.
Lawn mowers ads are transmitted on 103.3.
Tire ads are transmitted on 104.5.
Dry-cleaning ads are transmitted on 107.6.
Mutual fund ads are transmitted on 108.2.
Our Attentional System knows about all of these frequencies, but how does it choose which frequencies to monitor?
There are two ways that our Attentional System can be queued to start monitoring frequencies. First of all, we can have an explicit problem that we are trying to solve. I may have some shirts that I need dry-cleaned and I don't want to pay full price so I start looking for dry-cleaning ads. Second, we can have several things that are bothering us and that are leading us to look around without our explicitly doing so. For example, I may be toying with the idea of changing jobs and may start noticing Help Wanted ads without explicitly looking for them.
In both cases, pain is the strongest queuing mechanism for the Attentional System. Frequencies that correspond to a source of clear and immediate pain are the ones that are monitored the most closely. They are also the most likely frequencies to be monitored by the Conscious Attentional System. This means that people are actively looking for a solution to these problems.
This makes perfect sense. Remember that the Attentional System filters information based on relevance. Well, what could be more relevant than a piece of information that relieves a pain that we are feeling or that solves a problem that we are currently facing?
So what does all of this mean for marketers?
First, it means that marketers need to keep the Signal to Noise ratio in mind when crafting their messages. You need to ensure that the Attentional Systems of your target audience will perceive your message as a Signal and not Noise. This is critical because most of the messages that people will encounter during the day will get filtered out as Noise. You need to see yourself as being in a war for relevance with all of those other advertisers.
Only a few will squeak through the filters.
Second, it means that you must focus on clarity when crafting your message. If it isn't clear what pain you are relieving or what problem you are solving then people won't know to tune in. They will miss the point of your ad or message.
You also need to understand that due to the volume of the Noise, the Attentional System must work very quickly. That means that it will not work that hard to process a message, even if it does contain a kernel of relevance. It is also easier to say "No" than "Yes".
Picture it this way...
:
:
Message --> Relevant? --> No.
Message --> Relevant? --> No.
Message --> Relevant? --> Yes.
Message --> Relevant? --> No.
:
:
This is happening thousands of times each day.
As a result, your message must be very easy to process quickly. You must also communicate the relevance of your message from the start of your message and not bury it at the end. If you wait until the end to be relevant, then the Attentional System may very well have moved on because it has so much work to do.
That is why headlines are critical in both newspapers and ads.
It also means that the goal should be simplicity and clarity, not creativity.
You are not going to sneak past the Attentional System with a funny or creative ad. It won't work because a funny or creative ad generally won't pass the relevance test. At the most it will generate a laugh but is unlikely to generate a connection with a frequency that is being monitored.
The same rule applies to image ads, weird ads, shocking ads, and ads that are obscure, do not show the product, and do not show what it can do.
The biggest waste is when the people who are actively looking for your product don't receive the message because they don't see it as relevant or applying to their pain. They just ignore the ad.
Third, this explains why concepts like Positioning work so well. They are explicitly designed to deal with the relevance problem. For example, owning a word in the customer's mind simplifies things tremendously and makes it much easier for the customer to perceive a message as relevant. It also explains why David Ogilvy thought that the headline was the most important part of an ad.
Finally, it explains why opt-in e-mail works but Spam does not. An opt-in e-mail list is composed of people who have previously indicated that they are interested in a product or service. That means that a message will be perceived as relevant by the majority of these people. On the other hand, Spam has the same problem as ordinary ads because it does not automatically pass the relevance test.
Copyright © 2001 Chris O'Leary
