Think of two ad campaigns. One is very informative: It tells you about the product, how it works, and where you can buy it. The other is a narrative: It’s filled with colour, music and emotions. Which one is more impressive?

The one that made you laugh or cry. Am I right?

In today’s highly busy, extremely noisy and oversaturated market emotional marketing is a way to connect and stand out.

Emotional marketing creates a persuasive message as it affects the viewer’s own emotional state, which creates a deeper connection. This turns into a bigger chance of being noticed, remembered, shared and bought.

As Maya Angelou is often quoted for saying “People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

We have seen some of the most successful ad campaigns solely tell a story and create emotion with almost no information or just a vague relation to their product. But sales increased because the viewers felt something, they were moved and this motivated them to share it, like it and buy it.

Humans are emotional. Even when we are trying not to be. It’s simply our nature. In fact it’s fair to say there is an emotion behind every single action.

By harnessing the power of emotion in your marketing you may inspire people to act. In fact some studies show that we rely on our gut feelings for the act to purchase more than information. 

Psychology Today reported that “functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) shows that when evaluating brands, consumers primarily use emotions (personal feelings and experiences), rather than information (brand attributes, features, and facts).”

To create an impact you must focus on a singular emotion and then weave it into all aspects of your marketing. The four main emotions are happy, sad, fear/surprise, anger/disgust.

But emotion is a spectrum and getting down to a singular emotion can be tricky. 

I like to use Robert Plutchik’s “Wheel of Emotion”

Choosing the correct emotion to elicit is all down to your audience. As everything in marketing always starts with your target audience. I recommend researching in depth to find out how they really feel and what it is that they need.

Once you understand what emotion you are trying to elicit follow these techniques to weave the emotion into your marketing.

Colour 

Another extremely powerful factor is colour. We all know about colour psychology and I have touched on it in the brand colour blog post. 

Narrative 

Tell a story. Use the story technique to relate to your audience. Is your target audience for mothers? How do they feel? Do you want to evoke a feeling of pride for their role in raising their children? What story can you tell that will evoke that?

Inspire

Building a brand that inspires others creates hope and encourages dreams. 

Community 

Using emotional marketing to create a community around your brand triggers a few aspects in the human psyche, the bandwagon effect, and this creates an interest in what the crowd is doing. It also builds feelings of camaraderie, acceptance and excitement, which all add up to brand loyalty. However, if you want a real community, and you do, you have to wait for your audience to start forming by themselves, outside of your company. This is the sign. Once you have signs of a budding community you may control the narrative but always remember your community is about the community, not you. 

Use emotion to engage with your target audience on a level that they understand and know. You will be memorable and ultimately more successful by creating a deeper connection with your audience.