Marketing Psychology

Today we think statistics are the enemy, numbers used to mislead and confuse us. That’s a mistake, Tim Harford says in The Data Detective. We shouldn’t be suspicious of statistics - we need to understand what they mean and how they can improve our lives: they are, at heart, human behavior seen through the prism of numbers and are often “the only way of grasping much of what is going on around us”.

If the consumer economy had a sex, it would be female. If the business world had a sex, it would be male. And therein lies the pickle. Women are the engine of the global economy, driving nearly 80 percent of consumer household spending in the United States alone. They hold the purse strings, and when they've got a tight grip on them as they do now, companies must be shrewder than ever to win them over.

Gravity affects every aspect of our physical being, but there’s a psychological force just as powerful - yet almost nobody has heard of it. It’s responsible for bringing groups of people together and pulling them apart, making certain goals attractive to some and not to others, and fueling cycles of anxiety and conflict. In Wanting, Luke Burgis draws on the work of French polymath René Girard to bring this hidden force to light and reveals how it shapes our lives and societies.

The Age of Persuasion is for those who say "advertising doesn't work on me" as well as those who want to understand how this industry has become inseparable from modern culture. Using their popular CBC Radio series as a starting point, Terry O'Reilly and Mike Tennant tell the fascinating story of how modern marketing came of age - from the early players to the Mad Men of the 1960s and beyond.

Customers everywhere describe their interactions with companies in a deeply personal way: We hate our banks, love our smartphones, and think the cable company is out to get us. What is actually going through our brains when we make these judgments? Customer loyalty expert Chris Malone and top social psychologist Susan Fiske have discovered that our perceptions arise from spontaneous judgments on warmth and competence, the same two factors that also determine our impressions of people.

The tipping point is that magic moment when an idea, trend, or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire. Just as a single sick person can start an epidemic of the flu, so too can a small but precisely targeted push cause a fashion trend, the popularity of a new product, or a drop in the crime rate. This widely acclaimed bestseller, in which Malcolm Gladwell explores and brilliantly illuminates the tipping point phenomenon, is already changing the way people throughout the world think about selling products and disseminating ideas.

In Made to Stick, Chip and Dan Heath reveal the anatomy of ideas that stick and explain ways to make ideas stickier, such as applying the human scale principle, using the Velcro Theory of Memory, and creating curiosity gaps. Along the way, we discover that sticky messages of all kinds—from the infamous “kidney theft ring” hoax to a coach’s lessons on sportsmanship to a vision for a new product at Sony—draw their power from the same six traits.

There used to be two teams in every workplace: management and labor. Now there’s a third team, the linchpins. These people invent, lead (regardless of title), connect others, make things happen, and create order out of chaos. They figure out what to do when there’s no rule book. They delight and challenge their customers and peers. They love their work, pour their best selves into it, and turn each day into a kind of art.

Spread through the public in the form of popular stories, ideas can go viral and move markets - whether it's the belief that tech stocks can only go up or that housing prices never fall. Whether true or false, stories like these - transmitted by word of mouth, by the news media, and increasingly by social media - drive the economy by driving our decisions about how and where to invest, how much to spend and save, and more. But despite the obvious importance of such stories, most economists have paid little attention to them. Narrative Economics sets out to change that.

Whether you are in advertising, marketing, management, on sales, or just curious about how to be more influential in everyday life, Yes! shows how making small, scientifically proven changes to your approach can have a dramatic effect on your persuasive powers.

Fact: Your brain is being controlled - and you don't even know it. Because if you think the ads you're seeing today are just pretty pictures with nice, creative copy, you're mistaken. Truth is, you are being powerfully influenced by dozens of proven scientific principles of advertising psychology...little-known techniques of consumer persuasion that go completely unnoticed by the buying public.

Another extraordinary business fable from the New York Times best-selling author Patrick Lencioni. This new book in the popular Lencioni series shows what it takes to gain a real and lasting competitive edge.

Behavior change is hard, but O’Mara shows that by adopting strategies that are well-founded in the science of brain and behavior, individuals and organizations can adapt to the demands of the modern world.

One of the biggest myths that plagues the business world today is that our ability to network depends on having the “gift-of-gab”. You don’t have to be outgoing to be successful at networking. You don’t have to become a relentless self-promoter. In fact, you don’t have to act like an extrovert at all. Matthew Pollard, an introvert himself, draws on over a decade of research and real-world examples to provide an actionable blueprint for introverted networking.

People don’t make decisions with their conscious mind, but on instinct. In The Power of Instinct, marketing consultant and behavioral science expert Leslie Zane shows that to grow a brand, business, or even a social movement, traditional persuasion tactics fall short. Instead, you must connect to the instinctive mind. And to do this, you need to understand the science of consumer choice and employ techniques that work with a person’s brain, not against it.

In For the Culture, Marcus Collins argues that true cultural engagement is the most powerful vehicle for influencing behavior. If you want to get people to move, you must first understand the underlying cultural forces that make them tick. Collins uses stories from his own work as an award-winning marketer—from spearheading digital strategy for Beyoncé, to working on Apple and Nike collaborations, to the successful launch of the Brooklyn Nets NBA team—to break down the ways in which culture influences behavior and how listeners can do the same

How can we create and market creative works that achieve longevity? Holiday explores this mystery by drawing on his extensive experience working with businesses and creators such as Google, American Apparel, and the author John Grisham as well as his interviews with the minds behind some of the greatest perennial sellers of our time.

Do you want to overcome stress? Do you want to learn to assert yourself? Do you want to be understood? Do you want to understand other people? These are just some of the concerns that developing your emotional intelligence will address. Having a high intelligence quotient may not be enough to achieve success. Psychologists say that emotional intelligence affects performance. It has a huge impact on your professional success.

Why are people named Kim, Kelly, and Ken more likely to donate to Hurricane Katrina victims than to Hurricane Rita victims? Are you really more likely to solve puzzles if you watch a light bulb illuminate? How did installing blue lights along a Japanese railway line halt rising crime and suicide rates? Can decorating your walls with the right artwork make you more honest? The human brain is fantastically complex, having engineered space travel and liberated nuclear energy, so it's no wonder that we resist the idea that we're deeply influenced by our surroundings.

Why do managers usually fail when it comes to motivating employees, in particular salespeople? What should they do instead? In answering those questions, author Mike Crandall recommends many innovative strategies inspired by the work of David Sandler, creator of the Sandler Selling System. To get the most from your organization, you need to understand why people show up for work and tie that reason to your company's mission. Crandall's book is about motivating yourself, your team, and your company at optimum levels.