Memory Theory and Advertising that Sticks

John Zebell Leave a comment

What were we talking about?

Oh, yes. Memory theory and advertising that sticks.  Yes. Yes.

The topic’s important now because those old purchase models of yesteryear are falling obsolete.  The line isn’t as straight as the awareness, interest, understanding, trial and loyalty diagrams of the past.  In today’s world, it’s a convoluted customer journey that winds through life.  For the marketer, therefore, it’s important the brand be remembered when the time to buy comes.  In short, memorability matters.

So to start, before I forget, let’s cover the memory theory part.

Everyone is challenged with memory from time to time.  Where did I put my phone?  What’s that person’s name?  Was that Samuel Jackson or Lawrence Fishburne in The Matrix?

The big worry with memory is it supposedly gets worse over time, and that’s a scary thought.  So, after my beloved wife accused me of being spacey about important family matters, I took to studying the practice of memory.

The journey itself was, dare I say, unforgettable.  As in:

  • Did you know there is a World Memory Championship held every year where contestants go through incredible feats of memory?   http://www.worldmemorychampionships.com/
  • Did you know former New York Knicks center Jerry Lucas memorized and recited the names of an entire studio audience on a 1970s talk show?
  • Did you know there are currently 151 Grand Master of Memory award winners?  They earned it by memorizing 1,000 random digits in one hour, the order of 10 shuffled decks of cards in another hour and the order of a shuffled 52-card deck in under two minutes.  http://www.world-memory-statistics.com/grandmasters.php

Fascinating stuff, memory is.

The study of memory has helped me immensely and, though I’m by no means a memory expert, I feel great about my personal improvement.

Proven Memory Techniques

The key techniques I’ve put into practice include these fail-safes:

  1. Create visual references, stories
  2. Make associations with familiar places, journeys
  3. Revisit, regurge and repeat
  4. Engage with hands-on involvement

Visual learning is the obvious and easiest to understand.  People remember things they see because we’re programmed that way from prehistoric time. Early man didn’t read his way through life — he saw and experienced things. Complex concepts, such as good and evil, were made into people or animals not just because the words for them didn’t exist, but because people could visualize, understand and remember the stories and then pass them on.  (And if they couldn’t, well, that’s a separate topic that Darwin explored nicely.)

Hence, as if by magic, it works well to remember things by creating visual associations and connecting them in a story.  Even more magical, the odder the story, the more memorable it becomes.

A similar but different memory aid is to associate things with what’s already well known: common places and journeys.  It’s the Method of Loci, which dates back as a study in mnemonics to Greek and Roman times.

The Method of Loci involves creating visual ties with familiar places like your home’s living room layout or journeys like your route to the office.  This is a great technique because it compartmentalizes things nicely and it can expand and expand and expand into whatever level of detail you need.  Once you’ve made the associations, you just have to enter the room or take the drive to recall things.  Method of loci: http://health.howstuffworks.com/human-body/systems/nervous-system/how-to-improve-your-memory7.htm

Next, there is the revisiting and repeating.  Certainly, memory improves on anything the more you go over it. But when you go over the visual associations and the critical information together, it seems to hold the memory tighter, longer and easier.  It’s in the connections in the mind, and it works.

Engaging is the last of the tools. You have to actually try something to learn it. That’s why we have internships.  That’s why sciences are taught in labs.  That’s why music is theory and practice. It’s the practice that sinks in.

Don’t Forget Great Advertising

So what does that have to do with great advertising?  Plenty.

Brand building in general and advertising in particular are about being recognized, remembered and revered.  It’s not surprising one of the fundamental research questions surrounding any brand or ad is about recognition and recall.   Unaided recall: Very good.  Aided recall: Ok.  Never-heard-of-it: Bad.

True, great advertising isn’t all about being memorable, of course. The 2015 Super Bowl ads for Nationwide Insurance were memorable for the wrong reasons and created regrettably negative associations.  Advertisements that cross into the inappropriate, off-target or confusing world of misguided creative may break through and be remembered, but that’s not good brand stewardship, either.

All the same, brand recognition and recall are essential to brand value, and I believe ads need to go beyond breakthrough and beyond blind repetition to be memorable.

Examples to Remember

So let’s connect the four techniques:

Create visual references that tell stories — and the odder the better.  The still photograph, the illustration, the video are what people see and what they remember, way before the clever headline or tag.

Here are a few examples: Absolute vodka transformed everything we see into the shape of the bottle, and it became iconic. Snickers “Brady Bunch” ad brings in tough-guy Machete Kill’s Danny Trejo who morphs into Marsha and Steve Buscemi appearing as Jan. Nobody remembers the line “When you’re hungry you’re not you” but the message and ad aren’t forgotten.

Another campaign of historic proportions is the “Bud” “Wiser” “Er” ads featuring the talking frogs. They connected frogs outside of a swamp bar to a beer. That’s an odd visual story that can’t be disconnected, no matter how hard I try.

Bottom line: Copy driven ads don’t get remembered.  It’s the visual elements that stick.  Focus on the visual first in any concept.

Making associations with familiar places and journeys.  Most advertisements, even the everyday forgettable ones, talk a common language and show common places. That’s not it. What makes the sticky ones stick is how they twist the familiar to create the tie-in.

For All State Insurance, Mayhem walks you through reasonably probable perils of owning a home or a car in common settings.  What makes it memorable is the terror the spokesperson goes through while explaining the insurance.  Now, when you’re thinking of those insurance needs, can you not think of Mayhem and All State.  All State: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErGzrPGJmoY&spfreload=10

Take Bud Light.  There’s the a guy out on the town going to order a drink at the bar is the everyday — right up until the time it explodes into a over-the-top, raucous “Up for Whatever” fantasy.  I’m not a big fan of the campaign (nor am I the target), but I can’t forget it for some reason.  Bud Light: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9A1NowrnGI

Bottom line:  Show the product doing what it commonly does in an arresting, uncommon way.  People will remember that when they are thinking of your category.

Revisiting and repeating.  Frequency can rack up not just gross rating points but also memory cells.  Still, running an add over and over again isn’t the answer.  It gets boring (and expensive).  What really works are revisions or retakes or fresh angles on the original theme.  That’s the repetition that gets noticed and sinks in.

Absolute did it, running the campaign through a whole museum worth of art using its bottle. Snickers kept the brand theme going through a series of interesting, memorable ads that didn’t even look or really sound the same.  All State’s kept with Mayhem, and he seems to survive an ever worsening set of terrors — none of which are covered with cut-rate insurance.

Bottom line:  Play out the concept in as many fresh ways as possible to make it memorable.  People won’t get bored with it, and it will have a long life in their minds.

Engagement.  Just as with every thing, experiences become memories that we recall again and again.  That’s why Brand Engagement is such a hot topic today and the modern call to action goes beyond  “try one today.” Marketers today want prospects to experience the product online, through videos, with customer chats, with content and with samples.  That’s all about earning engagement, which translates into memorability and activity.

Memorable ads of the past had gripping calls to action.  The great “Just Do It” campaign is the obvious example.  The ads themselves weren’t so memorable. They showed everyday people telling their stories of health and exercise. What really made the campaign memorable is that so darn many people actually “did it.”  Millions bought the Nike shoes, joined the work-out subculture and took to practicing the mantra.  That engagement keeps that ad line alive to this day, some 25+ years later.  Nike: http://www.adweek.com/adfreak/happy-25th-birthday-nikes-just-do-it-last-great-advertising-slogan-150947

Also a flash from the past, a great type of engagement comes in a musical form: Jingles.  Remember those?  People sang them. People caught themselves humming them.  Others took them further and created musical parodies that made them stick even further.  The jingle’s not as prevalent as it once was, but for memorability, there were many great ones:  Plop Plop Fizz Fizz (Alka Seltzer); I Wish I Were an Oscar Mayer Wiener; You Deserve a Break Today (McDonald’s), Stuck on Band Aid; I’d Like to Buy the World A Coke.

Bottom line:  Advertising that helps engage the customer in any way, shape or form will help make it memorable.

What to Remember

There are many things that go into a great ad.  Great ads need to have the right target, the right message, the appropriate voice and consistency.  Great ads break through the clutter and have people take notice.  And great ads build sales and brands.

Today’s ads need to work hard.  They need to stick as much as they need to motivate immediate action.  That’s why it’s important to develop ads that connect rationally and emotionally over a longer period of time.

In judging an ad campaign for its memorability, ask how well it exploits these keys to our memory banks:

  1. Does it deliver a strong visual connection?
  2. Does it connect to the familiar in a new way?
  3. Can it be extended, refreshed or revised repeatedly?
  4. Does it engage the target to action?

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