Top line. Science shows people don’t buy products. They buy versions of themselves. Identity — not logic — drives the vast majority of decisions. When brands speak to who people are (and who they want to be), they bypass reason and plug straight into the subconscious engine that really sells. Erol Demir could have bought […]
Better vision doesn’t sell. A better image does. Read More →
Top line. Science says the odds of making good choices now for your future self are slim. Why? The brain sees its future self as a stranger. Behavioural science exposes this flaw—and shows how to use anticipated regret to bridge the gap, trigger emotion, and drive smarter, lasting decisions. At 37, I was asked to
The best way to look forward is backward Read More →
Top line. Despite clear neuroscientific proof that emotion—not reason—drives decisions, most brands still aim messages at the rational mind. And continue to fail. The Elliot case proved that without emotion, the brain can’t choose or react. Read to discover how to strategically leverage the brain’s emotional system for a neural edge over rivals. Before surgery, Elliot*
What Elliot should have taught brands about emotion. But hasn’t. Read More →
Top line: Most execs dismiss storytelling as fluff. But the Significant Object experiment proves otherwise: attaching a story to worthless items raised their value by over 6100%. This article unpacks how emotion, narrative, and meaning fuel buying behaviour—and why story may be your brand’s most underused profit lever. Many business execs write off storytelling as
What is a story really worth? Read More →
Top line. Images don’t decorate your message—they direct it. The brain relies more on visuals than any other sense to frame meaning and trigger decisions. A simple image swap on a diet website lifted conversions by 52%. Read on to learn why visuals steer the subconscious—and how to use them strategically. Why visuals help the
Pictures paint a thousand words Read More →
A young man, feeling nostalgic after a night at the pub, began drafting a WhatsApp message to his ex. Changing his mind, he deleted the message, But in the dim of the light, he missed a single full stop. And inadvertently sent it. There were consequences.
When a full stop ends more than a sentence Read More →
In 2017, an Australian ad campaign to persuade consumers to reduce plastic straw consumption crashed and burned. The campaign didn’t fail because Australians aren’t bothered about the 8 million tonnes of non-biodegradable plastic that gets dumped into the world’s oceans every year. It bombed because the human subconscious mind cares about its autonomy more. When
Why questions work better than answers Read More →