Why do we buy? Do we do it because of the real effects that the product in question has on our lives or do we also get carried away by what we think that product can do for us? The truth is that purchasing decisions are not completely rational (as different studies have shown) and are marked by many variables that are far beyond our conscious mind. One of those issues that modify how we buy (and especially how we feel about what we buy) is what is known as the ‘placebo effect of marketing’, an element that works completely at a subconscious level and that falls within the masterstrokes to understand how the mind of the consumer works that neuromarketing has demonstrated and understood. What exactly is the placebo effect? The truth is that the explanation of what a placebo is clearly shows what it is in the field of marketing Australia Mobile Database. A placebo is something that is not really anything but that we are told that it is a medicine (and sometimes it has a direct effect on our health and makes us feel better, thanks only to the idea that we are taking something that makes us feel better). In marketing the placebo effect also works at a level of what we think it is and what it really is.
When we buy, our brain has internalized certain rules. Expensive things seem better to us and therefore when we pay more for something we feel that we are buying something better or of higher quality. The consumer feels that they are making a better investment, a much higher and higher quality purchase. Such is the effect that price has on our subconscious on the quality and effects of products, which can modify, as neuromarketing studies have shown, even how we perceive the effect of pain relievers. If they are cheap, we feel that they relieve us less (although in reality the medicine is the same). According to a study by the French business school INSEAD, the amount of gray matter and the areas of the brain that are activated while consuming are different and therefore make some consumers more or less prone to being carried away by this effect. This is how our brain responds to placebo But how does the brain really work in the face of this reality? Studies have tried different realities and tests to test whether or not we respond differently to the same products in terms of price.
The most famous of the analyzes is the one that pitted consumers against five different wines (or so they were told) ranging from $ 5 to $ 90 a bottle. In reality, there were only two wines (although they were within the same price range). Consumers (who were unaware) noted that the more expensive wines tasted better. While they drank the brain was responding to the stimuli it was receiving. While they drank the wines they thought were expensive Brother Cell Phone List, the parts associated with the reward were activated in their brain. Expensive wine was therefore associated with the idea of receiving a reward. But the placebo effect not only worked at that level, it also had among ‘its victims’ those consumers who had more developed the prefrontal cortex, which is what is used to make decisions and mark social behavior. Those who were less influenced by the placebo effect were those who had more developed the area of sensory processing. They were more carried away by their own sensations and if they perceived that the wine was good they did not care if it cost less.
We not only decide the purchase, the perception of effects also changes This is not the only experiment in which reality and what is said works as an element that modifies consumption patterns. In fact, a study by an MIT professor started from the same idea that parents have been applying for decades to trick their children when it comes to eating (that of hiding the ingredients on a plate and seeing the child lick with pleasure before a meal made with what in theory he does not like) but to the creation of products. The expert asked consumers to rate two beers, which were actually the same with the point that they had added a touch of balsamic vinegar to one. Interestingly, when it was just a question of drinking and scoring the beer with vinegar, he got better positions. As soon as the consumer faced the test knowing that that beer had vinegar, the consumers directly hated it. Also, the placebo effect doesn’t just work in product choice. It also changes how the consumer perceives its effects and qualities. An experiment on products, price and perceptions proves this. The experts subjected the sample participants to a knowledge test after drinking an energy drink. The drink was the same for all participants, but some were given a discounted drink and others were not. Those who drank it at a lower price had worse results. His brain sensed that he had been less energized.
