When conducting research, we frequently want to get at people’s emotions.  What excites people?  What gets their attention?  If we know that, we can market much more effectively.

The question is, how can we uncover people’s feelings when they might not even be aware of their emotional reactions themselves?  One way to do this is to utilize projective techniques in focus groups, using metaphors and visuals to go beyond participants’ rational side. 

But there’s a new way to get at emotions more directly: bio-metric research.  Participants wear a lightweight vest that measures galvanic skin response, heart rate, respiration and movement.  Changes in those measures have a direct correlation with emotional involvement. 

The results are quite remarkable.  When testing commercials, we see the exact points when viewers are engaged and when they lose interest, enabling advertisers to create advertising that is much more memorable and effective.  We also use this method with print ads, websites and new product research to uncover people’s “hot buttons” – when they’re most engaged – as well as understanding which elements are unexciting to people.

We find we can gain deep insights by looking at the discrepancies between what research participants say and their emotional reactions.  These discrepancies can be an extremely rich source of insights.  And since the method is fairly new, we’re still discovering new ways in which it can help marketers.  Give us a call at (818) 752-7210 and we can talk about the best ways to understand what makes your customers tick.