Remember less, search more
In this guest column, Brad Bennett reveals that as technology evolves we are remembering less and searching more, creating a powerful opportunity for brands.
Your favourite trend-spotter probably recently returned from SXSW. She rightfully calls this the year of…. ‘VR’ or ‘social messaging’ or ‘the IoT’ (again) or ‘location-based apps’.
All of these technologies present amazing creative opportunities for brands. But harnessing new technologies – or for that matter anything ‘digital’ – is not just about learning new production techniques.
Technology is literally changing our brain chemistry. It’s changing the way we think. This presents an opportunity for those advertisers who learn to communicate differently fundamentally.
A growing body of research shows that children are losing the ability to read emotions as they trade-in person time for screen time. It shows that technology is causing shorter attention spans, poorer impulse controls and an increased addiction to novelty.
At the same time research shows that our IQs are increasing and that children born today “are better at tool use”.
Some changes are good, some bad.
Amongst all of these fascinating changes taking place between our ears, there are two points that are of particular relevance to advertisers.
First, the act of searching is increasingly central to how people engage with the world around them. Our brains can’t physically cope with the deluge of information. So, “we have become particularly adept at pushing much of our thinking outside of our skulls and off-loading it on to the world around us.
We have engineered information rich informational environments that actually help us think better.”
Some advertisers see this change and have responded with “always on” messaging. This is good, but often misses the point. Brands must do more than deliver an optimised message every day. Truly taking advantage of this change involves being useful in a complex information landscape. It means measuring and reacting to intent.
And this leads to the second relevant point: the information rich environments we create become extensions of our identities.
The idea of ‘prosthetic memory’ has been around for a while. But insofar as our identities are defined by our memory we are increasingly dependent on our smartphones and server farms for our sense of self. Users reward those brands that respect their mental space.
So, as we incorporate the emerging tech from SXSW into our plans, remember the opportunity extends beyond using new tech for cut through.
Traditional brand communications are losing their effectiveness on a biological level. Brands must take advantage of our changing brain chemistry and behaviour by designing communication ecosystems that are mobile-first, findable, quick, useful and measured.
Brad Bennett is the head of technology at The Hallway
Really nice piece. The ‘plasticity’ of our perception had come a long way since people would run out of the tent thinking the train projected on the white sheet in front of them was going to run over them. I think the communication ecosystem needs to be as you described, but the responsibility of the brand comm will also entail finding ways to intervene and capture attention outside of this ecosystem.
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There’s a reason new media and technologies are adopted. The amount of information and knowledge available is increasing exponentially; human cognitive power is not (nor are days getting longer). It’s a popular idea, but incorrect. Technology is not altering brain chemistry (at least not any more than it has always done – every time we learn a thing or a skill, the ‘wiring’ of the brain changes). The most successful web tools and tech are the one’s that are most adapted to the way humans think, not the other way around.
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@Eaon. I’m not sure how you’ve come to the conclusion that Brad is asserting in any way that human cognitive power is increasing exponentially, nor have I read of this ‘popular idea’ in any academic or populists texts.
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@antony g
Sorry, bad grammar on my behalf.
I meant that the notion of digital technology rewiring brains – as some kind of unique phenomenon – is the popular idea.
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@Eaon. The IQ test is a subjective measure, standardised to conform to a normal distribution curve with the mean IQ being set at 100. If you consider the work of James Flynn, then you would believe that relative IQ scores have risen 1/3 point per year since 1932. Studies have found the greatest gains amongst households with college-educated mothers in financially well-off families. The Flynn effect is said to be a result of environmental influences; i.e. improved education, health and exposure to technological innovation.
So it would appear that maybe IQ levels are increasing over time, and it may well be possible that this rate of increase has accelerated of late.
Bear in mind, IQ is a measure of a specific set of reasoning capabilities, memory tests and response times. In some realms, its validity is being replaced by Emotional Intelligence, EQ. Though also a subjective measure, one component of this may be considered a person’s empathetic response to others; i.e. their ability to read emotions in others as Brad had phrased it.
It’s impossible to make a definitive statement about this, but given the brain’s plasticity in response to localised and outside influences, the possibility that it is being rewired at a greater rate given the greater influx of information, and the nature of the information interfaces, seems entirely plausible.
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