Pub background chatter can teach us an important lesson about ads
The Choice Factory author Richard Shotton explains how the cocktail party effect can have a profound effect on how we think about advertising.
It’s Friday afternoon, you work in advertising, so you’re enjoying a lukewarm pint in your crowded local pub. Oblivious to the background chatter, you listen to your colleague’s latest preposterous anecdote.
Then your ears perk up: faintly from across the room, you’re sure you heard your name. Sound familiar? It’s an example of what psychologists call the ‘cocktail party effect’, and it has important marketing implications.
Just under 90% of the n=250 ‘regionally tailored’ participants respondents did NOT think that the tariff was great value, while 96% of the n=250 ‘national’ participants did NOT think that was great value.
In essence nine out of ten, no matter where they lived, thought that the tariff was great value. When you are on the extreme left or extreme right of the normal distribution curve it is a statistical vanity to compare such small numbers to draw such definitive results.