Is real behaviour change beyond the remit of marketing?
In this guest post Amelia Moulis argues marketers should be pushing companies to look at their structures to make customer behaviour change more effective.
When you are trying to change patterns of behaviour, should you be trying to change the culture and attitudes that can warrant behaviours, or trying to change the structures of design that can instruct behaviours?
This question came to me while I was facilitating a workshop recently, challenged with improving mental health outcomes for specific groups of people. It was a complex challenge and it raised complex questions about the role of marketing and communications in changing behaviour.
You don’t have to be Einstein to appreciate that behaviour is influenced by a mosaic of visible and invisible forces. Is it nature or nurture? Head or heart? Peer pressure or independent will?
At a base level, as communications professionals, we want to influence a person to ‘do something’ through ‘thinking something’. It is Inception in action, and we always strive to make it as easy as possible for that person to adopt the particular behaviour or way of thinking that we want to achieve.
Interesting read. One of my lecturers in psychology was discussing shock tactics to elicit behaviour change; their essential premise was that shock tactics don’t work – which I found quite interesting because I could point to various examples (Grim Reaper, TAC) where shock tactics had an effect, albeit also needing a multi-pronged approach for deeper efficacy.
It’s worth getting a hold of ‘The Power of Habit’ by Charles Duhigg because he makes a strong case for the window of opportunity for behavioural change being its strongest at certain points in our life continuum. I think establishing structures broadens the net, but the real desire for change comes from within.
Having said that, it’s difficult to separate the rational from the emotional. You could rationally explain the benefits of gun control to a libertarian, but you would rarely induce behavioural change.
Say what?