Neuromarketing Paperback – International Edition, October 14, 2007

The authors tell us that most people buy from what they call their old brain. In short, the old brain is man's ancient way of thinking from the beginning of time --- the fight for survival. The authors argue that we make our buying decisions from this brain.So, if this is so, the way we sell must talk to that brain and not the logical brain or the brain we think is used to make decisions.I think that most people in advertising and marketing have known this but may not call it "the old brain."However, I found the book full of useful ideas that will help me write more effective sales messages. After all, if we can find the prospect's pain, we can address it and show the prospect how we have the solution. It's basically that simple.The book is mostly common sense marketing. But the slant is new and some of what we read is rather revolutionary.Some people say that neuromarketing could be used to manipulativepeople. Perhaps. But doesn't all advertising manipulate people, or attempt to do so?In neuromarketing, we learn that fear is the most basic and primal motivator. We make many --- perhaps most --- of our decisions based on fear. For example, IBM used fear in it's advertising to the point where we heard, "No one was ever fired for buying IBM." In other words, fear of losing our job caused us to "safely" buy Big Blue --- even if another solution might have actually been better.I find in the copywriting I do for my clients that using fear in the sales messages I write for them is very effective. No one is immune from fear. We don't all crave the same things. But we all have fears. And fear motivates. Researchers, for example, have demonstrated that we react faster to observing fearful faces than we do in seeing happy faces (Emotion, 2007).Which motivates you more? The message that you could earn more money or the fear of becoming homeless? The former matters. The latter is a hard-hitting motivator that works on our primitive emotions or, as the authors call it, the old brain.This is an excellent book. It's fast paced and well written. The authors believe that short sales messages work best. They also believe that people recall what's at the beginning and the very end of the message. I like that. It's always worked for me and it will work for you.Highly recommended.

Simply awesome! Every Product Marketing professional must read this book. This book really breaks it down to the basics. So refreshing!We often hear people say 'keep it simple stupid' and 'understand the right and left brains' (as if that really matters!). This book provides proven insights that really matter.I particularly found the new way to dissect the brain into three parts and the section on how the brain really works quite intriguing as well as applicable to consumer marketing to analyze and influence the well-informed customer of today.- Avinash (Avi) Jhangianiblog: h[...]

In keeping with what they counsel, the authors make a stark statment: this is the only book that marries the latest in cognitive research with sales techniques. Now that's an effective approach. Why? Because our brains were wired 10,000 years ago to survive by seeking out the simple and direct and it still does. So, use the power of contrast; have a powerful start and a powerful close(the "old brain" as they call it nods off in the middle); focus not on white noise that is filler but on what you have that will help the prospect( just used this in responding to an RFP by cutting the clutter of my company's history and bullet pointing the three things we have that will be assets(oh, they say to limit it to three, it is easier for the Old Brain to absorb things in threes). Book is short, with easy to read font and spacing.

I have read a few books on pitching and selling ideas and this one seems to explain things in the most concise and useful way possible. The book wastes no time in getting straight to the heart of the topic and gives many useful techniques for communicating your ideas to people in a way that really makes in impact. I highly recommend it.

The content of the book showed me that I absolutely knew nothing about the art of sales and marketing. Thank you for sharing such game changing nuggets of information.