Does that brand make you happy, sad or angry?

How your favorite brands are so close to your heart?

“Yeah, this investment is worth it.” – Something you’d hear your colleague or friend say, beaming at their new Nike kicks or a cool new watch. However, what made them buy their products? Are they aware that there are plenty of similar products, if not better, present in the market? To sum it all up, there’s just one word – emotion.  

To understand how brands work in tricking you to buy their product, you need to delve deeper into the world of psychology and advertising. Building a brand is a process similar to making a new friend. You start off slow, taking in every single aspect of theirs.

First, you’re a little skeptical about trusting them, but over time, you realize that they appeal to you and understand you. Converting that emotional bond to a purchase is the only thing that differentiates the two.

Taking three core emotions – Happiness, Sadness, Fear and manipulating them to achieve the coveted “trust factor” from customers is the end game of every single marketer and advertising professional. However, excluding the fact that the product in itself needs to be a winner, marketing and positioning the product from an emotional aspect is very important.

Paper Boat – Rowing in nostalgia:

Take for example, the Indian beverage brand, Paper Boat. The relatively new brand has sailed ahead in terms of market share owing to a brilliant marketing strategy. They have managed to evoke a feeling of nostalgia amongst their core audience – between the ages of 20 to 40, most of whom come under the “millenials” tag.

Looking at the way they have played on one of the most powerful aspects of humanity – memories. They have managed to tap into a part of the brain of Indian consumers that evokes strong memories of the summer, childhood and a time that passed them by. This in addition to dabbling in beverages that have mostly non-branded competition and this has made them stand out in today’s world of money spending, adrenaline filled beverage field.

Each product of theirs is carefully packaged and priced. Healthy and light, these products are also considered diabetic friendly.  What perfect place to promote themselves than in the diabetes capital of the country – India.

Other brands using emotion as a tool:

Similarly, plenty of other brands have leveraged emotion to get customers to sit up and take notice. Bankbazaar, a bank aggregator site, encouraged young people to #PlayTheirPart in their own weddings and contribute little. This was clubbed with a statistic that nearly one-fifth of all Indian parents spend their life savings on their children’s weddings.

The campaign got them immense traction, with close to 1.2 million views on social media and many others lauding the thought behind it.

Brands that are able to leverage a certain part of you and help you feel something for them are the ones that win. This is a tactic that is evolving with changing times, but the manner in which they approach it has remained consistent over time.

Name some your favorite brands that managed to incite strong feelings in you. Do share your story.