At the same time it is worth to remember that there is a major risk in using this strategy for well known brands in general and the Coca Cola brand in particular. Using “subliminal advertising” as a joke or in a phony way may be a powerful strategy for unknown brands since you will attract curious journalists and bloggers who will willingly write about the phenomena etc. To gain the right effect you have to “leak” the story in one way or the other, preferably to a journalist. Related paper: Attentional Load Modulates Responses of Human Primary Visual Cortex to Invisible Stimuli.Įvery now and then (not often but it happens) I bump into art directors and PR agents who are intentionally using amusing versions of the Coke & Popcorn hoax in their own marketing in order to get extra attention to their messages. Nevertheless, understanding how the brain handles subliminal messages will be of interest not only to neuromarketing devotees but the broader group of psychologists, neuroscientists, and marketers. It’s hard to imagine regulatory bodies viewing insertion of subliminal messages as acceptable. Certainly, it would be interesting to better understand the impact of these messages – would people actually act on a message to “Buy Coke”, for example? To some degree, this is of mostly academic interest. Still, it’s exciting to see proof that truly subliminal messages are processed by the brain. And anyone who has read Malcom Gladwell’s Blink knows that the unconscious mind takes in a whole lot more than one might expect. Our past posts on priming, for example, show the impact of information that is assimilated unconsciously. In one sense, this isn’t a huge surprise. See similar content at Subliminal advertising leaves its mark on the brain.) (From Subliminal messages ‘impact on brain’ – original linked page gone. “We show that there is a brain response in the primary visual cortex to subliminal images that attract our attention without us having the impression of having seen anything. “What’s interesting here is that your brain does log things that you aren’t even aware of and can’t ever become aware of,” Bahador Bahrami from the UCL said. The findings challenge previous scientific assumptions that consciousness and attention go hand-in-hand. Scientists at the University College London (UCL) have found the first physiological evidence that invisible subliminal images do attract the brain’s attention on a subconscious level. Exciting new research shows that subliminal messages do reach the brain, although their impact on behavior has yet to be demonstrated.

Does subliminal messaging work