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[toggle title='Read the Transcript' state=‘closed’ icons=‘font awesome-plus/font awesome-minus’ margin_top=‘20’ margin_bottom=‘20’]0:00
Welcome to The Thoughtful Entrepreneur Show. I'm Josh Elledge, Founder and CEO of UpMyInfluence.com. We turn entrepreneurs into media celebrities, grow their authority, and help them build partnerships with top influencers. We believe that every person has a unique message that can positively impact the world. Stick around to the end of the show; we'll reveal how you can be our next guest on one of the fastest growing daily inspiration podcasts on the planet in 15 to 20 minutes. Let's go.
Right with us right now. We've got Felix Cao, and Felix, you are the founder of the Happy Buying Brain and you're on the web at HappyBuyingBrain.com. You are an expert at neuro marketing. It's so great to have you on the show. Thank you for having me, Josh. I definitely appreciate them looking to having a excellent conversation with you. So how does Someone get into neural marketing.
1:02
Absolutely. So this is a little background on myself in terms of my journey. So I will just run through a really quick time lapse. So really what it started was about two decades ago. And initially the aspiration was actually more towards the medical field, more particularly optometry. So when you look at the term neuro marketing, the neuro part comes from the neuroscience, which is the study of like the nervous system, primarily the brain. So a lot of that background came from, you know, my educational courses that I took a background lie primarily in biological science and psychology. So, during that time, I was going to school for those, you know, two disciplines there. I also got more involved in terms of the business side of things with more self employment opportunities that revolved around you know, the industries of finance investments and real estate and What I eventually led to was, you know, getting involved in the tech industry. So, you know, that's something that I was there for nearly 10 years during that time. And but what I seen was, it was a perfect transition to near marketing, because right now coming from the tech space, you know, AI and virtual reality are becoming a part of our everyday lives, right. So, you know, like, right now today, what I do see is that we're at the cusp of another tech revolution, when it comes to the mass adoption of artificial intelligence in our lives. Some examples are, you know, the chat bots that you're seeing more often now and also with the voice commands, technology that you see in like, the Siri and the apple, Alexa and Amazon. So neuroscience is actually at the core of a lot of those innovations. And so those insights and research of how the brain works can also be applied to fields that are outside of technology. And that's especially true when it comes to applying neuroscience to Marketing. So what we have today is the massive doctor adopting of AI technology will allow neuroscience and marketing to become popularized, which you see happen when you have concepts associated with trends become familiar eyes. So that's how you have you know, the combination of you know, my educational background that lies in biological sciences and psychology and then you combine that with the, you know, 15 years plus in in the sales and marketing world to come to a route today.
3:31
So you have some crazy valuable skills, that sound they sound pretty compelling, like, you know, I think we all want to know, you know, how can we improve what we're doing and play into psychology of the consumer today. So now it's great that you and I are chatting because from on the consumer side of things, although you know, maybe not, you know, in the necessarily in the sales language side of things, but You know, I've been studying and leading consumer behavior. And I'm wondering if you would share your perspective or your point of view on how consumers have changed over the past, say 510 years?
4:11
Absolutely. So I think we've moved more into what we call emotional marketing. So that's where neuro marketing really comes into play. So I'll describe it kind of near marketing as a high level and then I'll make the segue to in terms of how it has impacted consumer behavior, you know, over the last couple of years, so, you know, just to give you a high level description of neuro marketing, so neuro marketing is this, you know, how the brain body responds to marketing stimuli, right? So we're applying cognitive psychology, evolutionary biology to solving business challenges by taking proven scientific approach to understanding the underlying mechanisms of the decision making process that happens inside the brains of consumers when it comes to buying So once again, you know, a lot of these these reasons that consumers buy, it actually operates at the level below the subconsciousness. But it influences up to 95% of the consumers buying decisions. So the subconscious drivers, what they are, is they're routed to, you know, a lot of a lot of its emotion, right? So being able to connect to the customers on that level is something that's really key right now, especially when there's so many brands out there, like how do you make your brand stand out? Yeah. How do you grab their attention? And then how do you make your brand memorable and a lot of that starts by targeting your core messaging towards the primal brain, which wants information presented in a certain way in order for the persuasive power of your core messaging, let's say in your ads and your website, and district content overall, let's say even your logo, so that, you know it reaches that part of their brain and influences them to choose your product and services as the solution to their pain points over, you know your competitors.
6:03
So if say, for example, well just for example, my influence. Um, so what we do is, you know, we deliver that emotion of significance, right. And so our ideal client and psychographically, what we know is our ideal client is someone that's achieved some success in business, but they're really not getting the recognition that right, maybe they feel like they should be getting and they look at other people, and they're like, I don't get it. Why is this person getting this recognition? And we're not like I, you know, we're way more successful than they are, or I'm way smarter than they are. And so that's the ideal person for us to work with. Because it's, you know, what we do is, you know, being celebrated and seen in the medium is not necessarily, it's not a meritocracy at all. It's really about You know, do you have domain expertise? But are you making yourself available? And are you making that a priority to build your media brand? So that's one thing that we're able to go and very successfully do that for our clients. But so if you're, if you were up my influence, and you kind of knew that, like, right, how would I? How would I leverage that? or How can I What would I do to communicate that?
7:22
Absolutely. So if you go back to the whole premise of neuro marketing, so you know, retargeting the persuasive power of your content, in terms of targeting the primal brain, so the primal brain, you know, subconscious drivers that really influences a consumer to, let's say, buy or choose your brand over another, you know, sort of primal brain the role of it is through to ensure the survival and reproductive success of an individual, and it's guided by you know, certain factors that, that it looks to you in order to achieve and fulfill those Those primary states, so you know, six of those drivers are, you know, you have survival, reproduction. Security status is a huge one. So status is the one that you're looking to really impound on at that moment, right? So in your case, you know, you have the two aspects of social proof and authority. So you're more in the domain of helping your clients build credibility, which is one of the core, let's say, primitive instincts that the primal brain looks to, you know, achieve and fulfill and enhance. So that is one thing that actually since, you know, humans are considered, you know, we're just creatures of our own habits, and we are more of the herd mentality. Yeah. So that's why it plays in terms of so there's one aspect is you have the skills to execute the task, but the other one is how you mentioned how do you Get out there. How do you make yourself known? And how do you establish yourself as an expert and that's where neuro marketing comes into, you know, to help, let's say, companies such as yourself, you know, bring people so that they do become known and they do become celebrity celebrated. So, you know this to give you an exact example, like luxury brands, for example, they're their primary mission is to target to instill feelings of self worth acceptance, and obviously, the high status that's associated with owning their luxury goods, right. So, in your sense, you'd be applying that same of paradigm so that your clients now elevates themselves to that status and that kind of notoriety in terms of the industry to be the go to person. Yeah.
9:51
So Felix, um, in your work now, you you primarily work with small medium sized companies and some larger ones. In terms of reviewing a lot of their messaging, then I would imagine it starts a little bit further back by talking about who is the customer? And what does the customer want? And then you come and say, What does the customer really want? Is that kind of where you when you start working with a client, kind of how the process goes?
10:21
Exactly. So what it does is, you know, we like to obviously hop in a discovery call with them, we'd like to learn more about the business, the goals that they want to achieve, you know, what pain points that they're trying to solve, you know, what are some of the causes of those pain points? And what have you tried to fix it? And more importantly, you know, how would their business look once those pain points have been solved? And there's also a Flipside to that, like, what how would their business also be affected in the opposite way and the consequences that would persist if those you know, those problems continue to, to remain so once we're able to identify, you know, a lot of those different problems that they're having. And also, the root of the problem with the next step is to structure it in terms of strategy calls. So they'll have a strategy call, we look to implement something that's a lot more tactical. And, and also, that's a clear roadmap to, you know, providing, you know, the maximal or optimal solutions to solve those problems using a narrow marketing approach. So, you know, that's our approach. And then, as you mentioned, we dive a lot deeper into that, because what we want what we're finding is, you know, a lot of people are structuring their core messaging. So that speaks primarily to the product through the actual logical part of the brain. But the way that the brain is actually structured is primarily into like three parts. So you have your primal brain, which so information so the main thing to understand is how information physically enters the brain. So a lot of people think as you know, you're talking to another individual is this going from let's say, my logical, my cortex or logical part of the brain to the other person Since logical brain, but that's something that actually does not work that way. So information actually is received through the brainstem, which is the base of the brain. So that's where the primal brain begins at. And what it does is, as I mentioned, it filters information based on, you know, survival needs and reproductive needs, right. So, you know, being able to highlight yourself more in like a safe way, and that's through like your social proof and authority. That's something that the primal brain is really receptive to. And then once you're able to kind of pass through that gate gatekeeper, the private brain actually passes your core messaging onto the logical part of the brain for more of the rational processing that looks at like the facts, the data and so forth. So it's very important to structure your messaging in a way where it's a receptive primal brain, and then it gets passed on to the higher levels of brain processing, which is your cortex and that deals with once again, the logical part In the rational part of the core messaging,
13:03
do you ever get someone who goes, Oh, Felix is just a bunch of hooey gooey, people don't care about that. All they care about are the facts and figures, right? And the numbers are what sell.
13:15
Right? Yeah, we do get that. And that's when we explained to him that it's very important to understand how the brain is structured. So that's why, you know, you have to construct your present your marketing stimuli in a specific way, where now it's actually brain friendly and receptive to how the brain actually likes to receive information. And just to give you an idea of like, the types of companies that are actually using it, that's always the, you know, using companies that are global or, you know, the gold standard in terms of highlighting, you know, authority and social proof at the highest levels. So, you know, I'll provide a couple examples is number one is in 2017, Facebook created their own neuroscience center to study marketing. So
13:58
everybody knows don't think Facebook's not doing Using this Yeah, exactly. Exactly mistaken.
14:02
Yeah, exactly for Facebook, it's probably good enough for you. Mm hmm. And it's not just Facebook too you have you know, large companies like Frito lays, for example. So Frito lays is a chips company owned by Pepsi. So obviously, you know, people drink either Pepsi or coke. So they know that as a major popular brand when it comes to cola. So they used it to when they're looking to, you know, gain greater market share into their female audience. So at that time, the Frito lays chip was actually packaged in like a shiny style of bag. And what they found was when they're actually doing brain studies tests with their female participants, was that their shiny packaging was actually activating a region of the brain that was associated with guilt. So they didn't want to associate their chip brand with the feeling of guilt. So what they did was the redesign their, their packaging, from a shiny package to more of a matte style finish. So that new redesigning of the mat style bags actually reduce the level of activation in that same brain region. So now, you know, the level of guilt associated with the guilt with their brand significant was reduced, but now they were able to create a positive association between their chips bradon to the female audience in terms of, you know, chips being more their chip ground being a viable option as a snack, and that greatly increased their sales. So that's the apple, you know, I can provide one more example. There's actually a lot more quantitative and that's Campbell Soup. So I'm pretty sure you've had Campbell's soup, right. So that's like a, like everybody has had Campbell's Soup. Yeah. So they're looking to increase their sales as well. So this is like probably around 2009 2010. So they changed their soup label and added made it more humanistic. You know, some added some motion to it, put a human face on it. We really want to appeal to the five senses and one of them I see a sense of the nostalgic smell of, you know, homemade soup. So they added, you know Roma vapors on to the soup label and they all my gosh, I know they really want to enhance, you know a lot of those, those those images that really attractive the, like the five human primary primary senses, and they also made their inanimate objects smaller as well. So before they used to have a large mute spoon, so they eliminated actually that spoon on it. And what it did was increase increase their sales by 12% annually. So you look at the number 12. And no, it's not a big deal to most people. But if we were to look at their sales during Yeah, hi, there, we're making annual sales in the seven to 8 billion. So imagine increasing your sales by 12% in that neighborhood. So you're looking at upwards of you know, in the hundreds of millions to potentially in the billion dollar range, simply by making that change based on brain studies and near Mark Kidding. So that
17:00
is that's amazing. So, uh, so I guess what would be some? You know, there's so many questions I want to ask. Yeah. So, like, what would be a great way that if someone were saying, Oh my gosh, like where do I began, like how does someone is considered self analyze their marketing to see if it fits with what their audience's sensitivities are their audience's triggers are?
17:32
Well, that's the thing is like in order to do neuro marketing, you know, you have to have deep understanding of pretty much the brain sciences, right. So, you know, good places to start, as you mentioned, is to join or to join near marketing communities. Also to learn and connect with neuro marketers, you know, one great places on LinkedIn. For example, you know, you could search Felix kale in the search borrow and you know, I'd be more than happy to connect with people on LinkedIn. The second thing is you know, there's also courses available as well. That's a good starting point to, to learn from and you know, there's books and blogs that are out there as well that people could start to to seek an idea and an introduction of you know, some of the concepts of neuro marketing how it can be applied and then from there just to get an idea of how everything works and of course in order to take out the guesswork position still, you know, a lot of things that come with creating a very successful neuro marketing campaign. So, you know, that's the other option is obviously to work with you know, somebody that successful in their marketing and that has helped up other companies you know, boost their conversion rates and you know, change their bring their marketing to the next level. Hmm.
18:55
So Felix when, when somebody when you work with somebody Buddy. I mean, what does that typically? Like? Is it really expensive to work with you? Or like who is a great client and and what kind of budget should they prepare for? Like, I guess, you know, someone's probably listen to our conversation. Oh, man, I work with this guy, but I'm nervous. He's gonna charge me a lot of money.
19:21
Yeah, perfect. That's actually a good question. So, we actually operate according to what we call a sliding scale. So, it, you know, every the size of the company, whether they're small or or a really large company, you know, our information, it carries value based on how they're able to implement it based on the value that they're able to give to their customers and obviously, the size of their customer base as well. So, you know, we're, we, as we mentioned, you know, we're, we work with small businesses medium sized and large businesses and despite operating through a sliding scale model You know, we're able to help businesses, you know, reach their level of success for their marketing, which could be a game changer for them.
20:09
And so, in terms of, I guess, just best practices for if someone wanted to gosh, it's so it's it's, you know, I maybe it's a maybe some books, or any something like that, that you could recommend at least get the ball rolling. Is there anything that you've read that you like? Yeah, it's actually pretty good.
20:33
And so, in terms of, I guess, just best practices for if someone wanted to gosh, it's so it's it's, you know, I maybe it's a maybe some books, or any something like that, that you could recommend at least get the ball rolling. Is there anything that you've read that you like? Yeah, it's actually pretty good.
21:50
show you learn from I mean, there's Robert Giovanni's, for example, Cialdini is one called Dini Yeah. So influence psychology persuasion precisely. Yeah, those are two books that I've read that are both right.
22:03
Yep, exactly. So yeah. Robert Cal Dini is excellent. He's a pioneer in that. Also, Roger Dooley, as well is somebody that's in the neuro marketing world, Martin Lindstrom is, is another one as well. So you know, I can name a bunch of them, but the ones that we just named are? No, some of their books are good. to a good start. Exactly.
22:25
Yeah. And so you do a free strategy call? What what happens on that call? Did you do a hard sell on them?
22:34
That is more just to get to know about their business. So yeah, this mentioned earlier about our discovery call. We just yeah, we want to build that relationship with our clients and the people that we work with, right. So a lot of is this understanding their business? And you know, what goals they have and, you know, what are their problems and really diving into the real reasons of, you know, like, why is their marketing not living up to the expectations and that's How we could start structuring their or crafting the marketing now so that it speaks to the primal part of the brain because that's what we're finding where a lot of the marketing campaigns for businesses fall short, short is it's a failure of understanding, you know, how important or how much influence that primal part of the consumer brain has on their decision making process when it comes to buying?
23:24
Yeah, and Felix, you've had some pretty good success, you have a decent book of business. And what do you do to attract new clients?
23:36
I think it says, you know, being authentic is number one, associating yourself with good people and, and, and as you mentioned, this, go out there sharing tremendous amount of value and showing how you could help them get to them to where they want to want to go.
23:53
Yeah, excellent. All right, well, Felix Cao just like the boxing K.O. your friends At HappyBuyingBrain.com aside from the free call, or anything, like any kind of content that you've created, or any other things that that you would have someone take a look at.
24:11
Absolutely. So one of the main goals in 2020 is to raise the awareness of neuro marketing and how it can be, you know, the practical implication or applications of that is, you know, can be game changing in terms of the marketing results. And that includes, you know, businesses that are small, medium all the way through to large sized businesses. So, as you mentioned, you know, one of the ways to learn is to, to, to what one of the ways is to I have a blog on HappyBuyingBrain.com. So you know, anyone who's interested in learning more about neuro marketing, feel free to subscribe. Also, also, the book that we'll be releasing as well in the you know, in the coming months will be a good way to get introduced to the concepts of near marketing and how it could impact you know, brown growth and marketing success. Yeah, and also courses as well. So that's something that I'm also in the process of, of, of creating as well. And that'll be coming out in the coming months.
25:10
Yeah, I mean, I should point out that your blog articles are actually pretty in depth. I mean, they there's some really good content here. So if you want to learn more about neural marketing, just go to HappyBuyingBrain.com click on blog and, and Felix, you've put together a pretty good library, some fairly epic articles around different aspects of neuro marketing. How is your business losing if you're not using neural marketing? What language does the primal brain understand when buying and and more so he talked about Black Friday? Yeah. Oh, a lot of neuro marketing going on Black Friday.
25:48
I think that's the pinnacle of neuro marketing when it comes to that day, so Oh, yeah. So yeah, a lot of blog posts as they do go really in depth and that's to give our readers a really good grasp and turn have, you know the power of implementing their marketing into their own marketing campaign? Right.
26:05
All right, Felix, co founder of the happy buying brain on the web on the web at HappyBuyingBrain.com. Thanks so much for joining us.
26:12
Thank you, Josh. I definitely appreciate it was fun.
Thanks for listening to The Thoughtful Entrepreneur show. If you are a thoughtful business owner or professional who would like to be on this daily program, please visit UpMyInfluence.com slash guest. Now if you got something out of this interview would you share this episode on social media? Just do a quick screenshot with your phone and text it to a friend or post it on the socials. If you do that, tag us with the hashtag UpMyInfluence. Each month, we scour Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram. We pick one winner from each platform, and you get crowned king or queen of that social media. What do you win? We're going to promote you and your business to over 120,000 social media fans totally free. Now, can you also hook us up now in your podcast player right now? Please give us a thumbs up or a rating and review. We promise to read it all and take action. We believe that every person has a message that can positively impact the world. Your feedback helps us fulfill that mission. And while you're at it, hit that subscribe button. You know why? Tomorrow, that's right, seven days a week, you are going to be inspired and motivated to succeed 15 minutes a day. My name is Josh Elledge. Let's connect on the socials. You'll find all the stuff we're doing UpMyInfluence.com. Thanks for listening and thank you for being a part of The Thoughtful Entrepreneur movement.
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