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I'm looking for insights about the importance of emotional vs. rational advertising/marketing when it comes to consumers making decisions about healthcare. Are consumers more likely to consider or choose healthcare brands (specifically oncology practices) that use an emotional appeals rather than rational appeals in their advertising?
Hey there! Thank you for your question on emotional vs. rational advertising in the healthcare market. In short, I could not find much information on emotional vs rational advertising in the healthcare brand market specifically (other than this article on the challenges faced by hospitals). However, there was a substantial amount of research available that could be applied to healthcare marketing and branding. This includes the neuroscientific notion that emotional marketing works best, but only does so in tandem with rational decisions. Additionally, some have argued for the end of thinking of this problem as a binary decision. Please find a deep dive into my findings below.
METHODOLOGY
I refined my search to the date range between Jan 2014 to present day in order to provide the most relevant and up to date research. I was unable to find any deep analysis on healthcare brand, or oncology specific marketing other than this article on hospital marketing. As a result I made the assumption that research on the emotional vs rational argument in advertising as a whole would provide sufficient information for your needs, as the research can be applied to healthcare marketing as a secondary step.
In order to best answer your question, I broke down my findings into three sections: "Rational vs Emotional," "The End of Rational vs Emotional," and "How this Applies to Healthcare." In each section I provided key quotes and references to other articles and books for further reading.
RATIONAL VS EMOTIONAL
"Some studies suggest we care more about rational ads for things we need, like medicine, and are more receptive to emotional ads for things we simply want, like clothes." However, another study shows that "younger consumers prefer emotional ads for "hedonic" products (beer and cologne) and fact-based ads for "utilitarian" products (pain relievers and investment plans), older consumers prefer affective ads for just about everything."
These nuances has led advertisers to assert that the most successful ads have a broad emotional and cognitive appeal. They target aspiration, persuasion, and emotion.
However, this article from Neuromarketing suggests that purely emotional ads work best. Not only do they work best, but emotional ads work work twice as well as ads with purely rational claims (31% to 16%), and purely emotional ads work only slightly more than ads with both a rational and emotional appeal (31% to 26%). Additionally, renowned neuroscientist Antonio Damasio revealed that the absence of emotion actually impedes decision-making. The author of the book Brand Immortality, Hamish Pringle, argues that the split in the appeal of emotional advertising stems from our brain’s ability to process emotional input without cognitive processing, and our brain’s more powerful recording of emotional stimuli. Thus, emotional appeals are recorded more powerfully and prompt us to make decisions accordingly.
Essentially, the research indicates that advertisers must "create a meaningfully different brand tied strongly to a relevant emotional connection" - an emotion that is highly relevant to its customer. However, Douglas Van Praet argues that "When our emotional desires begin to shift toward a prospective brand, we align our reasons to be consistent with that intention. Our critical mind is always looking for evidence to support our beliefs. The stronger the emotion, the stronger the belief, and the greater the tendency is to seek out supporting evidence. We are not rational. We are rationalizers." Thus we can understand that emotion is primary in decision-making. However, a brand that solely relies on emotion is missing the point.
THE END OF RATIONAL VS. EMOTIONAL
"Advertising images that may seek to influence behaviour without a rational evaluation, tend to activate the brain differently than ads that appeal to rational decision-making. The idea that irrational behaviour may be present every day for many people, even among those who ordinarily seem sensible and logical, is getting more and more attention." This attention has led us to the possibility that the answer to the issue of rational vs emotional advertising is not a binary one at all - cognitive science says the argument is pointless. It is misguided to think that thinking and feeling (reason and emotion) are somehow mutually exclusive.
In slight contrast to the idea that "irrational behaviour may be present every day for many people," Douglas Van Praet argues that while decision making is governed by our emotions, brands should still provide people with a logical lifeline. "While we can’t choose our emotions because they originate unconsciously, we can choose our conscious response to our feelings." We align our reasons to be consistent with our emotional response - we shift to evidence that will support our beliefs. "We are not rational. We are rationalisers." This means that you have to think through both steps - consider the emotional impulse and instinct, and then provide a logical step for the customer to take. "If you want people to buy what you’re selling, you have to give them logical permission to buy."
HOW THIS APPLIES TO HEALTHCARE
In the case of hospitals and healthcare brands, I suspect that the same issue applies - "could there possibly be another organisation on the planet whose purpose is more emotional than keeping people alive and healthy for as long as possible?" This highly relevant emotional connection is the red thread that runs through all forms healthcare, and thus presents a unique challenge for creating a distinctive brand identity. Hospitals and healthcare brands are all founded for the same reason, so how do they distinguish themselves?
In this article, Bell compares this challenge to the challenge faced by airlines - they are all started with the same intent in mind (to get people from one point to another), so what makes one brand more attractive than another? It comes down to what that brand chooses to distinguish themselves by, whether it is luxury, excellent service, or no nonsense cheap flights, each airline appeals to a different emotional trigger in the customer base. This distinction is what attracts. Essentially, "If you really want to increase your revenue, invest your innovation and passion into what you’re selling, not just how you’re selling it."
CONCLUSION
To sum up, "while decision making is governed by our emotions, brands should still provide people with a logical lifeline." For healthcare brands, this means they need to differentiate themselves based off of a key element, service or innovation that is unique to them and market that in a way that provides an emotional connection as well as a logical appeal.
I hope you found this information helpful and insightful. Thank you for choosing Wonder! Please let us know if we can help with anything further.