Stop With Why

1. The why question is not necessarily the most important question

After all, people often do things not for a reason. But with a cause. Much of our behavior is subconsciously directed. We often do things out of habit, on intuition, on impulse. We often trust our gut feeling. And rightly so, because various studies show that in hindsight we are more satisfied with decisions we make based on feeling (emotion) than with decisions after careful consideration (ratio)*. Ap Dijksterhuis describes this in his book "the clever unconscious" already at the beginning of this century (in 2007).

*= that greater satisfaction is there especially with "more complex" decisions.

So we are -otherwise said- often rewarded for not thinking. And so we do it again, and again. Is that our underbelly? Is that our fingers? No, it's just in our heads. Our brains are so incredibly smart and fast, we (our conscious mind) often don't even notice it ourselves, we are hardly aware of it. In fact, we often think we've decided something rationally, while that decision has long been made by our subconscious.
So far, for many marketers, not necessarily news. But, knowing that, what do you do with it? Do you know what heuristics exist around your category, your brand? Do you then indeed start thinking about what hooks there are to your brand? Or are you still mainly concerned with the why question? (Which would be quite understandable, by the way, because that's habit, just the way it works with consumers too. Oh well, we're just like people 😉)

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2. The answer may already be there

If a new launch is not going well, the commercial doesn't seem to be doing it, or the number of repeat purchases is lagging, often the first cramp is: get some consumers together: what's wrong? A very understandable burp, and maybe it sounds weird coming from the mouth of a market researcher, but: count to 10 and do the reality check first.

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Often the answer is already there based on logical thinking. Because maybe the numbers just follow a law. Possibly there is no problem, but based on media pressure, share-of-voice and distribution intensity, you shouldn't expect more at all. And revisit whether that commercial is following the golden rules? For example, look again at papers by SWOCC or publications by Binet&Field.

3. What people say is not always what they do

This applies not only to future behavior, but also to past behavior. People are always not good at explaining their own behavior. Asking the why question does not necessarily give the right answer. Even if someone is sincere in their answer, it may not necessarily be right. That makes a researcher's job fascinating and difficult at the same time.

Therefore, we have developed a method where the why question is forbidden. Our goal is to identify the context of the decision/purchase/use and look for the hooks for behavior. For us, it's about the trigger, about the triggers. About what should lead consumers to your brand. Byron Sharp, in his studies, calls these Category Entry Points (CEPs).

In the distant past, we once did that for Cup-a-Soup. That eventually led to the '4-hour moment' concept. We have now taken that approach 'out of the fat' again. We abandoned it for a long time, until 3 years ago. And now this Category Entry Point machine is running at full speed. Both for FMCG and durables, for both consumers and business, for both products and services.

The reason I'm writing this? To give you as a marketer an occasion to think again in a different way about how to give your brand a growth boost!

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