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Heidi Brauer (Chief Marketing Officer, Hollard) discusses the Neuroplasticity talk presented by HeyHuman at SXSW (South By South West in Texas)…

One of the key points brought up in the talk was the fact that new technology creates an inability to consume, capture and retain information. Stereotypically, it is said that women are multitaskers and men are not. However, recent studies have shown that no one is, in fact, a multitasker. Brauer explains that, although we believe that new technology is allowing us to do more things at once, we are actually doing less. HeyHuman says that we are not actually multitasking, we are simply continuously switching between tasks – an important distinction. People such as violinists and taxi drivers, for example, (people who require large amounts of concentration in their daily lives) are continually building neural pathways by repeatedly performing a task - therefore strengthening the brain’s abilities to perform. The average individual is not dedicating enough time to concentrating on single tasks and skills as “…our brains are flitting all over the place because we’re multitasking all of the time…”

Getting the attention of the multi-tasking consumer...
When creating an ad for TV, YouTube or any other platform, brands have to work on getting the attention of consumers who are doing multiple things at the same time. Brands have to ask themselves if the consumer is able to focus to get enough from the brand while being exposed to all these different things at once. According to Brauer, consumers are not able to focus in this way. Because of continuous technological input, our brains and memories are suffering from, in the words of the speakers from HeyHuman, a “digital K.O.”. Consumers are used to “outsourcing” their memories - email inboxes become to-do lists and notes on smartphones become reminders. As such the consumer’s ability to recall advertising communication has diminished. Due to cognitive overload, our brains have become like “really messy desktops”.

Less emotionally engaged consumers at a much higher cost...
This means that the cost of getting people’s attention is much higher and consumers are engaging less emotionally. Therefore, brands have to really reconsider the ways in which they get attention. There are many things which can be done, one of them being simply (wait for it creatives…) making the brand logo bigger to help people remember. It’s also important for brands to make their products relevant to consumers. When brands present consumers with products, they should be communicating on a personal level. Brauer ends by quoting the speakers from HeyHuman who said that “...brands must be a calm port of call in a perfect storm of communication”.