Affiliate marketing is incredibly competitive, and getting an edge of any sort can be daunting. One way you can gain an edge is by understanding user behavior. This is where something called neuromarketing comes into play. It works by combining science and marketing to better understand users and what drives their purchasing decisions.
All of this sounds like it's incredibly complicated. In reality, it can be boiled down to a few basic tips that will already help you with 80% of the things. The remaining 20% is what only the pros strive for, and with some of the information here today, you can tap into that as well!
But first, let's start with the basics. What even is neuromarketing?
Understanding Neuromarketing
In scientific terms, neurmarketing involves studying consumers' sensorimotor, cognitive, and affective responses to marketing. This all translates into simple terms, “it tries to understand how and why people respond to types of marketing.
In even simple terms, it figures out why people buy stuff. As you can guess, this can be quite important for affiliate marketing, as getting people to buy is what the job is all about. Since affiliates are not scientists, instead of putting people in MRI machines and analyzing what their brain patterns look like when looking at ads, we just track KPIs and make the best guess we can.
With the right approach, you can learn everything you need to know about your audience and what their interests are. With that knowledge, you can make more effective and engaging marketing campaigns, and get more satisfied customers and higher profit margins! Win-win all around!
How To Use Neuromarketing For Your Campaigns?
So now that you know what neuromarketing is, let's see how you can use it to improve your campaigns right away!
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Emotional Connection
Most of the biggest companies of today, like Apple, have realized that product specs and features don't sell, emotions do. You can see it in all of their ads, and like it or not, it works!
People often buy based on emotions and justify their decisions afterward. This is where affiliates can tap into to get the best results. As an example, if you promote some supplements, you can use the angle of personal stories of people feeling energetic, healthy, and confident. If possible, even show how it changed their life and how now their biggest issues are solved, with just one product.
When using these stories, they need to be genuine. While fake stories are easier to control and make a narrative, people will realize its fake, and it will hurt your reputation.
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Scarcity and Urgency
Fear of missing out or FOMO is a tried and tested way to get more people clicking on your things. When people think something is available in limited quantity or time, they tend to try and buy that thing so that they don't miss out.
While FOMO is quite powerful, if you overuse it, your audience will become immune to it. We all know at least a few online stores that always have “limited” discounts that last forever. When going for this, make sure you have something interesting for your audience!
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Social Proof
Nothing builds confidence like seeing that you are not the only one buying some product or service. Once you get a few customers, offer them some special discounts if they review whatever they bought. The review doesn't have to be positive, but the goal should be to sell things that give your audience a positive experience.
Displaying positive feedback, and even some neutral ones, can give your store a lot of credibility that it might lack if it's newer. Make sure your customer reviews and testimonials are real, as the fake ones are easy to spot as they always overpromote the things being sold, which makes them easy to spot.
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Anchoring
Now for more advanced techniques. Anchoring is when you present and tag a higher-priced item alongside a regular offer. This can influence your audience to make a connection with the product and make them think that it's worth more than it might be.
This can also have the effect of people thinking that the regular-priced item is incredibly priced, as the expensive item is that much more expensive for some small improvements. But it can also be used for the same product. Just display the usual prices and your discounts, and it could achieve the same effect.
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Reciprocty
For some reason, people often want to give back to you if you give them some value. Take restaurants as an example, if the staff is nice to you, and they may give you a complimentary drink or a simple basket of bread, you are likely to spend more and come more often to “return the favor”.
Affiliates can use this in multiple ways. Try providing your audience with extra value whenever you can. Free guides, ebooks, consultations, quality content, gifts with purchases, etc, will all have a similar effect.
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Simplicity and Clarity
Minimalism is the biggest trend in the last 10 years, and you should follow suit! Simple and clear websites make things easier to read and understand, as well as easier to make and design.
Keep things simple, keep your main selling points as the focus, and don’t try to cram everything into your customer at once. The breathing space can help them understand what you try to say better and make them convert more!
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The Power of Color
Colors can be incredibly influential. Think of famous companies and their logos. Depending on the niche they are in, they often have unique colors like blues, greens, whites, or reds that represent various things.
As an example, scientists have found that the combination of red and yellow works incredibly well for hungry people. This might sound stupid at first, but think of the colors of almost all major fast food chains. They all have some variations of the same colors, and there is a good reason for it!
To keep things a bit more simple, use red for urgency, blue for trust and reliability, green for great value and safety, and yellow for special discounts and alerts. This can have a huge impact on your CTA effectiveness and how they perform. Split test various combinations, and you should see what your audience responds best to!
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Authority
Everyone trusts authority figures and experts, and this is why you need to become one in the niche where you sell! Become THE place where people can learn all about the product category. Try showing people why you know more than they do about the particular topic, and how your knowledge can help them get a better product if they listen to you.
Communicate your authority by showing credentials, expert reviews, and endorsements within your promotional content.
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All together
So now that you know the basics, here is a quick recap:
- Optimize your landing pages by clearly displaying limited offers, using strong emotional appeals, and prominently showcasing reviews.
- Incorporate storytelling in your email campaigns to create emotional connections.
- Clearly show original and discounted prices to leverage anchoring.
- Offer free, valuable resources regularly, creating a sense of reciprocity.
- Ensure all content, from blog posts to landing pages, is clear, concise, and simple.
- Use appropriate colors for your call-to-action buttons to boost click rates.
Conclusion
Neuromarketing isn’t about complicated research. It's about analyzing your data from your audience and understanding what you can do to improve their experience and increase the chances of conversions. Understanding simple human psychology can be a great help, and with some practice, you could become an expert in this!
Stay honest with your marketing, show your audience the benefits, and provide them with value, and you should see good results in no time!
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