Sure enough, you can easily name the most user-unfriendly website or an app you've ever used. And you will never forget that beverage, which ruined your favorite T-shirt and made your furious. We always remember things and events better if they are associated with strong emotions. By measuring customer's emotions you get to know how people really feel about your product. That is why it is important to employ emotions measurement. Now, to those who wonder how to harvest this technology in the most effective way, here are 5 useful tips to help you.
1. Only emotional messages will provide emotional feedback
Seems obvious, yet many marketing professionals forget about it. The object of testing should be emotionally appealing. There is no sense in testing emotionally neutral advertising messages, images or videos. You will receive neutral emotional feedback from respondents and thus results of emotion measurement won’t be of great use for you.
2. Consider personality of customers
Personal and cultural background, race, religion, gender, education – all these factors can influence the way a person expresses his or her emotions. Just imagine how differently Iranian man and French woman would react to an image of a woman driving a car. So always consider these factors when profiling respondents for participation in your emotion measurement tests. In this way, your average emotion will be representative of your sample.
3. Keep secrets from your customers
That’s right, sometimes you have to play poker face when measuring emotions. Don’t tell customers what you are going to show them. People are capable of adjusting their facial expressions when they are provided with background information on the subject. To verify it just observe how quickly your friend’s facial expression will change when you tell him or her: “I have some bad news for you”. This precaution sets the mind of a person in a predefined emotion and compromises the outcome of emotion measurement tests. That’s why it is better to start with showing consumers visuals unrelated to the subject of your test and only then show materials you want to test. This will allow respondents to relax and “put” their facial expression to “neutral” mode.
4. One shot – one hit
Remember that you can get genuine emotional feedback from a person to the video, image or message only once. When people see something for the first time they initially react to it and only then analyze it. When people look at the same picture or video for the second time they know what to expect and try to control their emotions. That’s why first impressions and reactions are the most accurate and credible ones. Follow the rule: one respondent – one show and you will receive their genuine emotions and not controlled reactions.
5. Combine technologies to verify results
To get better results combine various technologies. Verify the data obtained from emotion measurement with EEG, for example. Brain activity measurement also can provide you with an understanding of the person’s attitude towards these or that subject of measurement. Use a survey and just ask people how did they feel while watching your video or navigating through your website. Now you can cross-analyze and see if what people declare they feel is true to their real emotions. It’s always better to verify information using numerous tools.