Underhand Tactics: Neuromarketing

my name is Marie and I'm a liberated woman I lead my life as I wish which is why I've chosen this brand the skin cream I can't do without

it the sensation when I apply it it's a real pleasure when I get home from the gym I often stop at this burger

restaurant I love its smell and the toasted bread and it's so nice inside I reserve my train tickets through this travel agency there are so many images

there that make me want to get a return trip to the sunshine it's like my bank I recently changed over to this Credit Company I

took out a loan for what I need to buy for the kids my name is Marie and I'm a liberated woman all these products

because I'm worth it well Marie do you really think you're a free and liberated woman do you know the smell of fast food is deliberately designed to produce an emotional

reaction the travel pictures are deliberately chosen to arouse your desires the bank slogan is espcially created to play on your [Music]

fears and your body cream has been developed to spark a desire from within your brain you didn't realize that of course why should you it's all calculated using the latest

technology from Neuroscience like an MRI or an electro enfal these new sales methods have a specific technique to control your brain it's called

neuromarketing but my dear consumers you're not meant to know about it neurom marketing is a taboo subject among the companies of the 21st century come on activate your neurons

we'll introduce you to the best kept secrets of the major brands you know [Music] well one marketing company has exceptionally agreed to show us how one

Mass Market retailer studies your behavior and incites you to buy we meet up in central Paris a typical looking

building and whoops this is our floor on the door a somewhat unusual sign and inside not a Parisian

apartment but a supermarket we call this an experimental store and it's in this kind of shop that we'll ask people to pretend to do their

shopping it allows us to study their behavior Eric Sango works for bva a market study agency whose clients include some well-known brands that test new packaging and placements on a

store's shelves from his observation post Eric sangler tracks the consumer's slightest reaction in the stores aisles they're volunteers from the

public in the street below each wears a strange looking pair of glasses worth €20,000 using a system of red dots the glasses record each movement of the eye

to the nearest millisecond it's known as an eye tracker now here you can see she's looking in a specific area for a product that interests

her there she's found it and it's what we call a direct purchase something she hasn't looked at too closely we've also put on the glasses suddenly we seem to see everything so

much more clearly they demonstrate exactly which elements spark our impulse to buy something without us knowing by analyzing the look

and its direction can you analyze what's going on inside the brain somehow well the tools permit us to go beyond words and to better understand

how the human brain works and how individuals reach the decisions that they take for example how the shape of the spoon in the mashed

potatoes the color uh or the design of the Mash's image will capture one's attention so it'll go some way to explaining the

elements that help us reach a decision on a subconscious level playing with your subconscious to make you buy something is the aim of this new high-tech

marketing which makes us think of a word that like marketing begins with an M manipulation let's check the

dictionary manipulation the state of being manipulated shrewd or devious management especially for one's own Advantage without the subject's

knowledge without the subject's knowledge here precisely is the new tool of bva the first neurom marketing device being developed in France the

electromyograph its inventor is Olivier drer a researcher in Neuroscience Nestle and L'Oreal have already signed up to test their ads using this machine it's subconscious

that every time you watch a izing your brain receives and acts on millions of different bits of information they provoke emotions you're not even aware

of the electrodes on the face and fingers allow these to be tracked there's one muscle it's called a zig Matic or more smiling muscle even if the muscle itself doesn't smile of

course you can detect an electromyographic Impulse that's the corrugator which is activated during most negative emotions this method is interesting

because it detects subtle discreet and often subconscious emotions he's so cute the importance of the subconscious as marketing is not hard to understand here's an ad for

McDonald's new line of hamburger he so cute it's so chubby oh you're too cute some Tabasco a bun scattered with

Paprika a new red chili pepper the reactions the human guinea pig are registered by the different curves now that's more than just an

Impulse it's almost at maximum level we can comfortably say there was a strong positive emotion after the test Olivier Dres asks

the lady at what point did she feel more emotion me it was then then well actually it's when we saw the hamburgers oh really well before there was a little

emotion but the peak comes when we see the pack shot the pack shot is the image of the product it was at this point that the lady became excited and there was an emotional

Peak I'm a little bit surprised as I thought uh it was more the character herself I didn't think it would be the brand that influenced [Music]

me the impact is not just coincidence but the results of our brain being worked on from an early age it's something you notice by conducting a little experiment in a

class in a Parisian school good morning boys and girls I'm going to show you some pictures under which there are some words WR when you don't recognize them you say

I don't know but when you do recognize the more you recognize shout out its name all right understood it's start the kids in

this class are barely 5 years old Euros very good great hey

hey okay this no okay nothing surprising so far then but

Apple telephone computer yes okay and now even louder

[Music] McDonald's and we go there why [Music] T how can McDonald's have made such an

impact on 5-year-olds [Music] a simple test in front of one of their restaurants provides the

answer who decided to go to McDonald's the kids the kids why does the child like it because there's a toy inside that's

it it's just for the toy he doesn't even eat he just plays with the toy since I have three kids that's three toys oh for the toy definitely uh he

eats hardly anything does your child get upset if you don't go to McDonald's yes there you are look right now he's he's all crossed and this is McDonald's weapon of

mass attraction this toy which may not look like much but it's highly profitable this is a confidential document from a US Association of McDonald

franchises it shows that 95% of families that visit McDonald's do so as a result of their kids [Music] in the game of cat and mouse children have little hope of escaping the

clutches of [Music] McDonalds the brand has made sure it will indelibly mark their [Music]

[Applause] Spirits the man who introduced toys to McDonald's has agreed to be interviewed he lives in a remote part of

Arizona and to find him takes you down many Windswept Dusty roads to be honest we did get lost at one point but we did finally find his

Ranch before retiring with his wife and horses Roy bergold was in charge of world marketing for McDonald's he worked for the fast food

giant for more than 30 years started in uh 1969 so that was a long time ago and we didn't we only had uh like I say we had

about 600 restaurants in the United States and none internationally and now I think they're in about I'm not totally sure but I think they're in about 140

countries now and I started about 100 countries the man who knows all the secrets of the multinational brand agrees for the first time to talk money on

camera he denies nothing about the methods McDonald's used to become one of the wealthiest brands in the world and he explains why Ray Croc the

company founder decided to focus on children if you can uh get the child at you know four five six years old to come to to McDonald's he's probably going to

continue to come uh as a teenager and as an adult and then to bring his kids so Ry always said if you have $1 to spend on marketing spend it on kids marketing

giving a hamburger to a friend the toy was the first marketing strategy aimed at attracting children with the clown Ambassador Ronald McDonald 50 gift certificates to everyone it's a nice way to

[Music] say advertising featured restaurants schools it reached its Target to associate McDonald's with a

brand stamping field good factor in the minds of future customers [Music]

that way you're not you're not a a commercial you're not there telling kids to do something you're simply giving a message that's important to that kid and

to his parents and his teachers and whatever Ronald is less in evidence these days here's the Happy Meal a new character that's very successful

McDonald's has an annual turnover of 47 billion we just plant the idea of fast food McDonald's in their mind and again

that translates into I'm hungry I think I'll go get something fast that's McDonald's and that's sales and that's the way it works that's marketing muscle

and we do know that if you can be a top of mind with a person in other words if they think I'm hungry McDonald's that's going to be great that's going to get

you a lot of business so we really believed in the power of marketing and how we could be uh how we could have the top of Mind awareness of a customer it further to the west of

Arizona in San Francisco for the first time a suit has been filed against McDonald's for using this type of marketing [Music]

strategy it began with a housewife and mother in Sacramento California Monet param has a 4-year-old and an 8-year-old daughter and a collection of

knick-knacks gathered during their stops at the fast food chain for months now she's been in a legal Wrangle with McDonald's she wants the company to stop

influencing kids by using presents I think it's it's disgusting you know they're going any way they can to get to these small children so they can get a

hook in them and keep them as customers for life but you cannot say no I mean absolutely the D absolutely and I say no

all the time I say I I say no all the time but I also don't want them Hearing in terms of marketing that hey this is cool you should get you know this meal

because you can get this toy and then you get all the fat and the sugar and the salt that comes with it um it sort of normalizes the behavior for young children it's okay cuz Barbie's you know

label is on it you know they're not able to think that through and process it that in a way that helps them make a healthy decision so I have to do that for them and have to say to a company like McDonald's I want you to stop

talking to my kids Lauren I just need a few minutes okay somebody mon param is not alone in this fight an increasing number of Americans

accuse McDonald's of taking advantage of children's vulnerability in addition the city of San Francisco has now banned toys from being provided in the happy I must have it activate disguise

generator legislators in New York are thinking of doing the same at Stanford University at pediatrician has proved the impact of such marketing on children Tom Robinson used an

enlightening method he placed some french fries in McDonald's packaging and some in a plain unmarked box he then asked 60 children

to try them and this is what he found out overwhelmingly kids thought the food or or kids pointed towards the food from McDonald's that they thought was from

McDonald's even though all the food was the same if they thought a food came from McDonald's they actually thought it tasted better so um not just whether they would choose it and not just

whether they they wanted it but actually whether it tasted better to them yes dear parents educating your little Darlings has made no easier when one brand shapes their taste buds from

the age of three to the extent of making them prefer its products to all the rest ice cream is got St you said it the major brands can do this because

they know how to penetrate deep in sight the front part of the brain the prefrontal cortex us researcher Samuel McClure made the

discovery for several years he's been scanning customers using an MRI a magnetic resonance imaging scan the large electromagnetic machine detects the flow of blood to the

activated parts of the brain you're going to go to in you're lie down in this bed and it's going to slide you in about up to your waist right now there are some really important things cuz measuring your

brain activities so you have to stay really still that's a big deal in 2004 Samuel McClure conducted an experiment that gave rise to neurom marketing

inside the MRI the guinea pigs were given Pepsi and Coke without being told which was which a majority preferred the Pepsi when they were told which brand

before drinking 3/4 preferred Coke as soon as you have brand information the pattern of brain activity changed entirely we got recruitment of the prefrontal cortex

which then we believe biases these sort of more basic structures related to taste so biases them to actually respond more vigorously and make you think that

you actually like this more by being embedded in our brains at a very young age a brand like McDonald's can make us become addicted to its products I'm

I think I'll go get something fast that's McDonald's the multinational doesn't stop there in its attempts to influence the public during our investigation we

discover McDonald's has been using customers brains to try out artificial [Music] flavors we managed to speak to one of

those responsible for these secret studies on condition of anonymity he reveals what happened this is not mind science fiction we able

to get consumers of that brand put them in a brain scanning machine measure their emotional response when we presented them with the fragrance now

that project is still under test but positionally and theoretically the brand is very interested in this concept has it been applied in some restaurant it

has been applied successfully in some restaurants in Germany and France and one or two in the UK can they measure that changing the fragrance was

successful they did brand perception research and they saw 7% increase in the brand perception index now what they're

doing is uh looking at the distribution chain to work out how they can implement it Fly we have a document that details the study it explains that if the flavor is

too obviously present rational thought will uncover the ploy that will then become ineffective as part of the test McDonald's apparently placed some of the odor in its cleaning products to subtly

be diffused without the client realizing what was happening today it's been proven that a smell that provokes a positive emotion will increase

sales Proctor and Gamble one of the world's biggest Mass Market retailers used an artificial perfume under the lid of one of its washing liquid Brands

aiel as a result sales increased by 70% Martin Lindstrom knows this kind of method well I'm trying to the Dane is one of the most successful neuromarketing

Consultants among his clients is [Music] McDonald's smes is the only sense we have which is bip passing the rational

part of our brains and go straight to the emotional part of the brain and even though I would tell you that they're manipulating that smell I would still not be able to say hey I don't want to be affected by it because that smell

goes straight to the emotional part of my brain so the rational filter cannot say hey don't be affected by it we know what you're thinking from now on you'll never look at a McDonald's

employee in the same way open the or a shine on the by experimenting on its customers brains and using a perfume that will make us

buy more is the company really respecting its ethical [Music]

Charter on its website the company claims we operate our business ethically sound ethics is good business we ask McDonald's directly but the

company refuses any comment in three successive emails it denies the charge and States McDonald's has never conducted any neuromarketing

studies and yet we track down the company that surveyed consumers in MRI machines on behalf of McDonald's it's called neurosense and is

based in London [Music] on the internet it lists its major clients they include GSK a pharmaceutical laboratory

unila and McDonald's okay's boss is JMA Cal sh you some uh various Brands and products her work centers on making sure

a product an advertisement or a smell will act positively on the consumer's brain what's known as the reward C it it's the holy grail for all

companies this small region which lies deep in the lyic system part of the reward Network this is the nucleus cumbent and it has lots of dopamine

neurons so dopamine is the kind of Feelgood molecule which is in the brain and it's expressed for example during sex it's expressed with uh cocaine and

other pleasurable experiences such as EOC looking at product you can activate this the same part of the brain that people who are taking drugs or something

like that that's right these are all reward centors they pleasure areas of the brain which is why people buy them so [Music]

much so this is the future that lies in store for us thanks to neurom marketing it's what might happen to your brain by simply walking into a

shop tempting isn't it the website you have several uh Brands you have mcdonal yeah we work for

a range of companies um and across a very broad range of their products and uh for a very large number of questions with those companies and you are able to

say what you do for this company of course we have ndas um with many of companies just like any other market research company what do you mean by I've got to stop there can sorry

restricted by confidentiality agreement JMA calet cannot talk about McDonald's but another researcher will prove far more enlightening we meet at Oxford

University's Department of experimental psychology and going into the laboratory we discover it's alive it's alive it's

alive uh no actually what we see is this a professor who specializes in neurom marketing and who took part in the studies for the fast food giant before the interview Charles Spence says he

won't mention McDonald's name on camera listen carefully to what he has to say he's a little bothered but what he does say is very interesting

we've done been involved in a project for one of the uh uh Burger chains were interested in

uh launching store fragrance so they uh funded a number of project to try and say can brain scanning as one of those techniques help us to choose perfume a b

or c uh and there um what the researchers were looking for was an increase in the blood flow um in the parts of the brain um responding sort of

uh flavor and reward when one fragrance was paired with McDonald's imagery so you showed the the logo of McDonald's and then you make people smell the new

fragrance so um for the burger chain um I'm saying which one uh oh you said you just say it was Bal no I didn't you did

no no you said I said a burger chain all right let's check with McDonald's imagery with McDonald's

imagery uh was a question again the researcher says the majority of people scanned were women typically with two children

guarantee kids don't forget are one of McDonald's principal targets consideration sincerity then when he doesn't realize he's being filmed Charles Spence will give us the very

proof we've been looking for and here they are McDonald's small artificial perfume bottles that's one of the uh one of the McDonald's

fragrances and it does indeed smell nice so it was to diffuse on the product or store in store that was one of the other ones because it doesn't smell uh

burger no exactly for Fruity bit floral for healthy for healthy rebranding this kind of practice is completely hidden from the client

something commercial alert a US consumer Association has strongly condemned Jeffrey Chester is its spokesperson we show him the interview to choose between

two uh fragrance when one fragrance was paired with McDonald's imagery versus one of the other ones when McDonald's is testing its products to see whether or

not it increases the blood flow to the brain what it really says is that um consumers are not being given a fair chance have any choice so consumers

today are being heavily influenced by multiple neuromarketing campaigns that raise questions about how long will we

be able to engage in truly independent action McDonald's still refuses to respond to our various interview requests so we had to interview them at

a conference called let's dare France a forum apparently for companies who dare the head of McDonald's France is there of course and is about to speak and the Executive Vice President

for McDonald's Europe luckily it's open to the media and yes that's us down there yes it's true I started up

McDonald's here in 1985 we had just 17 restaurants then France now represents 4.2 billion in turnover in a few years we have not just

become the second largest market after the United States but we've also learned how to DARE when sometimes it's better to say sorry than to ask permission it's

quicker especially for the large [Music] multinationals after the speech it's our turn to ask a few questions hello Mr P Elise Lu from

France TV we've sent several interview requests to your office and since we never received a reply I'm daring to interview you now have you dared to use newer marketing techniques in the

McDonald's group no no NE marketing no no I said no we don't use that sort of technique well the thing is we have definite information that shows you placed

mothers of children in MRI scans in the UK mainly to test new odors that might then be used in McDonald's Outlets so we know that yes you have used it I don't know what they might do in England

that's not my resp responsibility but it would surprise me a lot actually because I don't see the point of artificial smells well that's exactly what they are no I didn't think that was done in

England I can assure you it was well you'll need to prove it oh but I can prove it it was done through the intermediary of a company neurosense and by a university Professor called Charles Spence who was also involved in the

research and who confirmed it and provided documents showing that it was carried out well show me the documents doubt it doesn't it shock you to put mums inside an MRI scan to see what's happening

inside their brains I I would be deeply shocked that's not the way our company works and to answer your question at the risk of contradicting you well not at all your

answer would be great I categorically denied I don't doubt it but we're certain of our facts it's just one Professor who gave you some information no no no no we're absolutely sure of it

and besides neurosense is the company it's the company that use the MRI scans and they've even put you on their website where you're quoted as being clients excuse me but this interview is

over and I'm asking you to stop so make an appointment uh You' agreed to be interviewed of course all right you've been investigating this for 6 months so I would like to give you

detailed answers let me be precise right now these measures are not being taken in France jeaner P seems to not be aware then of the tests conducted by his

company one of the frences one fragance was paired with MD's imagery it has been applied successfully in France or to the

UK after our meeting France television and ourselves received a registered letter from the company it states our information is false and threatens legal action if we broadcast

it but a few days later McDonald suddenly agrees to an interview we're told to meet them in a smart Central Paris Hotel our interviewee is Pierre vek who

is the head of brand strategy in Europe we believe that he's responsible for the McDonald's [Music]

surveys has the company ever used neuro marketing well in 2006 we had a problem raised by a consumer who told us we had

an odor problem in a restaurant so yes we tried to find a scent that could solve this problem and which wasn't a food smell so we decided to find a scent that could suit the

McDonald's brand okay so was neurom marketing used yes or no there was a new system that would allow us to see if the smell would match the McDonald's

brand now what's important to know here is what happened after what happened after there nothing no it's important to know what

happened anyway so then you place women in MRIs we did put mothers inside with the smell and brand images to see if the two

would match inside MRIs right yes yes we agree on in MRIs I want us to be clear that we're in agreement we agree we did a study that simply compared a smell with an image of

McDonald's to see if they matched can you confirm whether or not in 200 through the neurosense company whether or not mothers were placed in MRIs to

taste some smells and images of McDonald's they were put there to test images in M some in MRIs thank you Mr boek for

admitting that so you say it all led to nothing no it was not successful at all we tested three odors in restaurants consumers said they could

notice anything so we stopped you see a perfume like that is used in several places it has to go through the air conditioning system we didn't want to do that for reasons of

hygiene well the information we have is that it was placed in cleaning products exactly we wanted to do that instead of having that slight chemical smell we wanted to put it in hygiene products but it proved impossible because it meant

the companies Who provided the cleaning products would have had to radically change their formulation so we left it if you regret it today are you asking me what I think of

neurosense yes yes I am I have no regrets if you ask whether at the time we thought it would be harmful no not one person thought it was wrong but does neuro marketing offend

you today yes I wouldn't use it at the time people who did they didn't think they were doing anything wrong you

included when we did the study when we saw the result yes by trying to compare a smell with a brand and whether it was bad by placing people in

MRIs listen when I saw it I was greatly surprised I I did find it surprising did I think there was a huge ethical problem at the time

no if I understand you well Mr vek what you're saying here and now is that McDonald's will never use neur marketing techniques again is that right yes yes

in any case as long as I'm here I can say yes more and more companies are specializing in Euro marketing these

days I was born with the power to read brain acity I'm a G Neuroscience stud of the bra here's a promo for one of the best

known this is how it works your brain's a series of complex networks it's based in California and it's called Eur Focus they turned down our requests for an interview but since we were in the

neighborhood anyway we rang their doorbell and brought a hidden camera with us oh nice to meet you we you know I'm sorry but we we don't work this way so what do you mean well we can't

accommodate you if you just show up on our doorstep so actually you said that you don't want to communicate with French TV no no no that's not the case we're we're simply too busy is it

correct that you're walking un subconscious of people to hear oh absolutely that's what we do we we test people's subconscious responses to stimulate that that's the nature of our

business we work for a huet packer uh we work for Google Microsoft I'm I'm only going to talk about The Client List that is approved

so okay but the listen to me yeah okay I am very busy right now I've explained our position and I don't have any more time to spend with you sorry see that

see the sheing in handc to the world of theur so this is the world of neurom marketing they measure our subconscious

but refuse to talk about it see the attention that you paid I can see what stor in your memor don't worry they can't see between you and me we measur up and yet this is serious stuff neurop

focus is even associated with Eric candle the noble laurate for medicine [Music] the crisis is impacting the consumer's wallet but companies don't want to see

their sales Fall encouraged by their marketing departments they call on businesses such as these in complete secrecy they scrutinize the brain patterns of their

clients to play on their emotions their urges and their subconscious their aim is to push them to buy even more these techniques aren't very ethical

which may explain why the companies that use them are reluctant to give [Music] interviews but one EUR a marketing consultant allows us in on one of their

training [Music] sessions this Frenchman lives on the west coast of the states and has set up his own business called sales brain

his customers today are businessmen from Oregon we have contact some own restaurants others sell agricultural material or even washing

machines good morning what if you could discover a buy button inside the brain of your customers what if you you could learn

what it takes to actually push that by button inside the brain and what if all it took to do this was two hours of your time this morning

Patrick ramaz doesn't use MRI scans his company has developed a method that merges neuroscience and sales techniques but guess what the thinking

portion of the brain is really a decision influencer but it is not the decision maker it's not the boss but the actual part of the brain

that triggers the decision is called The Reptilian Brain and The Reptilian Brain is the top of the stem and the portion that unite both hemispheres make sense

we decide at the level of a crocodile of a reptile why because exercises to help Patrick R teaches his clients to touch the primary instincts to incite the

active and The Reptilian Brain is the realm of the pain and the fears it's really the realm of the subconsciousness so your job if you want

to be successful is not to stop at the wish and the wants and the needs of your customers but really to drill inside the iceberg till you find their pain and then to develop a business whose

objective will be to eliminate that pain you you a 4our session is enough to convince the businessman but boy we came really close right we right second it

does kind of freak me out it freaks me out that that's why I do things in those who get really good at it can get me to do this by utilizing those techniques

but oh yeah absolutely but that's business I'm sure an argument could be made that um it's

manipulation but um it's what is it's what's driving our world there's always a danger of manipulating people but on the other hand when the

method of decision making is public knowledge it's also the responsibility of the consumer to understand what companies do to sell their

products now I want you to keep your eyes on this little locket your eyes are growing but can one be aware of it when you talk directly

very heavy to a reptile brain you can hardly keep them open Patrick vom's life is spent traveling all around the world to spread

the word of new marketing for several years he's been coming back to France at the request of big companies here he is a nie a few hours before he's due to give a speech to a

large French company but this time we're not allowed to record what will happen your client doesn't want to talk about it no my client doesn't want to talk about it as once again

neuromarketing in France is a bit of a taboo subject people in France often confuse manipulation and conviction careful now the logic of the next argument is not that easy to

follow you need to understand how to push your proposition a little by saying that if your glass is now half full your glass is more than half full you shouldn't say that it's more than half

full while making your client understand that it's not half empty lost right well we were too so your client needs to think the

glass is half full or half empty neurom marketing helps your client to understand that if your glass is half empty it's actually half full Patrick ramb refuses to name his

client today but we think that a company that it's telling its sales forces about neurom marketing is not just any old business so we look around nce and find

out that 230 salesmen are staying in a large Downtown hotel they're here to take part in a conference hosted by Patrick

ramazi their employer is ARA a subsidiary of the credit mutel bank these Bankers jobs are to sell Financial products to companies as well

as to public institutions such as as local communes or health authorities AR's slogan is the bank with a human face so how does neur marketing

fit into this with a hidden camera we approach the salesman as they're leaving the conference I was wondering what you learned this morning and what benefit is it to

you what I've retained mainly is the reptile brain that purchasing is linked to the subconscious well I've learned uh that we need to anticipate what the brain really

wants and I've learned how to understand what the brain wants without them knowing do you think the applications might be contentious well yes of course because

it's almost like manipulation a bit it's a good technique because it can be applied to finance and other products as

well what sort of products are you selling actually Financial ones Insurance uh [Music] credit well anyway I really enjoyed the

the conference it it was very good okay thanks we're probably naive but to us the the credy muel France's fourth

favorite Bank used to be this I've got some bad news oh yeah well what would you do if Father Christmas doesn't exist what are you talking about you're dreaming you don't think they're selling Financial products just because

they're good for you well yeah credit mutel more than ever the bank to talk to the credit mutel may be the bank to talk to but not necessarily the bank to

get interviews from it refuses interviews adding via email this conference his only goal was to open people's minds about a subject which might be of interest to salesmen and

besides we don't see any ethical problems we call one of those responsible up by phone and then everything seems clearer it might be counterproductive

for us to appear as if we practice neuromarketing purely to enter into our customers brain you know what I mean well why is that then well

when we use newer marketing it's to be able to almost subliminally touch someone who might be right there right right in front of

you okay but I'm still intrigued because one can manipulate people by the way you behave uh by the way you speak in in exactly the same

way but the product doesn't change though it's just the way you deal with your customers wow that's the uh that's all the neurom marketing traffic in France a philosopher who

follows the trends of consumer Society has risen up against this use of Neuroscience for purely commercial ends from the moment Neuroscience is involved it allows one to intervene

directly on The Reptilian layers of the brain I receive or I give those are the levels of The Reptilian Brain what makes neurom marketing work today is the use made of the immediate reaction that's

because there's a re action that can be very easily manipulated when you know how to take advantage of this you can manipulate people as if they were puppets you press the button and it provides a reaction that's what's so

worrying about it in theory there are laws limiting this kind of practice marketing studies using MRI scans are actually banned by law in

France Public Health rules and the civil code allow experiments on human beings for strictly scientific or medical [Music]

purposes what happens before the advertising when I'm shown this logo before I've seen the ad 10 times and after I've seen the ad more than 10

times there are long-term functional changes in the brain so who's the ultimate client what I say is I work for Market research

groups after the speech and still on camera Arno Petra reels off a list of his clients sfr maaf Insurance Cartier

and sncf French Railways Petra doesn't wish to talk about this last client again it's a matter of a confidentiality Clause but why would French Railways use

neurom marketing we track down someone who was involved in the survey he was an intermediary between the railways and our nor Petra's Belgian company he described the experiments on

condition of [Music] anonymity what the sncf was testing on customers brains was its online ticket sales

site our French Railways told us its main target or targets and it invited its website users to surf the Internet you may be looking for a ticket from

Paris to Brussels or from Paris to Leo Online and you're invited to sign up to buy a ticket what we do is to evaluate how easy or difficult it may

be so you use the MRI scan to sell tickets exactly to a volunteer oh yes and we try out different

versions on the computer top right are the web pages that have been tested in the center is the image in color of the zones of the brain that have been more

active during the experiment so you check whether the reward circuit has been activated by a web page precisely the reward circuit French Railways asked them to

test one page with a background picture of a pine tree and then one without the pine tree we tested reaction to various

perfumes that resembled pine trees and in the part of the brain that recognizes smell what's known as the olfactory cortex we notice some ity so in part for the imagination it worked in other words

it did smell of pine a little so on top of the page there's something about sturg for the Christmas holidays so if the smell makes your imagination think of Christmas and Christmas trees all the better as it makes the offer tangible

they said they wanted people to buy tickets more easily without Hassle and find the information they needed quicker times have changed on the railways the days of steam are long gone

and buying your fair from a human being at the ticket counter May SU disappear too everything seems to be happening far quicker these

days more than 60 million tickets are sold by sncf each year on its website the seat which is quite remarkably interested in what your brain is up to is also France's leading online

travel agency and that's something French Railways seems quite determined to get into your skull everyone should know that sncf also sells airline tickets we have have

all the solutions plane tickets car rental voyages sncf.com is more than just about trains you'll soon get used to it voyages sncf.com will take you

further than you might have thought we asked the head of the sncf travel agency Eve T if they hadn't gone just a little bit over the top what I'd like to know is what kind

of study you conducted and how precisely you conducted it to establish what people liked didn't like well first we ask different types of customers because well travel sncf.com is a special site

in a way it's the site of all the French people it's a site visited by about 80% of French internet users well you'd like to be inside the customer head to know exactly how they

feel when they visit your site wouldn't you oh of course do you use any neuromarketing techniques we did actually use some yes

ah so you did use some yes tell me what you did in fact what we wanted to know was if the customer's brain spontaneously reacted positively or not to the S

side so you did new marketing by placing some of your customers in MRIs to see the reaction in their brains is that right I'm not explaining myself well we know that this technology exists but

it's not a technology that we use in travel sncf.com you've never used it no are you sure no I don't think

so you didn't use it in France or Belgium maybe in Belgium on our site well we have proof that you used it in Belgium and customers underwent MRI scans there sncf is written on these

documents so you can see that the sncf has practice neurom marketing and has put its clients in an MRI for their site well hang on there are several things

here the ex the question you're asking is if we used it extensively and my answer is

no we we may have used it experimentally once it's possible but you agree that there is evidence you use newer Marketing in

Belgium placing people in m to see their reactions to your site it's not impossible there may have been tests in an experiment one day but in no way do we want to generalize

the use of these methods so why did you do it well listen we did it because now everyone does it but we decided not to use it regularly I don't think everyone

does do it because it's illegal in France let me quote you article 1614 of the civil code I quote brain technique can be used only for medical purposes or

in forensic cases and this is neither one nor the other which is why we don't do it anymore is it a taboo subject in France apart from being

illegal I don't know it's first time anyone's asked me about it you mean the first time a journalist has asking you about it because the topic was started by someone so they must have told you about

it no of course but again it's extremely marginal I don't want our viewers to think that it's a widespread practice that is not the case

but my question is is it taboo I don't know what to tell you I I don't know I don't know what to tell you okay thank

you a pledge safety guarantee consumers do not be afraid the neuromarketing experts are working on your

behalf for a better world a world where hamburger chains put a smile on your children's faces where Bankers know how to soothe all your

anxieties and where Beauty creams fill you with [Music] desire no matter what the product

tomorrow you will be satisfied by simply just opening your wallets

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