Best in Brand & Innovation for October

Every month we bring you the best articles we find in brand, innovation, and creativity.

This month’s list offers, among other things, how interpersonal language is effective in building brand awareness, what makes Facebook ads compelling, and the psychology of building brand loyalty.

Brand Marketing Research: ‘Personable, Emotional and Less Functional’ Branding Key to Increased Brand Awareness – Portada

Studies by University of Oxford and brand marketing industry leader Kantar Millward Brown have found that brand awareness is heightened by adopting interpersonal language. Social marketing campaigns that are more personable, emotional and use less functional words are more effective in creating brand awareness. While content and style of the advertisement does impact the success of a campaign, writes Gretchen Gardner, campaign success is not affected by industry category, region, or number of creative types used in a campaign.
Gretchen Gardner @gardnergretchen

Why Those Facebook Product Ads Are so Darn Compelling – Popular Science

It’s not the product that’s being advertised that makes Facebook advertisements so successful, but instead the marketing strategy. “People get this psychological gratification from feeling good about their own decision making,” says consumer psychologist and consultant Kit Yarrow. Sara Chodosh writes, “Getting these ads on Facebook certainly adds its own veneer of familiarity; the products pop up in the midst of your very own news feed, showing the names of family and friends who have already pledged their allegiance to the brand with a “like.” And of course, the data that Facebook sells to these advertisers means that the objects for sale will often feel like exactly the product you’ve always been searching for.”
Sara Chodosh @schodosh

Do You Daydream? You May Be Smarter and More Creative Than Your Peers – Live Science

Working memory is the mental workspace that allows the brain to juggle multiple thoughts simultaneously, writes Jennifer Welsh. And a new study by the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Science, shows that the most intelligent people tend to have high levels of working memory. This is important because the more working memory a person has, the more daydreaming they can do without forgetting the task at hand, Welsh says. In the studies, those with higher working memory were able to stay focused when the task at hand required it. Likewise, when the task at hand was not very difficult people with higher working memory were able to think about things other than what they were doing and these studies are proving that we’re able to the most creative when daydreaming.
Jennifer Welsh @MicrobeLover

Neuroscientist David Eagleman and composer Anthony Brandt explain how creativity works – The Verge

Bending Elements, Blending Elements and Breaking are the three main components of creativity, argue Neuroscientist David Eagleman and composer Anthony Brandt, in their new book, The Runaway Species: How Human Creativity Remakes the World. In an interview for The Verge, they tell Angela Chen, “In music, bending is a theme in variations, just taking an original and remodeling it in some way. Breaking is fragmentation of a theme, its motifs. As Eagleman and Brandt discuss creativity, they focus on the myth of the genius loner and emphasis that creativity is more often than not nurtured in social environments.
Angela Chen @chengela

Do You Have a Creative Job? That’s (Partially) for You to Decide – Artsy

A study published in American Behavioral Science shows that a person’s view of how creative their job is depends a lot on their “creative identity” or their conception of their own creativity. Job description and workplace environment aside, the study sought out to answer whether or not people see themselves as using their creativity in their work. The answer depends on numerous factors, including those beyond the specific field of the job itself, writes Issac Kaplan.
Isaac Kaplan 

Consumer Psychology: Five Tips for Creating Positive (and Reasonable) Expectations – MarketingProfs

Charlotte Blank offers five tips to help marketers learn how to build excitement without overselling and disappointing customers. People’s expectations drastically infuse how they think and feel about the world around them. Likewise, marketing can set up expectations. Blank writes that it’s important to have an understanding of how and why people’s expectations alter their experiences so that campaigns don’t set up for disappointment.
Charlotte Blank @CharlotteBlank

The Psychology of Brand Loyalty: 5 Key Takeaways – Entrepreneur

Jayson DeMers writes that “the best way to build a community is to nurture an organic one. Foster a sense of tribalism by allowing your customers to engage with one another.” In his article for Entrepreneur, he argues that people still have brand loyalty but that marketers must have the right strategies to strengthen that loyalty and grow business.
Jayson DeMers @jaysondemers

Can Branding Be Negative? -Forbes

Being “negative” can set brands apart. “Creating dissonance without reason is to use negativity poorly,” writes Pia Silva. When brands point out things people are annoyed or frustrated with, people are more likely to connect better with the brand. If there’s something you hate about your industry, it’s important to point it out for constructive reasons. Then marketers can create the space to show their solution.
Pia Silva @PiaLovesYourBiz

Employer Branding Trumps Consumer Branding For Young Job Seekers – The Lowell Sun

Lynette Vallecillo offers a few pointers to attract millennials, including to “build a culture of Brand Ambassadors and provide insight into your company culture.” New findings reveal that employer branding is so important to young job seekers that they’ll base who they want to work for on it. Employee ratings of the workplace was more important than consumer viewpoint.
Lynette Vallecillo @lynette_ma