Cashvertising

Imagine that someone has invented a cucumber and mouse smoothie for cats, and you’re the lucky person who gets to write the ad. How in the world will you sell this weird concoction to millions of picky cat companions?

The secret: setting off the right triggers. But what are they?

Every person is wired with eight desires that marketers would be foolish to ignore. These desires, the Life-Force 8 (LF8), helped us survive in the past, and they’re still hard-wired into our brains.

We wouldn’t make it through the week without the first three desires: to stay alive; to enjoy foods and beverages; and to be safe and free of pain.

Naturally, we also yearn for sexual companionship and comfortable living conditions.

Finally, we’re social beings, which is why we desire to protect our loved ones, long for the approval of those around us and strive to excel at what we do.

Good marketers are able to transform these desires into money. In fact, consumer researchers have found that these eight basic desires drive more sales than all other human wants combined. But why?

Desire is a form of tension that compels you to act if a need is left unmet. For example, if you’re hungry, you feel a tension that drives your desire for food. This in turn leads to actions that satisfy your desire. Our actions always follow this pattern: tension leads to desire leads to action.

Marketers can benefit from this simple biological process by understanding and appealing to the L8 in a clever way.

So how do you sell that cucumber and mouse smoothie? Appeal to the cat owner’s desire to protect her cat. Tell her how the smoothie will protect the cat from going blind due to its high amounts of taurine – a substance that cats really need but can’t produce themselves.

Now you understand these basic triggers; our following blinks reveal how marketers use them to sell you their products.