ndeed, companies as diverse as Unilever and DaimlerChrysler have used neuromarketing. Viacom Brand Solutions, the commercial arm of MTV Networks, for instance, late last year had Neurosense study how viewers digest programming and ads. It looked at nine regions of the brain that control such functions as attraction, long- and short- term memory and understanding. One counterintuitive result: commercials generated more activity in eight of those nine cortical-regions than the programs did, indicating that ads do register with viewers. But programming dominated the ninth area, which controls absorption —— indeed, viewers were so absorbed by the programs that the other areas were nearly dormant. More predictably, the study also found that ads work best when their content is in harmony with the programs they're interrupting. An ad for the alcopop WKD, for instance, registered more viewer interest than a Red Cross appeal when it appeared during a South Park clip.
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