When it comes to effective marketing, the feelings evoked by an ad or special offer may be more important than the offer itself. That’s because most people make decision using an emotional spectrum to distinguish various products and services—often making purchases despite their better judgment.
But what emotions persuade consumers to act, buy, or click on a link? That’s exactly what Persado, a technology company using advanced math and science to generate persuasive language for digital communications, intended to uncover in its latest Emotional Ranking Report.
Important Findings
Organizing the data into four categories (Industry, Channel, Country, and Engagement Type), Persado was able to predict consumer behavior with unique insight into the effects of emotion on marketing message performance. For each report segment, at least two hundred experiments were taken into account.
Among the findings, Persado reported that not all emotions performed equally well depending on the origin country of the consumers. For example, when comparing categories of Intimacy and Relief in similar email marketing text, North America and South America both preferred language that evoked Relief. However, in Europe, Intimacy was greatly preferred by consumers.
Another notable finding is linked to specific types of emotional language. Celebration is the least persuasive emotion for Finance and Insurance in all Channels and for the use of Subject Lines across all Industries. Fascination is the least effective emotion for email body text for all countries studied, as well as across Channels and Industries in Europe. Language that evokes a Challenge is the least persuasive emotion for North American audiences, and Gratification is the least persuasive emotion for Retail and eCommerce when it comes to Industry and for one-time Action when it comes to Engagement.
Incomplete Story
This is just a small sampling of the data Persado extracted from its recent study. The full report is available online for Persado customers.
As you may have noticed, in the available report online, Persado only delivered the results for the least efficient types of emotional language. If you want to know what emotion worked the best in North America across all Channels and Industries, you’re going to have to give Persado a call and sign up for its services. But that may not be necessary just yet. Using similar split testing methods, small businesses can develop several significant insights into the way they use language to efficiently market to consumers without having to rely on a third party.