Perception

5
Perception
Learning Objectives
1. The design of a product today is a key
driver of its success or failure.
2. Products and commercial messages often
appeal to our senses, but we won’t be
influenced by most of them.
3. Perception is a three-stage process that
translates raw stimuli into meaning.
Learning Objectives (Cont.)
4. Subliminal advertising is a controversial—but
largely ineffective—way to talk to consumers.
5. We interpret the stimuli to which we do pay
attention according to learned patterns and
expectations.
6. The field of semiotics helps us to understand
how marketers use symbols to create meaning.
Product Design
 The design of a product is now a key
driver of its success or failure.
Sensory Systems
 Vision
 Scent
 Sound
 Touch
 Taste
Vision
 Marketers communicate meaning on a
visual channel using a product’s color,
size, and styling.
Scent
 Like color, odor can also
stir emotions and memory.
 Scent Marketing is a form
of sensory marketing that
we may see in lingerie,
detergents, and more.
Packaging, Sensory Stimuli
 Imagine you are the marketing consultant
for the package design of a new brand of
premium chocolate
 What recommendations would you make
regarding sight and scent?
Sensory
 Products and commercial messages often appeal
to our senses, but because of the profusion of
these messages, most won’t influence us.
Key Concepts in Use of Sound
 Audio watermarking
 Sound symbolism
 Phenomes
Key Concepts in the Use of Touch
 Touch matters.
Touch & Feel
 How has your sense of touch influenced
your reaction to a product?
 Which of your senses do you feel is most
influential in your perceptions of products?
Perception
 Perception is a three-
stage process that
translates raw stimuli
into meaning.
Sensation and Perception
 Perception is the process by which
sensations are selected,
organized, and interpreted.
Perceptual Process
We receive external
stimuli through
our five senses
Exposure
• Exposure:
– Occurs when a stimulus comes within the
range of someone’s sensory receptors
• Consumers concentrate on some stimuli, are
unaware of others, and even go out of their way
to ignore some messages.
Stage 1: Key Concepts in Exposure
 Sensory threshold
 Psychophysics
 Absolute threshold
 Differential threshold
 JND
Sensory Thresholds
• Psychophysics:
– The science that focuses on how the physical
environment is integrated into our personal subjective
world.
• Absolute Threshold:
– The minimum amount of stimulation that can be
detected on a given sensory channel.
• Differential Threshold:
– The ability of a sensory system to detect changes or
differences between two stimuli. The minimum
difference that can be detected between two stimuli is
known as the j.n.d. (just noticeable difference).
Weber’s Law
• The amount of change that is necessary to be noticed

is systematically related to the intensity of the original
stimulus
• The stronger the initial stimulus, the greater a change
must be for it to be noticed.
• Mathematically:
i
K
I
– K = A constant (varies across senses)
– Δi = The minimal change in the intensity required to produce
j.n.d.
– I = the intensity of the stimulus where the change occurs
The Pepsi Logo Evolves
Stimuli Change
 How much of a change would be needed
in a favorite brand’s price, package size,
or logo would be needed for you to notice
the difference?
 How would differences in these variables
affect your purchase decisions?
Age and Sensation
 Some studies suggest that as we age, our
sensory detection abilities decline. What
are the implications of this phenomenon
for marketers who target elderly
consumers?
Packaging, Sensory Stimuli
 Imagine you are the marketing consultant
for the package design of a new brand of
premium chocolate
 What recommendations would you make
regarding sight and scent?
Attention
• Attention:
– The extent to which processing activity is
devoted to a particular stimulus.
• Attention economy:
– The Internet has transformed the focus of
marketers from attracting dollars to attracting
eyeballs.
• Perceptual selection:
– People attend to only a small portion of the
stimuli to which they are exposed.
Attention
 Consumers experience sensory overload
 Marketers need to break through the clutter
Attention and Advertising
• Nike tries to cut through the clutter by spotlighting

maimed athletes instead of handsome models.
Personal Selection Factors
• Experience:
– The result of acquiring and processing stimulation
over time
• Perceptual vigilance:
– Consumers are aware of stimuli that relate to their
current needs
• Perceptual defense:
– People see what they want to see - and don’t see
what they don’t want to see
• Adaptation:
– The degree to which consumers continue to notice a
stimulus over time
Stimulus Selection Factors
• Size:
– The size of the stimulus itself in contrast to the
competition helps to determine if it will command
attention.
• Color:
– Color is a powerful way to draw attention to a product.
• Position:
– Stimuli that are present in places we’re more likely to
look stand a better chance of being noticed.
• Novelty:
– Stimuli that appear in unexpected ways or places tend
to grab our attention.
Sensation
 How have you seen brands use size,
color, and novelty to encourage you to pay
attention to a message?
 Were the techniques effective?
Factors Leading to Adaptation
Intensity Duration
Discrimination Exposure
Relevance
The Priming Process
Stimulus Organization
• A stimulus will be interpreted based on its

assumed relationship with other events,
sensations, or images.
• Closure Principle:
– People tend to perceive an incomplete picture as
complete.
• Principle of Similarity:
– Consumers tend to group together objects that share
the same physical characteristics.
• Figure-ground Principle:
– One part of a stimulus will dominate (the figure) and
other parts will recede into the background (the
ground).
Gestalt Principle
• This Swedish ad relies upon gestalt perceptual

principles to insure that the perceiver organizes a lot of
separate images into a familiar image.
Principle of Closure
• This Land Rover ad illustrates the use of the principle of

closure, in which people participate in the ad by mentally
filling in the gaps in the sentence.
Figure-ground Principle
• This billboard for Wrangler jeans makes creative use of

the figure-ground principle.
Application of the Figure-Ground
Principle
Interpretation
We interpret the stimuli to which we do pay
attention according to learned patterns
and expectations.
Interpretation
• Interpretation:
– The meaning that we assign sensory stimuli.
• Schema:
– Set of beliefs to which the stimulus is
assigned.
• Priming:
– Process by which certain properties of a
stimulus typically will evoke a schema, which
leads consumers to evaluate the stimulus in
terms of other stimulus they have
encountered and believe to be similar.
Schema-Based Perception
• Advertisers know that consumers will often relate an ad

to preexisting schema in order to make sense of it.
Subliminal Advertising
 Subliminal advertising
is a controversial but
largely ineffective way
to talk to consumers
Subliminal Perception
• Subliminal perception:
– Occurs when the stimulus is below the level of the
consumer’s awareness.
• Subliminal techniques:
– Embeds: Tiny figures that are inserted into magazine:
advertising by using high-speed photography or
airbrushing.
• Does subliminal perception work?
– There is little evidence that subliminal stimuli can
bring about desired behavioral changes.
Subliminal Messages in Ads
• Critics of subliminal
persuasion often focus
on ambiguous shapes in
drinks that supposedly
spell out words like S E
X as evidence for the
use of this technique.
This Pepsi ad, while
hardly subliminal, gently
borrows this message
format.
 Do you think that subliminal perception
works?
 Under what conditions could it work?
Semiotics: The Symbols Around
Us
• Semiotics: Field of study that examines the
correspondence between signs and symbols and their
role in the assignment of meaning.
• A message has 3 components:
– 1) Object: the product that focuses the
message
– 2) Sign: the sensory imagery that represents
the intended meanings of the object
– 3) Interpretant: the meaning derived
Semiotics
 The field of semiotics helps us to understand
how marketers use symbols to create meaning
Semiotics (cont.)
• Signs are related to objects in one of three ways:

– 1) Icon: a sign that resembles the product in
some way
– 2) Index: a sign that is connected to some
object because they share some property
– 3) Symbol: a sign that is related to a product
through conventional or agreed-upon
associations
• Hyperreality: The becoming real of what is initially
simulation or “hype”
Office Space and “The Red Stapler”
Examples of Brand Positioning
Lifestyle Grey Poupon is “high class”
Price leadership Southwest Airlines is “no frills”

Attributes Bounty is “quicker picker upper”
Product class Mazda Miata is sporty convertible
Competitors Northwestern Insurance is the quiet company
Occasions Use Wrigley’s gum when you can’t smoke
Users Levi’s Dockers targeted to young men

Quality At Ford, “Quality is Job 1”
 How do your favorite brands position
themselves in the marketplace?
 Which possible positioning strategies
seem to be most effective?
Summary
 The design of a product affects our
perception of it.
 Products and messages may appeal to
our senses.
 Perception is a three-stage process that
translates raw stimuli into meaning.
 Subliminal advertising is controversial.
 We interpret stimuli using learned
patterns.
 Marketers use symbols to create meaning.

Perception

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5

• The amount of change that is necessary to be noticed

• Nike tries to cut through the clutter by spotlighting

• A stimulus will be interpreted based on its

• This Swedish ad relies upon gestalt perceptual

• This Land Rover ad illustrates the use of the principle of

• This billboard for Wrangler jeans makes creative use of

• Advertisers know that consumers will often relate an ad

• Signs are related to objects in one of three ways:

Lifestyle Grey Poupon is “high class”

Price leadership Southwest Airlines is “no frills”

Product class Mazda Miata is sporty convertible

Competitors Northwestern Insurance is the quiet company

Occasions Use Wrigley’s gum when you can’t smoke

Users Levi’s Dockers targeted to young men

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