315 – Brain Hacks That Trigger Your Customer to Buy with Melina Palmer of The Brainy Business

Gift biz unwrapped episode 315.

You're saying exactly the same thing,

but how you present the information changes the way that the

brain feels about it.

Attention gifters bakers,

crafters, and makers pursuing your dream can be fun.

Whether you have an established business or looking to start one.

Now you are in the right place.

This is give to biz unwrapped,

helping you turn your skill into a flourishing business.

Join us for an episode,

packed full of invaluable guidance,

resources, and the support you need to grow.

Your gift biz.

Here is your host gift biz gal Sue moon Heights.

Hi there.

It's Sue and thank you for joining me here today.

If you're a longtime listener,

I so appreciate your loyalty.

And if you're brand new here,

welcome, you've picked a great show to start with.

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income producing business in the class.

You'll learn the biggest single thing makers who are just starting

out in their businesses,

miss, which prevents them from growing.

You'll also hear the five critical elements that must be included

in your price so that you can make money,

how to attract customers,

who will pay what your product is worth and the secret

to loyal customers who will buy from you again and again,

to register,

just go over to gift biz,

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There select a time that works for you.

And I'll see you in class.

Now. I know I say this often,

but seriously,

I am so excited for you to listen to this particular

episode. You are going to experience the proverbial kid in a

candy store.

Joy. When you find out all the ways that you can

increase attraction for your business,

the kind of attraction where people can't wait to order your

products. That's a big promise.

I know,

but stay with me here because this information is worth millions.

I could have said that it was priceless pretty quickly.

You'll understand my choice of words.

Okay. Today it is my pleasure to introduce you to Molina

Palmer. Melina is the founder and CEO of the brainy business,

which provides behavioral economics consulting to businesses of all sizes from

around the world,

her podcast,

the brainy business,

understanding the psychology,

why people buy has downloads in over 160 countries and is

used as a resource for teaching applied behavioral economics for many

universities and businesses.

Think about this.

Are you charging the right prices?

And are they nudging your customers to buy?

Are your brands nuances sending the right signals to your customer's

brain? Molina teaches applied behavioral economics through the Texas a and

M human behavior lab and her first book,

what your customer wants.

And can't tell you is scheduled for publication.

Next month,

Welcome to the gift biz on repped podcast.

Thank you so much for having me.

I have heard you speak a couple of times.

I've listened to your podcast and for a long time,

I've been thinking I have got to get her on the

show. So now is the time perfectly aligned with your book?

Yeah. Yes,

absolutely. I know we've connected a couple of times too.

I think in person,

maybe it's biz chicks a while back.

I remember chatting with you a little bit.

Yeah. I was delighted when I got your email.

So thanks for reaching out.

Yes, I'm so happy.

And we're going to start off by doing what is a

tradition here that is having you describe yourself a little bit

differently and in a creative way through a motivational candle.

So if you were to share with me what a candle

would look like that would really resonate with you,

what color would it be and what would be a quote

on that candle?

Well, I debated quite a bit as to whether it should

be purple or just like super gold glitter ridiculousness,

but decided I'm going to stick with,

I'm going to say it would be a purple candle and

purple is a color.

I use a lot in my own branding and it's a

color of creativity and innovation.

And so that is a reason that I picked purple for

my branding and my kind of mascot is a purple brain.

So it felt like that should go well together.

And the quote that would go on it is how I

end all the episodes of my show and how I sign

off on my emails,

which is be thoughtful.

And it's kind of a little hidden gem there.

The bee is capitalized for behavioral economics,

which I know we'll get into a little bit.

And then thoughtfulness is just understanding your own brain and the

way it responds and thinking about the things you do a

little bit deeper than we might naturally.

I love that.

And you shared with me a little bit before we started

recording that you are also a creator at heart.

Yes. 100%.

So I've made all my holiday gifts for years and years

and years.

And sometimes you get a bit busy and do something a

little bit less time consuming,

but I've done custom quilts for people for whether it's baby

showers or holidays,

as well as I do knitting and crochet,

I one year paid for all my holiday gifts by making

crocheted items that I sold at different craft stores and things

along the way,

and do specialty cakes for my kids for their birthdays.

So 100% love doing all the crafts.

Love it.

So we're circling you in as one of our own hair,

for sure.

Yes. For sure.

So Where did you get into the whole interest in how

the brain works and share with us a little bit of

your experience there and what's led you to today?

Absolutely. So one thing that you'll notice,

which is using a concept called priming,

but when you go to search for my podcast,

or if you're looking for something like behavioral economics,

the logo I have for my company is very friendly and

inviting and kind of cartoony.

And it's intentionally set up that way.

So people know it's not going to be some boring lecture

that is not helpful for them with the level of what

they're looking for.

And so,

yes, trying to just make sure everything's very relatable and getting

into my background.

So my undergraduate degree,

I got in marketing and I remember there was this one

section of one book of one class,

just tiny little tidbit that had just a little bit about

buyer psychology and like why people do different things act the

way they do by the way that they do.

And I thought it was just amazing and so fascinating.

And in that moment said,

Oh, I'm going to go back.

MBA's not for me.

I'm going to go get a master's in this someday.

And I spent the better part of 10 years calling universities

and asking about programs that had to do with,

about buying psychology.

And everybody said,

it wasn't a thing.

It didn't exist.

So kind of too bad.

So I was working in industry,

running the marketing department for it ended up being about six

years. But while I was there,

I was in this innovation program and they brought in some

people from what's called the center for advanced hindsight at Duke

university, which is their behavioral economics wing.

And they were talking about research that they were doing.

And I just knew that that was what I'd been searching

for for a decade.

And so I found myself a program in behavioral economics and

got my master's and realized really quickly.

I knew I was early into the field,

but there just wasn't a lot about how to apply it

and use it and stuff that was so obvious to me

about communication and marketing and pricing and company strategy just didn't

exist anywhere yet.

So started the podcast and here we are,

What also resonates with me throughout the book,

because you gave me an advanced copy.

So I've gotten a little peek into what's there.

You're going to position something.

Whether, you know,

you are or not,

and people are always going to form an impression,

one impression or another.

So you can't really avoid it anyway and doing it to

get the right message across is really where you're trying to

go, not to manipulate,

but to provide the right message,

Right. And just helping people to find the best solution for

them. And when you think about your business,

you are creating products that are adding value,

and you have a customer that you spend all this time

thinking about the avatar or persona or whatever you're looking at

and what they want.

And you're creating things for them.

But if you're not making it easy and to find the

things that they want,

they will get overwhelmed and potentially go somewhere else.

In the world of behavioral economics.

We talk about this in terms of what's called a nudge

to help people go in the right direction.

And also that what's called choice architecture.

So the way that you present information,

and I love the kind of quintessential example here is if

you think about setting like kids loose in a cafeteria and

say they have all the money in the world and no

one will ever know what they chose,

we would all probably expect that it's French fries and ice

cream and pizza,

and nothing of any nutritional value is what they're going to

get. But what the study found and they did across school

cafeteria as was when you moved something to the front.

So if you took desserts and put them at the front

of the line,

the kids were 25% more likely to pick those than they

were when it was in a more neutral spot.

When you put it toward the back of the line,

they were 25% less likely to choose the desserts and whatever

was at eye level,

whether it was carrot sticks or French fries is what they

were most likely to choose.

So choice is really all about context and the way that

is presented makes a difference.

And so if you don't think about it,

you might be setting it up.

So a bunch of kids are going to be on a

track to obesity.

If you put a bunch of desserts first or put them

somewhere else,

Willy nilly,

and don't really think about it.

But if you have some intentionality,

it can help nudge them to make healthier choices that they'll

actually probably be happier with in the long run.

Yeah. And you know,

you bring this up in the book too saying it's not

limiting their choices,

it's positioning the choices.

Right? So to your point,

all the healthy stuff up front,

it doesn't mean they still can't get the other stuff they

might want.

It's just where it's positioned.

I remember this a lot from my corporate days.

Cause I worked with a lot of grocery stores.

And if you ever wonder why milk and all the dairy

is way in the back,

it's because that's usually what people are coming for,

at least at that time.

And you had to walk through then the whole store to

get there.

So same type of thing.

You're going to pass.

So many other things.

Also the same reason why produce and all of the higher

priced items are usually on the periphery because that's the way

people walk.

Right? Yeah.

So I can relate to it a lot in that way

as well.

Yeah. Yeah.

So I have to say you caught me with something I

didn't know.

Right. In the beginning of the book,

which I thought was so interesting and it's just a different

way of positioning.

We talk about branding here a lot that everything is encompassed

in your brand.

Like the colors you use,

the images,

all of that.

But you talk about brand as being a memory.

I would like you to share a little bit of more

of that concept,

but I'm also taking from that,

that your brand then keeps expanding upon itself as new memories

are made,

Right? Yes,

definitely. And I wish that I could claim that I came

up with that myself,

Peter Steidel,

there's a quote from his book called neuro branding saying that

a brand is a memory.

But when you look at the way that our brain puts

things together,

it is very much kind of collecting all this information for

you. And I love using that example of your favorite brands.

So if you who are listening,

think about some of your favorite brands and who comes to

mind, the ones that come up now,

if you stop for a moment and say like,

why, why is Disney or Apple or Kate spade or whatever,

why are any of them,

your favorite brands and what might they do if they were

to kind of have a slip up here or there that

if it was a new brand,

you were having an experience with that you didn't know about

yet where you would go write a terrible Yelp review about

how awful they are and never go there again.

But if it was something a little bit off with Amazon

or Disney,

you might go,

well, they do so much good stuff.

I still love them.

They're still a 10 in my mind.

And it's because of all those things that come to mind.

When you think about those favorite brands,

those past experiences are those memories compiled together.

It's a great opportunity to realize this collection of experiences that

people have with you both.

So you can look at building other great ones in,

you know,

their chapters on surprise and delight and things like that in

the book.

But you also,

if one thing goes wrong,

maybe where it may feel like it's the end of the

world, or you get a complaint,

you have an opportunity to extend beyond that item that has

happened, which is getting into the peak end rule,

which is also in the book,

definitely helping,

as you might be able to get a sense for the

book is about being able to understand what behavioral economics is

and work toward actually starting to apply it kind of a

framework to use it in your own business without having to

go get PhD or master's degree.

Yeah. There is so much in the book.

I mean,

so many,

if I continue to take notes,

I don't know.

My little online highlighter was going crazy to tell you the

truth. And I have pulled out a couple of things.

Cause I love for people to leave here with a couple

of things that they can specifically do,

but give his listeners.

I'm telling you guys,

you have to get this book and we'll talk about it

later. But there is so much in here.

And the thing Molina is a lot of this is really

easily applicable.

Once you understand it,

once you hear it and know it,

right, just to get back to memory for half a second.

I think what you were saying really makes sense,

because let's say you've had customers for a long time and

then all of a sudden,

one thing goes wrong.

Like for us,

the postal service is delayed because it's the holidays and they're

fully packed or whatever the situation is.

Customers are much more understanding when they've had so many good

experiences with you all the way along,

because it's not the norm.

Right. But what happens if the first experience isn't a good

experience? So that does have a lot of weight on the

overall experience,

but as I was pointing out,

and this is looking at something called again,

the peak end rule.

And so if you were to look back on an experience,

say eating out at a restaurant and people say,

Oh, how was it?

Or someday when we're eating out a lot more,

we'll remember that better.

I Can't wait.

I know,

But, Oh,

how is everything?

And you say fine.

But when you actually are trying to reflect,

there are so many different items you could have been putting

into play there,

but beyond the sound,

the amount of time you were having to wait,

the flavor was the food hot,

like all of these different data points.

And are you looking at that every minute,

every 15 minutes,

every millisecond,

how are you quantifying this?

It becomes a very difficult calculation for your brain,

which is why it uses a simple rule of thumb to

say that there are only two points that matter when we

are evaluating our entire experience with a brand or with some

sort of customer journey that we have been on.

And that is the peak,

whether it is a negative or a positive one,

and then the end.

So if the first buying experience someone has with you,

that they're ordering something for a holiday and it was delayed

and they're upset because this happened,

this negative peak is a really bad point to end an

experience on.

But if you instead look and say,

how can I do a little bit of something extra to

make that just a little bit better or to get them

something else that's beneficial.

It doesn't have to be a discount or something,

but what can you do to extend beyond that negative point

and make it so it's not the end that can help

make it.

So people are happier with their overall experience with you,

even if something that was a little bit bad happened.

And so if there was an experiment done where,

how people put their hands in really,

really cold water for a minute and they didn't like it

clearly, but then they went a second time and after a

minute they warmed the water just by a single degree for

about 30 seconds.

So your hand is in cold water for 90 instead of

60 seconds,

which would seem like it's worse,

but people all said they liked that experience better.

And would rather do that again than only have their hand

in the cold water for 60 seconds.

And it's because of that,

just like little bit better helps us to feel that the

overall experience wasn't as bad.

Well, I've often heard that if you're speaking in or you're

in a meeting or whatever,

people will remember the last thing that you present the most.

And I'm thinking,

as you're talking about this,

if for some reason you find that somebody's brand new,

this is the first time you're interacting with them.

That it's a little off to pay attention and really make

sure that you've added on.

And just like you were saying something a little bit special,

extra, whatever,

to kind of neutralize the initial issue.

Yes. And then if brand is memory,

then would it also hold true then that as they continue

to work with you and have more and more experiences that

you're able to,

at some point erase that initial bad experience or does it

always stay?

It won't always stay because of the only being the two

data points.

So assuming you have some peaks,

hopefully positive ones that are better than that one negative point

that was previously a bad peak.

So if you have something that is better,

that has happened,

that was maybe one of those surprise and delight moments.

It can really erase that for people.

Okay. That's great news because we all can do that for

sure. All right.

So one of the other things I definitely want to talk

about here is the whole idea of mirror neurons.

So why don't you define what that is?

And then we can get into some conversation about it.

Sure. So one of the ways that we learn from other

people is using these mirror neurons.

And the way they were discovered was actually by accident.

And the,

as the story goes,

there was a team in Parma,

Italy that was studying different areas of the brain.

And so they had a monkey who was hooked up to

some systems and they were trying to map different areas of

what lights up in your brain when you move your arm

or things like that.

And so as the story goes,

grad student walked in and was eating some ice cream or

perhaps gelato since it was Italy and the monkey didn't move,

you couldn't see it physically take any action,

but its brain was lighting up.

So when the person was moving their arm to put the

ice cream cone to their mouth,

the monkey's brain was lighting up as if its arm was

moving. When the student was eating the ice cream,

the monkey's brain was lighting up as if it was doing

that as well,

even though it didn't have any sort of movement.

So what this figured out is when we see something that

someone else is doing,

or we can have that experience,

our brains will light up as if we are already doing

it, which makes it easier when we're going to do it

ourselves. This is why watching someone open a jar of pickles.

If you've never done it before,

you could try yourself by having seen them do it once

before and really practical way of using this in your own

business is you've seen the ads for games or whatever,

where it says,

like, click here,

click here.

And it's got like a finger moving,

like it's clicking on the button or click to subscribe.

And it goes,

click, click.

You actually like it's pushing on the button.

It seems like it's unnecessary.

And that it doesn't influence you,

but actually it can be activating those mirror neurons and it

makes it so it's easier for you to click the button

yourself because your brain feels like it's already done it before.

And we sort of self heard and we'll be likely to

follow our own actions when we've done it already.

That makes so much sense to me.

It's kind of like directing a person also on how to

buy. If you like,

what you've seen here,

click the button below,

you'll go to the sales page.

The button will be there.

Whatever your checkout process is.

The other thing that I think is so relevant to everyone

who's listening here is,

and no surprise to you Molina.

We've got this whole barrier about going live on social media.

Like how do I do it?

What do I say?

And I'm thinking of these mirror neurons as being the way

to provide content to your audience.

So let's say you are a crochet hair and you have

this beautiful,

let's go with mittens and a hat,

for example,

to actually demonstrate putting it on,

you know,

where your ponytail goes when you put it on or whatever,

and putting on the mittens and how warm and soft they

are and going through not only demonstrating physically,

but also speaking through the experience somewhat replicates,

then what the viewer would be doing in their brain.

Is that right?

Yes. And I would even go a step further than that,

to where if you show,

if you have this sort of a skill,

but would be it for which,

for video editing and things,

not everybody has,

but ideally if you had to like click by and we've

seen those kinds of like fast motion videos,

where then it's like putting it in the box,

getting it to the thing,

drop it off,

it comes to you.

Someone arrives,

opens the package,

you see their excited face when they get it.

And maybe they take the soft mitten or the scarf and

kind of like rub it against their cheek and you can

see how much they love it.

And they put it on and they feel the warmth and

they're out playing with their kids or whatever that all is

really helping someone to see the value,

which feels like it should be implied.

So 99% of anything our brains are doing is done on

a subconscious level.

And we like to think that we're consciously making all these

decisions the time,

but really the vast majority is done kind of under the

radar using these what we might call a gut instinct or

a rule of thumb to make a choice.

So things like that,

mirror neuron activation and the video and being primed by different

things. So in this case,

there's a lot of value in the power of touch.

And even if something is online and there have been studies

that if you have a fabric with really great lighting to

where someone can see the texture,

their brain will react as if they are touching that item,

that you kind of know what it feels like.

And there's a difference between explaining something as being,

you know,

couch, material,

leather kind of go,

okay, right?

Whereas if you say buttery,

soft chocolate,

Brown leather,

you feel something there differently and you want it more because

your brain will take on the endowment effect.

You have this like perceived ownership over the item,

especially if you touch it,

but you can get that across in videos really well done,

lit pictures and things.

When you are activating those mirror neurons and that activity of

experiencing an item,

This is something so tangible for us to do.

I mean,

we can go back and look at product descriptions even,

and add more adjectives and adjectives to the point of as

if someone was experiencing it.

Like what would be the adjectives of somebody lighting a candle

that you make and placing it in the perfect place with

the snow coming down outside or something like that.

But adding those adjectives will help.

I think what you just said is personalized the product for

someone who's viewing it and making them feel that it's more

desirable, that the product would be more desirable to have So

interesting. Isn't it stay tuned because there is more to come

right after this quick break.

Yes. It's possible increase your sales without adding a single customer.

How you ask by offering personalization with your products,

wrap a cake box with a ribbon saying happy 30th birthday,

Annie, or at a special message and date to wedding or

party favors for an extra meaningful touch.

Where else can you get customization with a creatively spelled name

or find packaging?

That includes a saying whose meaning is known to a select

to not only are customers willing to pay for these special

touches. They'll tell their friends and word will spread about your

company and products.

You can create personalized ribbons and labels in seconds,

make just one or thousands without waiting weeks or having to

spend money to order yards and yards print words in any

language or font,

add logos,

images, even photos,

perfect for branding or adding ingredient and flavor labels to for

more information,

go to the ribbon print company.com,

right? And it's just More relatable and it's not even something

they would ever be able to articulate to you.

But if you look at this as being going back to

the nudging,

so at Texas a and M have done a lot of

research through the human behavior lab on optimizing menus for different

restaurants and wineries and things.

And so one of the things that we do there is

making it,

so the description for something that you're wanting to nudge someone

toward like the best wines or whatnot,

or most popular ones,

maybe have three lines of a description instead of two,

just a tiny bit of a difference.

But if you add a little bit more detail to the

one that you're trying to feature,

the brain is going to pick up on that and see

that there's a little bit more there and naturally kind of

cling on to those different words.

And so with the candle piece,

like you were talking about,

if you have the scent described with really great adjectives,

but also having a picture like you said,

yet, someone lighting the candle,

but it's that moment of like smelling it where your eyes

are a little bit closed eyes,

that first kind of scent,

you know,

the image I'm talking about without me even having to describe

it much more,

if you can showcase that with someone experiencing your candle,

people will quickly go,

that smells good and you don't have to say it.

You can show it to them using a really well chosen

picture and then finding out what that means can be the

hints of if you have cranberry and cinnamon and orange nearby,

and then you have the description that has some great adjectives.

It all comes together.

You know,

we had a conversation about this,

just, I guess it was this week in my VIP group,

we were talking about the lifestyle images,

like on a website versus three word rebellion,

which is a topic that we had talked about in a

prior podcast.

Like how many words should you put on?

Or should it be an image?

But then there's also the popularity right now of flat lays

where people are just showing the product.

And one of the things you talk about in your book

is having photos that show an intent,

your example was either tea or coffee.

I forget which,

but having a pot with the mug like is if someone

is getting ready to enjoy a cup of,

was it tea or coffee?

I forgot.

Right? It's T in this having to do with the mirror

neurons as well.

So mirror neurons don't really activate for movement without a consequence,

I guess.

So when there's an action and a goal at the end,

you're more likely to get them.

So what they were looking at is showing where it was

like a picture of someone,

but it made it look like they were cleaning up the

tea cup to where there were kind of crumbs or on

the table.

Then they had just sort of no background just holding the

tea and the saucer.

And then one where it was maybe looking more like you're

getting ready and surveying.

Are you going to drink where there's full stuff on the

table? And when there is a goal that you're able to

see what's happening,

it will be more likely to trigger those mirror neurons than

if it's just look a candle.

Doesn't really,

even if someone's pointing at it or something,

it might not have the same impact as that smelling it

action that we can tell something is happening.

And so our brain is going to focus in a different

way. Got it.

So the way we were talking about this is a photo

that shows an experience.

Yes. Okay.

So to summarize here,

gift biz listeners,

I want you to think of this when you're thinking of

mirror neurons is if you're doing something that's live,

actually demonstrate it.

Like it might seem silly.

We'll stick with candles that you would take off the lid

and maybe smell your own candle,

or maybe be sitting at a table next to one of

your candles lit like it might seem obvious,

but the point is,

what is your viewer seen and what are they experiencing?

So get as many sensory things in with those lives that

you possibly can,

product descriptions.

Look at that and add descriptive experiential,

I guess adjectives would maybe be the way to say that.

And then with lifestyle photos showing the intent,

like you were just talking about Molina,

does that kind of summarize that up a little bit for

us? Yes.

And I will add two things to it.

One being,

if we're looking at like you were talking about three word

rebellion, so your title,

the name of the product,

you don't want to go over the top crazy with all

the words and descriptive adjectives and things.

You want something a little bit snappy,

that's going to draw someone in to get started.

But if you have so much going on in that top

header portion,

like if it was safe,

strawberry banana scented candle,

that's delicious,

really amazing.

And blah,

blah, blah,

as the header yikes.

Right. That we're going to get overwhelmed and go away.

So don't want to put tons of adjectives and things everywhere,

but selectively using those.

Yeah. So maybe in the product descriptions,

but not in headline image.

Right. And you can still use a great adjective in the

product name or the headline,

but don't try to put all your eggs in that basket

because it's not going to pay off as well as a

really good description.

I was just going to make a comment on the visual

since we're there right now,

is your words,

don't have to say the same thing that the picture does,

right? No,

they don't.

But it's a balance of having things working in tandem where

you don't have to do exactly the same thing.

And if there's a picture of all the ingredients or something,

you don't have to list them all or what that happens

to be.

But if you're trying to think about what you want the

person to feel in this case and keeping the candle here.

So it feels probably silly to say something like warming because

candles provide,

they've got the flame aspect and whatever.

But if we're looking at just that holiday candle talking about

it, being a warming sensation or this like a warm hug

or some thing that if you're trying to evoke that feeling,

it might be valuable to include it in the name,

but it doesn't have to go there.

You just want to be selective of what's the most important

thing that you want to have there.

The other thing I was going to say was if you

want some really great examples about how you can make something

on a screen where you're not able to get the senses

in the same way,

but people that are incredibly talented at this that you can

use as inspiration for your making business is to go watch

the food network.

And there's a reason.

So they take a bite of the food,

or if you've ever watched like food network challenge,

like next food network star,

if you watch how they teach them,

you have to take a spot enough bite,

but they are explaining what is happening in that moment to

help the viewer trigger the same sensory emotions of taste and

the smell.

So when they're straying things and they go,

Oh my gosh,

this smells amazing.

And then they take a bite and say,

Oh, it's just the way that the butter is really mixing

in with that brightness of the lemon coming through is really

helping to combat the thickness of this particular cut of fish,

whatever. Right.

But they are telling you what is happening.

And it is getting a lot of sensory emotion and things

happening for you to where you want to go make that

recipe or keep watching.

You want to eat it yourself.

You want to do the same thing.

Like if you're talking about those lives,

when you light that candle and say,

Oh man,

I just love the center of this.

It's this really warming kind of a cinnamon scent.

And you have the cranberry in there which adds a hint

of brightness with the citrus.

And it just all makes us together.

It's like a warm holiday hug here and a candle,

right? Like that makes a difference than just,

Hey, here's the candle.

It's cranberry orange cinnamon to them.

Yeah, no,

your description right there.

It just adds so much more depth to what you're demonstrating.

You're already there alive.

So by talking it through and I love your example of

going and watching what other people do,

because as you were saying it,

I was closing my eyes and listening and then comparing it

against the same visual with no words.

Right. And it is,

there is such a difference there for sure.

Right. And I don't know if you got to this point

in the book,

but people are more likely they feel better about spending money

and there's less pain of paying.

There's a chapter in the book on the pain of pain

when they're buying a gift.

So Hey,

good news,

everyone who's listening because probably the majority of what you make

are things that you are putting together as gift type of

packages. And so knowing that people like to give gifts,

it's easier for them to spend money when they're giving a

gift and they are more likely to spend more on items

and feel better about it than if they were buying something

for themselves.

Being able to point out how this thing is a really

great gift.

This makes a great gift.

Like when you can't be there to give a hug yourself,

send this lovely sweater because,

or this blanket or whatever,

and they will feel your love.

There'll be enveloped in it this holiday season.

Even if you can't be there with them,

reminding people,

it's a great gift will make them feel better about buying

it. Even if they gift one to themselves.

Well, they could do that for sure.

Yeah. That could be an upsell option maybe,

but that makes sense.

And the idea that you're being generous and gifting,

and boy don't,

we know from the last year we just came out of

so many times when we couldn't be with somebody and people

were gifting.

So that's interesting to know.

And I don't know that you keep up with any of

these numbers Molina,

but gifting has risen this last year.

Like crazy for that reason alone.

If you can't be with each other,

zoom is great,

but also gifts coming in,

right? You guys,

these are tips and points and ideas that are throughout the

book. We would be here for probably a week.

If we were trying to go through everything that was in

the book.

So I've picked out again,

just a few things that I think would really be relevant,

but like,

honestly, all of it is to be honest.

So in the chapter where you talk about framing,

and you've also talked about this in a presentation,

and I think it did really narrows it in and makes

people understand this.

And then I'm going to tell you my one surprise that

I didn't know.

But will you talk about the hamburger example in terms of

framing? Yes.

I feel like I probably say all the time.

This is one of my favorites because I love all the

examples, but I use this one a lot.

Well, if they weren't your favorites,

you wouldn't put them in your book or your presentation.

Yes, for sure.

Yes. So if you were to say,

so imagine you're going to go it's spaghetti night and you

have to go stop by the grocery store to pick up

some ground beef for Turkey and you get there and you

see, there are two stacks of ground meat.

The one is labeled as 90% fat free.

And the one next to it is labeled as 10% fat.

Which one do you feel more compelled to buy?

And having used this example a zillion times,

I can say that almost everyone always says they want 90%

fat free.

That's the one that they want.

And maybe you took a look,

even though you want that one.

And you realize it's saying exactly the same thing,

but how you present the information changes the way that the

brain feels about it.

So especially 10% fat,

maybe we look at it and go,

Ugh. Like I haven't been able to get to the gym

and over a year now that sounds awful.

Where's that 10% going to go.

Whereas 90% fat free feels like you're doing such a great

thing for yourself and your family.

What a healthy choice,

even though it's the same,

your brain doesn't hear it that way.

And so being able to realize that and know the way

that you present something,

maybe you didn't add in everything the offer might be right.

But the way that it was worded or framed didn't resonate

as well.

If you change around the title or the call to action

button or whatever it is,

it can make a really big difference in something resonating with

people or not.

If you look at tweaking those frames.

Yeah. I mean,

this was so incredible to me and it makes me want

to go back and look at all my copy everywhere.

Now I'm presenting and you have a number of different examples.

There's another one that I think we have a little time,

cause I really want to drill down this point.

And then I'm going to tell you my surprise.

I'm keeping everyone in suspense,

which I always do.

People who follow me know I like to tease a lot,

but that Snickers one was really interesting too.

Yeah. So that concept called anchoring and adjustment,

which is both a form of framing and priming,

which is how the examples kind of build on each other.

As you go throughout the book.

The piece with Snickers is there was a study done using

two different end cap displays in a grocery store.

And so one says,

Snickers bars buy them for your freezer.

And the other one says,

Snickers bars by 18 for your freezer of which most people

probably agree.

18 is a lot more Snickers than most people buy a

particular visit.

And so you might,

if you were creating the ad for that,

if you were on the marketing team and think,

Oh 18,

like that's an arbitrary number.

I don't want to have people ask why I came up

with it and you know,

then was unlimited and people could get a hundred Snickers bars

if they wanted.

And so your logical brain will kind of talk you into

going with that safe option of them.

And maybe you don't feel like it makes a difference that

much at all.

But actually what they found is when the number 18 was

used, instead of the word them,

there was a 38% increase in sales.

Just from that one change.

It's not that people bought 18.

They might have bought,

I think you say nine instead of maybe one or two

or three.

Right? So when we see the word them,

it's like a fancy word for zero essentially.

And maybe we'll get two or three,

like you said,

but when it's 18,

your brain would go,

Whoa, I'm way better than everybody else.

I don't need 18.

I'll just get six as you go through.

And you don't even realize how that little nudge had an

impact. This is why people buy more when something is labeled

as 10 for $10 instead of $1 each.

And it's like double or more,

even if it's the exact same product,

exact same needs from that person.

When you have those big numbers that can set an anchor,

it makes a real big difference in the amount that people

end up.

Got it.

Yeah. And you know,

it's so crazy to me because even though you see that

logically behind it,

it's the same price.

You're still tempted to go in one direction or another.

Right. Okay.

So here is the surprise that I had no idea about

when something's on sale and I've known this from my advertising

days of the past that you always want to have something

that's relative.

So let's say something was $45 and now it's 30.

Okay. So you still want to have regularly 40 or 45

with a slash through it and then the price of 30,

but the difference and the thing that's surprised me so much

as you demonstrate that make that 30 smaller in font where

the tendency of you'd think,

Oh, well we want to make it bigger because you want

to show that it's a lower price.

It actually feels like less money when that $30 is smaller,

Right? The tendency that people would have is,

and you see this on sale tags everywhere is to have

the old price kind of in this small font so that

you know what it was.

And then it's like,

look at this amazing big sale price.

I pray it's only $30 now that you make it really

huge. But that subconscious brain is very literal and will take

big font,

equals big price essentially is how that goes together.

And small font equals small price.

And when you change it to where the old price that's

crossed out is still larger than the new sale price,

which is in a smaller font.

It had an increase on sales from people because that very

literal association happens with those sides of the numbers and what

it feels like for The brain.

So seriously,

I'm going through all my sales pages,

looking at how they look.

And I don't know.

I like after I had told you,

I'm about two thirds done with the book at this point,

I'm going back and looking at all my highlights and then

comparing them against things that I have out there and making

adjustments accordingly,

because there is so much goodness,

like the little tips in the ideas and it makes so

much sense when you hear them.

Some of them are,

it's kind of like,

well, that seems so obvious.

Why didn't I have a recognize that before,

but you just don't right,

Right. The subconscious knows what it does.

I don't know if this made it into the,

I think I say this at least once in the book,

but where you read some of these and go,

Oh, of course that's how you know,

it's on the right path.

Right. So you say something in the subconscious says,

yeah, I do that.

Yeah, that's right.

It recognizes those rules that it's using along the way.

And even though some seem really maybe counter intuitive,

like the size of the font when you look at it

and that's where,

like you said,

I have strategically chosen examples.

You, as the listener may think,

well, I don't know,

but if you were to go and just type it out,

or when you get your copy of the book,

you can see it there,

you see it and go,

yeah, that does feel smaller.

It does feel like a better deal when I see it

this way.

But when you're creating it for yourself,

you're using that conscious logical brain to build it.

But everyone who's buying from you is in that subconscious space.

And so that's really what the whole book is about,

is helping you to understand those tricks that the subconscious is

using so that you can communicate with it better.

Okay. So now I have a question and you led perfectly

into this question.

Great. Let's not go through the story.

I'm going to let people get the book and read the

story about the briefcase versus the backpack.

But what you've talk about here is everything within an image,

subconsciously is picked up by someone who is looking at that

image. And so here's my question for you.

If, as an audience,

let's say we know that based on the product that we

sell, or I'm just going to pretend like I'm a product

maker and I'm thinking this through,

okay. I'm thinking of images that I'm going to make.

And based on the product that I sell,

I know a lot of my customers like Southern living,

for example,

the magazine Southern living.

So is there a difference in impact of an image if

I do a lifestyle photo and I have the magazine Southern

living maybe laid out somewhere versus the same picture with a

mechanical engineer magazine laid out there.

Yes. There definitely can be.

And there's,

we do research in eye tracking and brain scanning and things

that I do.

And we do at the lab for clients and whatnot to

where if you really were wanting to dig in on something

to see how it's working and whether it's pulling attention or

not, we can get into something really specific for individual clients

and things.

But in general,

yes, we're being primed by what is there.

So if there's in the chapter on priming for,

when you're looking for that story later and all that sort

of imagery around,

you want to be really selective of what makes it there

and what you're using and where it is,

because it can all be building that experience.

And it's either building toward what you want and what's going

to resonate,

or it's just random and is potentially going to be distracting

or pulling people away from you feeling like they're not your

ideal client,

even if they can't articulate what pulled them away.

Yeah. That's interesting.

I used to have a boss who,

and I felt this was so staged.

We would go into pretty big negotiations.

And he shared with me how he positions things in his

briefcase. This is the days when you did use a briefcase,

but he would open up the briefcase and he would have

his Mo block pen.

And he might have another contract with another big company sitting

there, like,

so he strategically did that to position the meeting.

And it was just so interesting to me,

the way he did that.

But now reading what you're talking about,

it's reinforcing to me what he was doing.

I kind of think we landed the contracts because we were

just that good.

But there's that I bet it's a mix.

Right? The other things probably didn't hurt in that way and

yeah, can definitely set the stage.

That's also having the other contract is looking at something called

social proof,

which when you look at the Yelp reviews and the number

of stars you have and testimonials that all builds on us

being a hurting species and we don't have time for it.

But again,

it's in the book.

Yeah. But it goes to testimonials being so important,

especially when you're not just telling people how your customers love

your product.

It's when other people are talking about it.

There is so much more weight given with that.

Right. Absolutely.

If I could just buy a book for everybody,

I would,

because there's just so much in here and Molina a lot

of things that I've never heard before,

but when I hear them,

it's like,

yes, obviously.

So, right.

Yeah. So I already told you I'm going home and finishing

the book today because I just have two.

Awesome. I tried to get it all done yesterday,

but it just didn't happen.

But today,

so share with everybody where they can learn more about you

and also how they can get their hands on.

Absolutely. So the best resource of all the things would be

to go to my website,

the brainy business.com

and there you can find,

so I do have a podcast.

It has lots about the book.

Now it is available on presale.

If you're listening to this episode,

right. When it comes out.

But like Sue said,

it's coming out pretty soon after,

so it should be shipped to you quite quickly,

but it's on Amazon and Barnes and noble and bookshop and

Booktopia and all these different spots.

So that is all available.

And it'll be coming out in may.

And if you go to the website,

you can also get now the first chapter and read it

for free to be able to have access if you want

to kind of start in on that.

But yes,

the brainy business.com

and you can find me on all the socials as the

brainy biz,

the IC.

And I am sure there are a million good tips that

you pick up through the podcast every single week too.

So I am an avid listener.

And if you're liking what you're hearing here and in the

book also for sure.

Check out Molina's podcast.

Thank you.

And I guess didn't actually say,

I don't know if we said the name of the book

maybe at the very beginning,

but it's called what your customer wants and can't tell you,

I think we said it once,

but probably good.

If you want to just go search for it.

Yeah. I said it in the intro,

but not a problem at all to say it again,

because I want people to know exactly what it is for

sure. Okay.

As you're looking out into the future,

besides the fact that it's all about the book right now,

what do you see in the future for yourself?

I have been building the business to have kind of a

three pronged approach.

And I think one that's really important while I do corporate

projects and things is small businesses and especially female owned businesses

and entrepreneurs have always been really important to me.

And so to make sure that they don't get left behind

as behavioral economics really scales up,

I've created a courses and membership group and things that go

along with this DIY application of using the book and everything

that's available for those in small business so that they can

really use and do better in their own communication and things

like that.

So they feel really confident in their sales.

So I've been working on and we'll continue to expand that

out to have really great resources for that group.

Much like your Fabulous,

because I don't know that we can get enough of you.

So I idea hear that there are more ways Molina.

Thank you so much.

You are so incredibly interesting.

And I so appreciate having you here to share with us

today. Yeah.

Thanks for having me Now.

I want you to know that I was true to my

word. When I got home later in the day after this

interview, I did finish reading Molina's book and I've been through

it a second time already,

too. I want to underscore the research Molina referenced about how

people have the propensity to pay more.

When something is a gift,

how often do you use the word gift in your messaging?

Something to consider along with all the other fabulous ideas you've

heard today,

next week,

we're going into the sweet side with a very popular woman

in the world of baking and confectionary art.

But this conversation isn't only for sweet makers.

So make sure to tune in.

Finally, I want to slip in another reminder that you only

have a short time to sign up for my free masterclass,

how to turn your handmade products into an income producing business.

The first class is May 1st.

So go to gift biz,

unwrapped.com forward slash masterclass for all the details and to register.

Thank you so much for spending time with me today.

If you'd like to show support for the podcast,

a rating and review would mean the world to me and

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So it's a great way to pay it forward.

Also make sure to follow the podcast.

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That way you don't miss a thing and now be safe

and well.

And I'll see you again next week on the gift biz

unwrapped podcast.

I want to make sure you're familiar with my free Facebook

group called gift is breeze.

It's a place where we all gather and are a community

to support each other.

Got a really fun post in there.

That's my favorite of the week.

I have to say where I invite all of you to

share what you're doing to show pictures of your product,

to show what you're working on for the week to get

reactions from other people and just for fun,

because we all get to see the wonderful products that everybody

in the community is making my favorite post every single week,

without doubt.

Wait, what,

aren't you part of the group already,

if not make sure to jump over to Facebook and search

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