Our Profiles Have Eyes

www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/27798/

We've heard it a hundred times, "Be smart about what you put on your facebook page." This seems like good advice, but marketers don't want you to be smart, they want you to be... you. That way they can market to you in a way that will actually reach you. Psychologists are getting so good at breaking down and analyzing social media profiles that they can determine personality type with no other input. This is just one more example of how marketers are turning to the electronic world. It would appear that we cannot escape being "watched" without eliminating almost all social network or electronic interaction.

Is This Really Worth It?

I'm sure that we all have wondered at times, "Is any of this college stuff worth it?" Especially during weeks like presumed "dead week" and finals week, this seems like a common question. With the current economy and the behavior or employers, this seems an ever increasing sentiment of college students. This article is interesting because it highlights how college grads are meeting a difficult job market and not finding what they hoped. With roughly half of grads being unemployed or underemployed after graduation, it is hard to be optimistic about what awaits us. Good luck Seniors!

Graduation is not all it is cracked up to be

Find Meaning

What does any of consumer behavior teach us without meaning? Nothing. Whether it's in the application of these concepts and ideas towards our careers, or just how we apply them to our own consumption patterns, without meaning, it's all useless. This meaning does not necessarily mean that we need a "higher power" at the root of our decisions or some existential endeavor. All meaning needs is some sort of purpose behind it. Without meaning, why care? Without meaning, why would we even look into consumer behavior?

Everyone Sees Something Different

An interesting video on how different people react to the same stimulus and how to change or adapt to different audiences.

The Silence is Killing Me...

http://games.yahoo.com/blogs/unplugged/quietest-place-earth-mutes-sounds-messes-head-212556719.html

This article is incredibly interesting. We are so used to the constant noise that we experience everyday that silence causes our minds to create or amplify what little there is when noise is absent. As stated in the article, companies like Harley Davidson even use this room for testing their products noise without outside interference taking effect. Similar to the film The Persuaders, we are constantly bombarded by stuff everyday. It turns out, the way to rise above the noise or stand out may not be in being the loudest or most noticeable, but rather being the quietest?

Gender Traits and Stereotypes

The commercial below is a great example of making a product sex-typed. I find it humorous how a handlebar mustache is presented as awkward for most situations, but when it comes down to it, it's a symbol of pure strength, which then turns the awkward into the magnificent. It is great how they try to utilize a mustache that is rarely seen ( or pulled off for that matter) as a symbol of masculinity to associate with beer. Beer always seems to find those things that make a man a.....well, a man I suppose.

Expectations

Why do I buy things? Because I expect them to do something. That something will be a task and the tasks can be from a variety of areas from fixing something else, to filling a "void." Essentially, I buy because of what I think the product will provide/do, and not necessarily because of what I know it will do. One example of this expectation theory is in the Coke vs. Pepsi battle. Both brands have had their own taste tests in which they find that people prefer their own soda. This is possible because Pepsi does a blind taste test and Coke does a test in which the subjects know which sodas they are consuming. Coke dominates Pepsi in the known category because people expect Coke to be better. Coke is the classic beverage, the age-old traditional beverage, and when people know which one it is, they expect it to be better, and then experience it as such. So, do expectations actually influence our experience of a product? Absolutely. If I think that something is the best, and then experience it, I will probably think that the experience was actually better than it really was. I'm sure we've all had this experience.