Advertising and the Seven Sins of Memory

Imperfections in memory have obvious implications for the successful processing of advertising. Even if a positive intent is achieved through an advert, a memory malfunction can ruin it all for the marketer.

The Sin of Transience
Forgetting something that naturally occurs over time may be thought of as transience. This implies that people 'recall' from advertising is much more likely to reflect a generic description of what is expected about a brand rather than the specific benefits that are a part of the message.

encourage more elaborative encoding to help reduce transience is to relate information that target audience is interested in remembering with something they already know.

The Sin of Absent-Mindedness
Absent mindedness manifests itself both failing to remember past experiences as well as failing to remember to do something in the future.
Because on is more likely to pay partial attention rather full attention to advertising , familiarity with the advert is more likely than the specifics. Spaced exposures generally result in better memory.

The Sin of Blocking
All-too familiar experience of recognizing someone but not being able to remember their name. This is blocking. An association with the encoded information in the brain is not made. It is also what can lead to remembering of a product name but not a brand name.
Have benefits unique to a brand name to enable better association.

The Sin of Misattribution
If one correctly remembers something learned, but attributes it to the wrong source. 'unconscious transference'
Benefit must be linked to the brand- memory linking

The Sin of Suggestibility
Occurs when one tends to include information that has been learned from an outside source as something personally experienced.
This sin in the world of advertising might actually come as a blessing. Advertising that utilises questions that remind people of a favourable brand association could occasion a 'memory' for that positive experience, even if it never occurred.

The Sin of Bias
This sin reflects how currnt understandings, beliefs and feelings have the ability to distort how one interprets new experiences and the memory of them.

• Contingency and change bias
• Hindsight bias
• Egocentric bias

Include personal references in advertising and other marketing communication.

The Sin of Persistence
Emotionally charged experiences are better remembered than less emotional occasions. The sin of persistence involves remembering things you wish you would forget, and it is strongly associated with one's emotional experiences.
Emotionally-charged information automatically attracts attention, and even in the briefest exposure, the emotional memory will encode information.