A Center Store with Curves

Oak Brook, Ill. -- Frito-Lay's neoroscience research aimed at aligning the brand with the female demographic has significantly impacted merchandising and advertising, according to Michelle Adams, now vice president of shopper insights for PepsiCo.Adams, until recently director of shopper insights and the S.M.A.R.T. Learning Center for PepsiCo's Frito-Lay, co-presented "The $7 Trillion Woman: The Female Brain Shopping" with Caroline Winnett, chief marketing officer at neuromarketing research company NeuroFocus. Their presentation focused on marketing to the female brain using Frito-Lay and NeuroFocus research.The presenters cited statistics from AdWeekMedia that women are responsible for $7 million in spending worldwide and control 85% of all purchase decisions, and that 78% of women are considering purchases more carefully. With 27% of households now being headed by single women, "a woman's wallet is more influential than ever before."Winnett said 90% of NeuroFocus' studies show significant differences in gender response. Women look for landmarks and connections, explore territory, prefer faces and are relational. Men look for a target, zone in on the target, systemize and make maps, seek facts and are fascinated by machines. "Those evolutionary influences are hardwired into our brain," she said.Frito-Lay identified key problems to solve via the research: shoppers were not coming down its aisle; those who did found it underwhelming; and the center store was lagging. To align with female shoppers, Frito-Lay used NeuroFocus mobile electroencephalography (EEG) and realistic video methodologies to closely replicate the real-world shopping experience.Traditional store design has historically been dominated by men, which may partially explain why the center store doesn't resonate with women. "One of the things the brain has trained subconsciously to do is stay away from dangerous things," Adams said. "We've basically built a grocery store with a lot of dangerous edges, corners, metal fixtures."Through research, Frito-Lay's "key merchandising principles" are now breaking up the aisles with vertical focus, rounding edges on endcaps to invite her in, connecting to her values, leveraging emotional occasions, featuring her, and including her family and friends."We were a long sea of bags," Adams said. By creating "shoppable sections," or dividing up the aisle, Frito-Lay improved aisle perceptions and performance. "We get significantly higher scores with the new merchandising units," she said.In advertising, the key to connecting with the female brain is to play to her emotions. Frito-Lay now tests all of its ads through NeuroFocus. Among the findings within various advertising categories: Print ads: Geometrical patterns resonate better with men due to their superior spatial processing, while copy has more effect with women due to their superior ability to process language. Among the neurological best practices is to put images on the left, semantics on the right. TV ads: Non-human animated characters resonate better with men, as do ads with collisions, explosions, dials and mechanical devices. Circular ads: Women prefer food images that represent an occasion. They generate higher emotional engagement due to women's emphasis on social interaction. Men prefer images that relate to the indulgence of food and circular ads that are symmetric and well-organized. Women respond well to images that relate to her role as caregiver, or those that promise small rewards for her.Adams summarized with key insights for marketing to the female brain: use collaborative, reciprocal language; emphasize social connections; acknowledge females for their abilities; and deliver positive emotion, as facts by themselves don't work.To put it in perspective, Adams said, "Think about the things that actually bring her joy. It's not doing the laundry, it's not even really grocery shopping. It's the results of those things... It's the joy of your kids looking a certain way."While applying neuroscience to marketing is relatively new, Adams does acknowledge the bottom line. "It's interesting that it's neurologically more effective, but it really, really is important to sell more stuff," she said.

A Center Store with Curves

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