What Advertisers Know (and parents can use to build happier families)
3 Pillars Parent Newsletter #30
By: Glenn Collins and Catherine Lynch
Dear Awesome Parents,
It’s October, and you know what that means….you start seeing ads for all the things the retailers are hoping you’ll buy for Christmas presents! Marketers are smart, and their wisdom can make us even better parents. Enjoy!
What Advertisers Know (and parents can use to build happier families)
Have you ever carefully laid out the reasons why your kid should do something, sure they’ll understand your impeccable logic, and jump right to it? But instead they dig in their heels and absolutely refuse? If you’re anything like us, it probably happens all the time! Sometimes the rational approach works, but more often than not, it doesn’t - at least not by itself. Logic, facts, and reason usually aren’t enough.
Advertisers, on the other hand, are masters at convincing us (and our kids!) to buy their products. What do they know that we don’t?
Advertisers know behavior is motivated by feelings, not reason and logic.
Facts and logic can help sway us one way or the other but at a fundamental level, we generally make decisions based on how we feel about something. Getting us to feel is step one.
They know that if they can get us to feel an emotion we’ll be more likely to remember and buy their product. Happiness, humor, sadness, nostalgia, pride; it doesn’t even matter what emotion it is. Successful ad campaigns have been built around all of them.
Here’s an excellent example. The ad is for Dodge Ram trucks. It uses still images and a speech by Paul Harvey. It doesn’t mention, or even show, a truck until the very end. Nonetheless it is an extremely powerful, moving, and memorable ad precisely because it targets our emotions so well.
There are lots of ways to get our kids to feel, and parents instinctively understand feelings’ power to motivate. Any parent who’s made their kid feel excited, sorry, or embarrassed has used feelings to change behavior.
Another way we make them feel is by punishment or just the threat of it. Either one creates a fear of being hurt or deprived of something. Bribery is also popular - there’s a feeling of anticipation - something good is coming soon!
These work, of course, but there can be a steep cost to the relationship, both now and in the future. Especially if they become the go-to methods. There are better and more positive ways to leverage our kid’s feelings and motivate them to do what needs to be done.
There are powerful positive feelings we can evoke in our kids that strengthen the relationship and make them much more likely to do what we want. Feelings like love, respect, trust, belonging, and purpose.
Here’s a few of our favorite methods to create the positive feelings that pave the way to the behavior you want:
The Power of WE: “Let’s do this together.” This works well for unpleasant things. Especially when combined with empathy. “I know washing dishes is yucky, but it needs to be done. Let’s do it together.”
Prioritize Relationship: When we care about someone and have a good relationship with them, we want to do the things they ask us to do. The more love, trust, and respect there is, the better this works.
Family Culture: Our family does this/acts this way and you are a valued member of this family.
Agency: When we give our kids the power to make decisions about things that affect their lives, they are more invested. They have skin in the game.
Fun: We all love to have fun and if you can make an activity more fun, your kids will be more likely to be interested.
Competition: Whether it’s shooting baskets, who cleans their room the fastest, or who checks the most boxes on the vegetable eating checklist, competition is great for increasing the level of interest and feeling.
Reflection:
What’s your go-to approach when you want your kids to do something, and just telling them to do it doesn’t work?
What does your kid feel when you do that?
Home Practice:
What does your kid say “No” about most frequently? Look at the list of strategies (above) and choose two or three that you can easily apply to the activity that brings out your kid’s “No”. Use those strategies before your kid says no. If it doesn’t work, pick another strategy or combine strategies and try again.
September Sunset
Where we live on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, Autumn usually brings some of the most spectacular sunsets of the year, and this year has been no exception.