****Please forgive any and all transcription errors as this was transcribed by Otter.ai.****

Nancy Harhut 0:00

Hi, I'm Nancy Harhut, and you're listening to A Shark’s Perspective!

(Music - shark theme)

Kenneth Kinney 0:20

Welcome back and thank you for joining A Shark’s Perspective.

Kenneth Kinney 0:23

I am Kenneth Kinney, but friends call me "Shark". I'm a keynote speaker, a strategist, a shark diver, host of the show, and your Chief Shark Officer.

Kenneth Kinney 0:31

If you're trying to get better performance out of your marketing, then you obviously need to take a lot of factors into account. A lot of it's getting the right message to the right person at the right time. But when it's still not performing well enough, then what do you do more content more social or more advertising? Or is it voodoo and magic parlor tricks? Or maybe it's also putting that same message the right way, in a way that's brain friendly? And if you wanted to lead into instinctive responses, then how would you use behavioral science in marketing?

Kenneth Kinney 1:00

A three-time guest you may remember from episodes 85 and 171, Nancy Harhut is a creative marketer, a behavioral scientist, a speaker, and the author of “Using Behavioral Science in Marketing: Drive Customer Action and Loyalty by Prompting Instinctive Responses".

Kenneth Kinney 1:15

And on this episode, we'll discuss some three-peat Bostonians, human behavior triggers ham, bacon and turkey, rally bad behavioral science jokes, a lot of research in a book marketing that's brain friendly, talking the right way to an audience without talking over them. Behavioral Science and storytelling economist in the information gap theory, being curious and going beyond the who, what, when, where, how and who labeling and framing the effects of social media and how social proof affects behavior time swimming or not in Cape Cod, Zeigarnik and Vaughan rest are hanging out in Beantown, great fried foods and a lot lot more.

Kenneth Kinney 1:47

So let's tune into behavioral scientist with a shark who is out early on good behavior on this episode of A Shark’s Perspective.

[intro music]

Kenneth Kinney 1:58

Nancy, welcome back to A Shark’s Perspective. Welcome to a three peat. Tell us a brief overview of your background, your career to date, I know everybody's heard it on episodes, 85 and 171, but tell us where you are in the world with what you're doing.

Nancy Harhut 2:11

Shark thanks so much for having me back. I am delighted to be here. So you know what I started my career as a copywriter, you know, primarily in agencies doing direct response, copywriting, rose up through the ranks, became a creative director. About six years ago, I co founded my own my own shop HPT marketing, it's a boutique agency. And what we do is we focus on applying behavioral science to marketing best practices. And what that basically means is, you know, behavioral science is the study of how people make decisions. Marketers, obviously need people to make decisions, behavioral scientists who find that there are certain decision making shortcuts that people routinely rely on. And as marketers if we can get out ahead of that, we can use that to our advantage, we can use what science has found about how people behave in order to influence that behavior. So that's what I specialize in. And I just published a book called using behavioral science and marketing.

Kenneth Kinney 3:03

Yeah, we're gonna talk about that in a minute.

Nancy Harhut 3:05

Okay, all right.

Kenneth Kinney 3:06

Well, you're jumping ahead.

Nancy Harhut 3:08

I'm jumping ahead. Alright. Don't want to jump ahead. But anyway, so that's that's who I am these days. I am the chief creative officer and co founder at HBT Marketing. HBT stands for Human Behavior triggers, because we're all about adding those human behavior triggers into the work we do for our clients.

Kenneth Kinney 3:24

It is not ham, bacon, turkey.

Nancy Harhut 3:26

It is not ham, bacon, turkey. Nope.

Kenneth Kinney 3:28

Sorry, I wasn't sure. So you're in the exclusive three-peat club. There'll be a ceremony later, a green jacket, you know, the whole nine yards, but most of the three Peters I've had on the show seem to all have come from Boston, which is a weird trend with Tamsin and Tom and other friends of ours. But I once tried a behavioral science show called you that didn't land so hopefully you've long forgotten about it, because it was that bad of a joke. But as a former stand up, I need a chance to recover. So I'm gonna give you these real quick. How do you know Santa Claus is a real person?

Nancy Harhut 3:57

I don't know. How do you know Santa Claus is a real person.

Kenneth Kinney 4:00

He suffers from present bias. Oh, I like it a little bit better. Why was the neuroscience movie rated R?

Nancy Harhut 4:09

Why was the neuroscience movie rated R?

Kenneth Kinney 4:11

Because it had pre frontal nudity. These are not great, okay. They're only just bad behavioral science jokes. What do you call a sociologist who is just okay if their job

Nancy Harhut 4:24

What do you call a sociologist who's just okay the job?

Kenneth Kinney 4:26

A so-sociologist, ah here all week, and I've already convinced you to try the veal. Alright, so let's talk about the book and what's really important. “Using Behavioral Science in Marketing: Drive Customer Action and Loyalty by Prompting Instinctive Response". You wasted so much time on those jokes. I wanted to get to this book, but let's talk a little bit about it. In all seriousness, this is an incredible book. I am thoroughly impressed. Tell me a little bit about what the impetus was that drove you into this. You and I have talked about the same topics for years but what drove you to write this brilliant 270-something page book?

Nancy Harhut 5:03

Well, thank you, thank you so much for your kind words, I really appreciate them, because That's high praise coming from you. And what what drove me to write it was I think just, you know, like, like you, I'm a big believer in behavioral science, and I've been using it for my clients, I've been seeing it work. You know, I speak about it at different conferences, and people will come up to me like a year or two or three later and say, you know, I saw you, you know, two years ago with this conference, tried some of the stuff you suggested, and it worked. And so that always felt good, you know, and, and obviously, not everything is going to work for everyone. But, you know, I heard that often enough, that I thought it would be great if I could get the word out to more people, you know, I mean, I can only work with a certain number of people, I can only speak at a certain number of conferences. And I'm such a believer in behavioral science that I wanted any marketer, you know, big or small, you know, solopreneur, or, you know, somebody in a large company or a large agency to be able to tap into these, these resources, because they're easy to apply, and they can be incredibly effective. So I thought, you know, what, I have an opportunity to write a book, I'm going to do it and you know, if people are interested, because it'll be able to tap into it. And if not, I'll fail miserably, but at least I've done it.

Kenneth Kinney 6:12

Well, you got praise from quite a few really smart people. I was thrilled to be one of those mentioned, I noticed you rank Chris Brogan praise Robert Cialdini and Mark Shaffer's praise slightly above mine. I won't hold that against you.

Nancy Harhut 6:26

I'll have to speak to the publisher about that. Let me make a note of it.

Kenneth Kinney 6:29

Yeah, they're fantastic people. There's so many, so much wonderful praise in there, Tamsen Webster, Ann Handley. Lots of great folks. But why should someone especially a marketer read a book like this? Should they just rely on Google and Facebook and data to tell them everything? Because I love how you set this up about how human behavior and instinct really drives a lot of the action that a lot of marketers don't necessarily think of or forget about.

Nancy Harhut 6:52

So I think there's there's probably like a two fold answer. You know, why should you read the book? Well, you know, one reason is, I've done a lot of the research for you, you marketers are notoriously busy. You and I are marketers, we're busy. You know, marketers are notoriously busy. I've spent years kind of doing the research collecting the case studies, doing the testing. And so I've saved you a lot of time if you're a marketer, because I've compiled all of that for you. And then I think the other reason is, a lot of times in marketing, we forget how people make decisions, we think if we can just get the right message to the right person at the right time, to give us the right response. And then when we don't quite get that right response, or we don't get enough of it. Well, you know, and what we're forgetting is, it's got to be the right message to the right person at the right time, the right way. And when I say the right way, what I mean is, it's got to be a way that's, that's brain friendly. You know, again, behavioral scientists have identified these decision making shortcuts that people routinely rely on that we just default to. So why not use that to our advantage as as marketers, and you know, as you read the book, you'll probably have a mixture of Oh, yeah, I do that. That's why it works. And oh, wow, I never even thought to try that. Got to work it into my next campaign. So it's, it's a nice balance of, I think you're telling you why something might work, how you might be able to make it work better. And also giving you ideas that you maybe hadn't even thought of before that could really work for the particular product or service that that you're promoting?

Kenneth Kinney 8:19

Well, I want to go back because I talk about this for marketers, but for all people, I want to bring it back to bring it back a little bit in the sense that you and I just spoke at a conference last week for entrepreneurs, I speak a lot of corporate Association events. But a lot of times I think that especially when we're talking about marketing, we often speak over the normal people running a business who don't have time to spend all day thinking about marketing and behavioral science or ad copy or anything else like that content marketing, sometimes we're just speaking over their heads, how can someone who's not a marketer, take this and really apply it back to their regular business, especially if you're an entrepreneur who doesn't have a big team? And they're wearing a lot of hats?

Nancy Harhut 8:58

That's actually a that's a great point, as well as a great question, you know, and it's called using behavioral science in marketing, as opposed to using behavioral science for marketers, you know, because the truth is, this is a great resource for anybody who needs to create or approve marketing that might not be their sole job, their sole function, they might be, you know, an entrepreneur, or they might be in another area of a business, but somehow or the other. You know, everybody needs to touch marketing, marketing. You know, a lot of people have said marketing is everybody's job in the company. And when you're a company of one, it's, it's certainly part of your job too. And, you know, the thing is, you don't have a lot of time to read up on it, you don't have a lot of time to study, you don't have a lot of time to, you know, to try to figure things out. And if you can get a leg up by applying some of the the tactics, the easy to apply tactics, tactics in the book, you know, it'll put you out ahead of the competition, you'll spend a little bit less time trying to create marketing that successful you'll, you'll give yourself an advantage when you put the marketing messages out there. And that will allow you to turn your attention to a million other things that are on your plate that that are required to successfully run a business.

Kenneth Kinney 10:05

And it's like when we talk last week as well. This is the kind of book that you can almost take and apply to a lot of different industries realtor's, FinTech, medical dental. So let's dive in a little bit further into the book and go to chapter six, elaborate, if you will, on how behavioral science can apply to storytelling.

Nancy Harhut 10:22

Sure, sure. So I'll just I'll just jump back to your previous point for just a second to say that there are lots of examples and case studies from b2b b2c not for profit, you know, finance, education, telecom, I mean, I tried to get in as many different verticals as possible. So, you know, to your point, you know, if you're working in in one of these verticals, you don't have to be a marketer, you just have to be in business, and you're going to find something useful. And then storytelling, storytelling is interesting. Storytelling has become a bit of a buzzword, I think, in the you know, in the industry, you think. But you know, but for good reason. I mean, stories are impactful, they're effective, they're persuasive. Way before the written word stories were how information was passed from generation to generation. But there's, there's kind of a brain science secret to storytelling, and that is, stories affect your brain differently than facts and figures do and sometimes, you know, when we're creating our marketing messages, when we're creating our advertising, we think we've got to get the facts and figures out there, the you know, the statistics and the speeds and the feeds. And, and all of that is important, but the truth of the matter is, you know, people make decisions for emotional reasons, and then they later justify those decisions for rational reasons. The emotional reasons often come with a stories, you know, stories kind of stir up emotions, stories are processed differently than than rational thought is story stick with you longer. There's a researcher from want to say Princeton, his name is Hassan, Yuri, Hassan. And he says the that stories are the only way to take your idea and plant it in the brain of another person and make them think it's their own. Now I'm, you know, summarizing or, you know, what he said, Those are his exact words. But that that is his thought it's one of the, it is the only way, you can basically take your idea, drop it into the head of your prospect, and make that prospect feel like it's their own. And that is an incredibly powerful tactic for someone to have if you're trying to do marketing, because, hey, you know, people may or may not listen to what someone else says. But they rarely argue with the conclusions that they draw, they really argue with themselves, right? So if they think it's their idea, they're much more likely to act on it.

Kenneth Kinney 12:35

I often talk about curiosity. So I really like chapter nine. And let's talk about the information gap theory, prompting consumers to take action through curiosity, and the need to know unpack that,

Nancy Harhut 12:46

if you will. Sure. So there's a there's a neuro economist named George Lowenstein, and he's the one who actually coined the term information gap theory. But very simply, what it means is, if there's a gap between what somebody knows, and what they want to know, they'll take action to close the gap. And again, if we're trying to market our products and services, if we want people to do business with us, we need them to take action. So a great way to get people to do what we want them to do is to point out an information gap to identify an area that somebody is interested in, pose a question that they don't know the answer to, but would like to know the answer to, and that will then prompt them to, to try to find that answer to take the action to find the answer. A great way to do it is to use the five W's and the one H who, what, where, when, why, and how. That's something I learned years ago when I was getting my journalism degree. But what they taught us in journalism school was if you write your newspaper stories, and answer those questions, who, what, where, when, why, how fairly early in the story, you'll get eyeballs, you'll get readership, because that's what people want to know. And it turns out that the same thing applies to advertising and marketing, you know, people want to know the answers to who, what, where, when, why, how, and then you can actually go a little bit beyond that and talk about, you know, things in terms of other superlatives, the best, the worst, the most the least, but these are the things that people want to know. And there's some scientific evidence that suggests that the reward is an actually obtaining the information like our brain releases chemicals that make us feel good when we actually discover new information. So not only do we want to get the answer for purely practical reasons, but there's a physiological a brain chemical reaction that we have when we discover something new, that feels great. And that then again, fuels us to keep looking for answers to things that we don't have answers to.

Kenneth Kinney 14:34

Later on in chapter 12. You talked about labeling and framing, how do we apply this to help make people see things our way?

Nancy Harhut 14:42

So labeling and framing is really interesting. So, researchers have found that when you label somebody as part of a particular group, they will start to behave as a member of that group, even if they hadn't previously thought of themselves as a member of that group previously, so research was read a study, I think it was in Chicago, and it was before an election was coming up. So they went, and they interviewed a bunch of voting age people about the upcoming election. And they asked them about the issues on the ballot and the candidates on the ballot. And they talked to them about, you know, their personal demographics, and you know, all the kinds of things you would expect a researcher would ask you. And then what the researchers did is they arbitrarily randomly assigned people into one of two, two groups. And they went to one of the groups and they said, You guys are the more politically active, so they labeled them as more politically active. And then they watched in the ensuing days as the election came up. And they saw that 15%, more of the people who were told they were a member of the more politically active group, 15%, more of those people showed up at the polls than the group that was not told they were politically active. And that was the only difference because people were just randomly assigned one or the other group. But the label, hey, you're more politically active person was enough to make those people more likely to show up at the polls. So what this means to us is, you know, if we sell a product, we, you know, we might want to say, you know, you're someone who has discerning taste in wine, or, you know, you're somebody who really appreciates the, you know, the cut of a fine suit, or, you know, you just, you label somebody as a, you're, you're somebody who's really concerned about the environment, you label somebody that way, and they will begin to behave in that fashion. So if you're somebody who really loves fine wine, well, you're probably going to buy the wine that they have for sale. Now, of course, the caveat is, if you're, if you're selling, I don't know, really good grass fed beef, and you're telling a vegetarian, that they're, you know, you know, a diehard carnivore, that's not going to work out, you know, obviously, if you find the label objectionable, it's not going to have the same effect. But what if it's neutral to positive, and you're told, Hey, you're somebody who's responsible, you're someone whose career minded people will start to behave that way. And then in terms of framing, be able scientists have found that the words that we choose to describe our products or services or companies actually influenced the way people see them, and the way they respond to them. So it's, the classic example is this glass is half empty, this glass is half full, how I describe it to you, influences how you see it, and then how you respond to it. But there have been a lot of studies that show that just changing words, you know, two words can kind of convey the same information, but you choose one or the other. And it can actually make a big difference in terms of people's response. So framing can be very powerful.

Kenneth Kinney 17:29

How much of social media was an impact on your research in this book, because you talk a lot about social proofing in here as well. And I was thinking about how addicted we are to social media in the US, compared to a lot of other countries. And I'm curious that that came up as a question or a concern or an afterthought in your research in regards to how much time we spend on Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn and Tiktok. And Instagram, versus what somebody in another country, say, in Eastern Europe, for example, doesn't spend time on every day.

Nancy Harhut 18:01

Yeah, so. So social media in this, you know, the effects of social media are not my specialty, per se, but but it did, it did come up somewhat in the book only because social media is connecting us in ways that just, you know, we didn't have before. And so as a result, we're much more susceptible. I think, as you were saying to social proof, because, you know, it's unavoidable, we open up our Twitter feed or our Facebook page, or we start to watch, you know, tick tock videos, and suddenly, we're just bombarded with information that maybe we wouldn't have had access to before. And when we see people doing things, or buying things or liking things, we start to feel that we too, should buy those things, do those things like those things. And these are, you know, maybe people that we know, but very often people we don't know, people who live way far away from us, but because they're bringing these things to our attention, it does have an influence on us. So it you know, it can influence our purchasing habits, it can make us aware of things that we weren't aware of before. It can make us feel like we're losing out on things and or we're missing out on things. And we know that FOMO Fear Of Missing Out is is a huge motivator. So so there absolutely is a is an effect. There is definitely an effective of social media that we can leverage with behavioral science.

Kenneth Kinney 19:14

Whether or not it's something with 100,000 likes on Tiktok or Sally H or John F from Des Moines on a review site. I still find it fascinating how people you don't have a clue if they're anything like you at all have like something and then you're drawn into leaned into. I find it fascinating. Let's talk a little bit about temporal landmarks in temporal discounting. Elaborate, if you will, a little bit on the effects of time on behavior. Yeah,

Nancy Harhut 19:41

so those those are two interesting behavioral science principles that are almost like a yin and yang. So temporal landmarks is all about certain kind of inflection points in our lives where we, we believe we have a fresh slate we basically close the door on our past lives, our past selves, and we opened the door to our future selves. So New Year's Day, you know, is a great example of that, like we all make our New Year's resolutions and you know, a few weeks in, we've abandoned them, but at New Year's Day is a huge one. But so our birthday, so our anniversaries, so are Mondays Mondays, the beginning of the week, you know, it's it's rare for someone to say, You know what, next Wednesday, I am going to start my exercise routine. But they will say next Monday, I've got to start, you know, so there's there are these, these times these these finite periods on the calendar. Some of them we all share, like New Year's Day are some of our very personal like an individual's birthday. But there are times on the calendar where we feel you know what, maybe I didn't do as well as I'd hoped before, but I have a fresh start now, this is what I'm going to do. And at these periods of temporal landmarks, people actually feel more energized, they feel more confident that they're going to be able to achieve what it is they want to achieve. And so as a result, they might be more likely to make a purchase to sign up for service because they're, you know, they're feeling energized, they're feeling they can do this. So it's all about, you know, the person you used to be there gone, the person that you are, now they're the person who's going to do it. Now contrast that with temporal discounting, what behavioral scientists have found is, people have a tendency to discount future rewards, and focus on the present, you talked about present focus bias, it's very similar, right, where we're much more likely to go for sooner, I'll be at smaller rewards, then, more distant later. But even larger rewards, you know, we want what we want. Now I take, you know, many, many studies have shown you'll take $5 now versus, you know, $15, tomorrow, but then when tomorrow comes, you're like, why don't I hold out for the 15 bucks. So in order to overcome temporal landmarks overdue in order to overcome temporal discounting, we need to get people to understand that who they are today, the same hopes and dreams and wants and likes and dislikes is going to be who they are tomorrow. And that's particularly important if you're in an industry where what you're selling doesn't have an immediate payoff, you know, you go to the grocery store, and you buy a bag of doughnuts, or a beer or something or a new dress, you know, that has a pretty immediate payoff. But if you're selling retirement funds, if you're selling insurance, if you're selling education, the payoffs are down the road, if at all, and it's really hard to get people to, to see themselves and to make that investment in a future payoff. And so what we have to do is we have to bridge that gap and get people to see who they are today is the same person as who they are. Tomorrow, researchers have actually found that when they when they ran research, people thought of their future selves as strangers, they my future self is as much of a stranger to me, as you know, the guy who just drove by me on the street, it was really interesting when they put people into fMRI machines and watch how their brains lit up. It was like, we just have no concept of who we are in the future. So on the one hand, temporal landmarks are great, because it's like who you are in the past is gone, you're a new person. On the other hand, temporal discounting requires us to say who you are today is really going to be the same person you are in three months in a year in three years. And therefore, if you're someone today, who values having enough money to do what you want to do, you're going to feel that way when you retire, and you better save some of that money so that you have the money to go to the movies on a Friday night on a whim, you know, so to two different halves of the same coin. Very interesting, the effects of timing on people's behavior.

Kenneth Kinney 23:37

Well, Nancy, I've asked you this multiple times, what's your favorite kind of shark is and why? And you've given great answers both times one, it was me, which was the obvious answer. And two, it was the great white, but are you spending a lot of time in the water off the cape up there?

Nancy Harhut 23:51

Yeah, so we're here. I'm not in Cape Cod right now. But I often am in the summer, and we're really having a shark issue. Challenge. I don't know. I want to say problem because you might, you know, that might bother you, but they just you've triggered me, Nancy, what's gonna trigger you I don't want to do that. You know, I just read I haven't been to Nantucket. But I just read this a hammerhead, which I know you guys talk about a lot on your podcast. They just saw Hammerhead off of Nantucket. But I spent a lot of time in Truro. And they are routinely closing the beaches down, you know, sometimes several times a day for an hour. And, you know, so it's it's a little disconcerting, and I was reading something about the question posed and the the article was are, are the sharks coming in closer to the shore, and it might be because the fish that they're preying on are coming in closer to shore. So it's it's a little nerve wracking, but I always remember what you told me and what I mentioned in the book, which is, you know what, you just have to remember that you're in their territory, and you've got to act accordingly. And so I'm still trying to enjoy my my beach time but, but it's never far from mind, to be honest with you.

Kenneth Kinney 24:55

Well, Nancy, it's that special time this show. You've done this several times before. Are you ready for the fight? Most interesting and important questions that you're going to be asked today?

Nancy Harhut 25:02

It's going to be the high point of my day shark.

Kenneth Kinney 25:05

Boy, you've got a low day. You set the bar too high with this. Alright, number one, Hedwig Von Restorff or Bluma Zeigarnik? And only nerds like us will know this.

Nancy Harhut 25:15

Oh my goodness. All right, so so Von Resdorff is all about things that are different standing out and Zeigarnik is all about remembering things until you complete them. So

Kenneth Kinney 25:29

...exactly. Isolation versus puzzles.

Nancy Harhut 25:31

There you go. Perfect. I'm gonna go with with Von Restorff. I'm a big believer in you know, we noticed a we're hardwired we're absolutely hardwired to notice things that are different. They stand out, they stay with us, that's a great skill for a marketer to have. They're both really good, but a great

Kenneth Kinney 25:48

I use them both in a lot of presentations, because love to share the picture of the red apple in the big bunch of green apples, and also as Zegarnick with puzzle pieces and trying to put everything together. Alright, number three, I've known you as a consultant slash speaker. But now you're spending a lot more time as an author putting out this book. Do you enjoy speaking more or writing?

Nancy Harhut 26:11

Ooh, that's a tough one. I enjoy both very much for different reasons.

Kenneth Kinney 26:16

It's good that you even said that with writing because a lot of people find that to be too laborious and painful.

Nancy Harhut 26:21

I but I get I'm a copywriter by trade, you know? So So I liked them both. I think I just liked them for different reasons.

Kenneth Kinney 26:29

Well, you gotta pick one or the other though. It's Sophie's Choice.

Nancy Harhut 26:32

Well, I suppose I spend more time writing not necessarily writing a book, but just writing for my clients and writing to persuade people. So if I had to choose, I think I would, I'd go with writing. But if there are any conference organizers listening, I absolutely would love to speak for you.

Kenneth Kinney 26:46

Yeah, your publisher will appreciate the writing the content organizers at conferences, definitely consider her as the speaker. All right. Number three, sociology or psychology?

Nancy Harhut 26:57

Psychology.

Kenneth Kinney 26:58

Why so?

Nancy Harhut 27:00

I think it's just a little bit, perhaps more tied into how the brain works. And that fascinates me.

Kenneth Kinney 27:10

It's the why behind the sociology. Alright, number four, you've got friends coming into Boston, they want a day to do something fun and interesting. Are you recommending they go see a Red Sox game at Fenway Park, or a trip and hike on the Freedom Trail?

Nancy Harhut 27:25

That depends on who the friends are? Right? I mean, when my when my niece comes up, she's all about the Red Sox, which is great. I have other friends who are real history buffs. So it really just depends on what they're interested in. Because both are good choices.

Kenneth Kinney 27:39

If I were coming up there and hanging out, what would you choose?

Nancy Harhut 27:42

I'm gonna I'm gonna pick you as a baseball guy.

Kenneth Kinney 27:47

100%.

Nancy Harhut 27:47

Now, Fenway Park is classic. It's really small. You got the green monster, we could go, we could see a good game, have a couple of beers, maybe go out for dinner in the Fenway Park area afterwards. I don't know why am I wrong about this?

Kenneth Kinney 28:01

No, you're right. I've done the Freedom Trail. It's great. But I'll take Fenway Park all day long. It's just more of my thing. And number five, I've asked you biscuits or cornbread a couple times before and your answer was corporate, so we got to switch it up. You're not a vegetarian or vegan? Are you? I am not okay. You're not good. That makes the sixth question a lot easier. Let's say you're having lunch or dinner down here in my part of the world. Fried Catfish or fried chicken.

Nancy Harhut 28:25

Fried chicken. Why? So? I'm not a huge seafood fan, which is odd. I knew I'm here in New England. I grew up in New England. I'm currently living in New England. And it's not that I dislike seafood but fried chicken, man. Like, yeah, totally fried chicken. But if you had ribs on the menu, that would be tempting to know

Kenneth Kinney 28:46

Yeah. I could have asked ribs or a good lobster roll question. But all of them are great answers. Nancy, where can people find out more about you get a copy of this awesome book. Keep up with what you're doing a more.

Nancy Harhut 28:57

So you can follow me on twitter I'm at nharhut and H-A-R-H-U-T. I'm on LinkedIn and Facebook. My agency is HBT human behavior triggers HBT Marketing. We're based here in Massachusetts. We post a lot of information on our blog interviews and podcasts and just you know, keeping people up to date on what's going on in social sciences and behavioral sciences. And then of course, you know, my book is available at Amazon and Kogan page and any place any place, great books are sold. So get your copy. I'd really appreciate it.

Kenneth Kinney 29:32

Absolutely. Nancy until the fourth installment that we do together. Thank you so much for being with us today on A Shark’s Perspective.

Nancy Harhut 29:39

Shark. Thank you. I really enjoyed it.

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Kenneth Kinney 29:46

So there was my third conversation with Nancy Harhut, who was previously on episodes 85 and 171. And she's a creative marketer, a behavioral scientist, a speaker and the author of “Using Behavioral Science in Marketing: Drive Customer Action and Loyalty by Prompting Instinctive Response". Let's take a look at three key takeaways from my conversation with her.

Kenneth Kinney 30:06

First, why should marketers think about using behavioral science, it's something forgotten way too often, as much as we think that data drives the world or Google or social media, when you focus on the greatest content or ads ever produced, eventually, what drives it more is human behavior. It drives much of the decision making process. And as Nancy said, and I quote, a lot of times in marketing, we forget about how people make decisions. So true. And she goes on to add that we often think that if we get the right message to the right person at the right time, then it's all going to work. But she adds that it also needs to be in the right way, ie brain friendly. In sometimes it's just adding that balance to get something to work, so be smart.

Kenneth Kinney 30:46

Second, a cautionary note for all of us explaining this to our groups, or bosses, or even our audiences, we quite often talk over them. A lot of the good marketing advice may even sound like inside baseball. And if you're not in air quotes inside, then you have to remember to help people solve problems. A lot of people, especially entrepreneurs, don't have time to delve into everything you may have convinced them to try. That's a good tactic, or a story or whatever. I would simply caution all of us to be more practical, and the use of our application of marketing words, and well be more brain friendly. That's generally what actually resonates with people that buy your product or service.

Kenneth Kinney 31:22

Third, storytelling is such a flippin buzzword. But she goes on to cite a Princeton professor who reminds us that stories are great, but they have to personally resonate with a listener if you want people to act on them. And that's a good story and a good application of behavioral science.

Kenneth Kinney 31:37

Got a question? Send me an email to Kenneth at a shark's perspective.com.

Kenneth Kinney 31:41

Thank you again for the privilege of your time, and I'm so thankful to everyone who listens.

Kenneth Kinney 31:45

Please consider writing a review it sure would be helpful and let me know your thoughts on the show.

Kenneth Kinney 31:49

And I don't know if I could apply behavioral science to diving but trust me when I'm down there. I'm not too worried about it. So enjoy your day and don't let your worries get you down. Come dive deeper in join us on the next episode of A Shark’s Perspective.

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