One effect of the publication of Martin Lindstrom’s Buyology book has been a significant uptick in media coverage of neuromarketing. Lindstrom has scored a few high-visibility TV interviews (e.g., Today Show and Australian TV), and plenty of print and online media coverage.
My perception is that neuromarketing news coverage is at an all-time high. Even now, Google News lists 35 neuromarketing stories, which doesn’t sound like much but is far, far above the usual. Surprisingly, although Google news trends shows a huge week-to-week jump in neuromarketing news stories in the buildup to the Buyology launch, the spike doesn’t look much higher than past peaks. Blogs tell a similar though perhaps more dramatic story:
The first chart shows Technorati’s count of blog posts that mention “neuromarketing”, which clearly show a big jump in mid to late October. The interesting part is the density of activity in that period (the area “under the curve”), which is more revealing than the height of the spikes.
If there was any doubt as to the cause of this leap in activity, below is Technorati’s count of posts mentioning “buyology.” It’s no surprise that the two Technorati charts have a lot in common in October and November.
Clearly, Martin Lindstrom’s ongoing publicity success in promoting Buyology is boosting awareness of neurmarketing overall. It’s also bringing neuro-alarmists out of the woodwork, but that’s a topic for another day.
I’m very interested in adding Buyology to my library and I can honestly say that I haven’t read any good books lately.
It’s amazing there are so many alarmists out there. I understand why but I think it is a complete overreaction.