SPH and NeuroTrend launch neuro-marketing consumer insights lab

Singapore

ADVERTISERS who are clients of Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) will soon be able to delve deep into the minds of consumers, to see how they tick.

The media company has teamed up with neuroscience technology company NeuroTrend to launch a neuro-marketing consumer insights lab in Singapore, the two companies announced at the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) on Tuesday.

NeuroTrend is the Singapore-based entity of JSC NeuroTrend in Russia, and the neuro-marketing lab is NeuroTrend's first one outside its home country.

The lab will be located in the SPH News Centre in Toa Payoh.

NeuroTrend chief executive Natalia Galkina said neuro-marketing provides more accurate data to advertisers than traditional research methods because it bypasses the mental filter people have when they answer questions.

She added: "It is today considered a serious research area that is a scientifically sound, genuinely interesting field in cognitive science, where the response to products and consumer decision-making is understood on the level of body and mind."

Participants who take part in the lab exercises will be fitted with non-invasive hardware, such as an eye tracker, a wireless headset, a polygraph and a facial-reader camera.

The hardware collects an integrated set of signals from the brain - eye movements, facial expressions and other physiological measurements. The company said that this method is the first of its kind.

NeuroTrend's patented neuroscience software then uses algorithms and Big Data to analyse the information obtained, focusing on the parameters of interest, emotions, attention and memory.

A report is generated to advise the media company on how a print or video advertisement can be optimised for maximum impact.

This next-generation lab can process five respondents at a time, allowing a round of testing to take three days to a week to complete.

On how SPH will use the technology to benefit advertisers, Ignatius Low, SPH's head of media solutions, integrated marketing, said: "The customer insights and intelligence generated will add value to their marketing strategies and campaigns, helping them to effectively target and engage their audiences across our multiple media platforms."

He pointed out that SPH itself can also benefit from the technology.

The company can learn more about advertisements on its traditional platforms - such as print and radio - whose effects are less documented than those of their digital counterparts.

In a separate announcement on the same day, SPH Magazines, a wholly-owned subsidiary of SPH, has partnered with Times Publishing to digitise and electronically distribute the latter's titles on SPH Magazine's online platform.

The partnership will enable advertisers to plan their advertising campaigns across an expanded catalogue of titles.