“The Persuaders”

Political consultant Frank Luntz believes that people identify with and like to hear certain words when being advertised to. He believes that reaching your target market is more about the words and phrases used that create the desired connection with the customer than it is about what the company would like to say. In other words people want to hear what they want to hear, whatever words that make them feel the way they want to feel.

In the case of Amy’s Kitchen’s customers, they want to know that the food they are buying is healthy. There are many key words and ways of arranging words that stand out when marketing to the health conscious. For one, “NO” almost always means that the product is without something bad. Examples would be “NO Artificial Ingredients”, “NO Trans Fats”, or “NO GMO’s”. Some of Amy’s frozen dinner labels read, “NO Dairy” or “NO Gluten” which are ingredients that would only concern someone with an allergy or sensitivity or a vegan, others may not even know what gluten is. Health conscious customers, like Amy’s, are most likely drawn to many products labeled with the word “NO” when shopping for other goods such as detergent, where you may read, “NO Dyes or Perfumes”. Another popular word that reads as the elimination of something bad is “FREE”, “FREE of Harsh Chemicals” for example.

As consumers are exposed to the same phrases again and again they begin to take on an entire concept or belief. If a frequent purchaser of products that are targeted toward healthy eaters or the environmentally aware you may become accustomed to seeing “NO” and when you see “NO” while scanning potential purchases you would be conditioned to assume that this product or service is potentially better than another because it is definitely without something bad or without something that will harm you. Through certain common uses of words or phrases we are conditioned to associate particular feelings or beliefs every time we are exposed to them.

As consumers we want to believe that the product we are purchasing is going to fulfill some want or need. Whether or not we’ve done any research on a product, especially in the case of low commitment purchases, we are most likely to feel comfortable with a product that says the words that we’ve grown familiar with. As an Amy’s customer, if I’m looking for a frozen dinner, I’ll most likely choose the one that has a list of “NO’s” because I associate them with personal benefit, even if I don’t know exactly what the benefit is.