Martin Lindstrom's Buy-Ology

Great Essays
Josh Salak
Consumer Behavior
8 November 2015
Buy-ology: Book Review Innovative. Unorthodox. World-renowned. Martin Lindstrom, author of Buy-ology, has earned his stripes in the marketing realm time and time again with his ability to successfully brand companies and their products. He directly reflects his knowledge with his prestigious company clientele, as well as anyone yearning to understand the world of marketing (myself included) with the publishing of several best-selling books, including Buy-ology. TIMES Magazine awarded Lindstrom “Worlds 100 Most Influential People” and rightfully so. This man did not stumble into this industry by any accident or luck. Martin Lindstrom entered the marketing field at age 12 thanks to his Lego obsession.
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However, his personal bias of himself and his own experiment also present him with a minor setback. Throughout the book and heavily in the early chapters, he overly-glorifies himself with his past successes and his “most revolutionary neuromarketing experiment in history”, and this also is reflected in his interpretation of his neurological research findings. His baseline study of the Buy-ology was the addiction of smokers and how ads affect their cravings. He proclaims that billions of dollars are wasted each year on ads that are supposed to deter smoking, when they actually cause the opposite effect. This may not be a far off accusation, but it fails to address and credit the ads for the countless people that were persuaded not to start smoking. Lindstrom also leaves key comparisons out of an analysis to make his example seemingly more powerful, in this case, Nokia’s notorious ringtone. His findings about the ringtone and the stimulations that it evokes are true; however, if he were to compare it to another ringtones effect, his conclusion would be more valid and credible. In no way does this discredit Martin Lindstrom’s findings, this critique would merely enhance what he has already created. Moreover, I believe, regardless of his bias undertones, that this book is four star quality as it explores new frontiers in marketing and is recreating branding methods for the future. I conclude with a four star rating solely because a degree of discretion must be taken into account with Lindstrom’s power persuasive abilities and lack of sufficient scientific

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