Why ease is The Donald's Trump card
Love or loathe Donald Trump, (I’m the latter), it’s worth scrutinising his techniques to investigate how he’s been successful.
While Hillary is eminently qualified to be president, Trump’s shtick is proving persuasive. A grammatical and vocab analysis of Trump’s speeches pegged them at 5th Grade High School complexity, and other candidates at 8th to 10th Grade. While many see Trump for what he is, people are swayed by simple language and ideas.
What Trump does well is to frame things in a way that makes them simple and tangible. ‘Immigration problems? I will build a wall. Inner-city problems? I will ‘Make America Great Again’. Put simply, the secret of Trump’s rhetoric is ‘problem, problem, problem, solution, solution, solution.’ We saw this with Boris and Brexit’s unexpected victory. They made complex issues easy for people. Their ‘We send 350m to the EU every week – let’s fund the NHS instead’ and ‘Let’s take back control’ messages really cut through on a grey issue. Similarly, with a mere 3-5% gap in the polls, Trump’s simple-looking solutions could win him the presidency.
Recent examples show that time and again, ease will win out. This default behaviour aligns with the fundamental tenent of behavioural economics – a bias towards convenience and ease. In this, there are lessons for tech brands and agencies working with them. When talking to audiences that are already overloaded, we need to put people first and think about easy ways to connect.
Tech brands can really learn from Trump’s communication techniques. This includes: the need to respond to more fleeting relationships and deliver to topicality; the need to understand what really drives people’s behaviour; and the need to make communications more brain-friendly.
3 Trump cards for tech brands
Focus on collaborative relationships
One thing that Trump does well is to come across as himself and jump on topical news – even at 3am. Sure he is no stranger to social shockers, but he has made this permissible by establishing early on that not everyone will love brand Trump. In this, he’s formed a collaborative relationship with his audience and cut through as a ‘team-mate’ challenger of the status quo – co-opting Hilary’s line ‘I’m with her’ to ‘I’m with you’.
In this way, Trump connects and maximises more fleeting interactions – disproportianately dominating media. Brands need to really consider their real relationship opportunity and give people the relationship they want with brands, rather than the relationship the brand wants with them.
Put behaviours first
Agencies and tech brand clients must reframe what they are doing to put people and behaviours first. Trump consciously plays to the ‘Ambiguity Bias’ – this is a cognitive bias where people favour simple-looking options and seemingly complete information over realistically ambiguous alternatives. A specific example of this came on the issue of Syria. Whilst Hillary outlined the complexity of the situation, Trump’s simplistic answer is ‘I will wipe out ISIS.’
Trump takes something ambiguous and makes it appear easy. In this he’s delivering to a simple cognitive bias that makes audiences lean his way. The opportunity for tech is to think benefits first and tech second and communicate certitude about what we are offering and how it makes sense in the context of people’s lives. Technology’s simple role is to extend people’s capabilities and help them be the best version of themselves.
Be brain-friendly
In 1997, Steve Jobs, (another demagogue), understood that people would only understand a very small amount about Apple. So ‘Think Different’ was born – a brand articulation that spoke right to the emotional core of Apple as the brand of creative outliers. The line’s genius lay in keeping the human in the brand. By framing Apple as Lennon, Einstein, Picasso et al, Jobs found a category entry point that tapped into existing memory webs and creative associations.
Tech brands young and old aim to make our lives easier, but the over-proliferation of feature-led campaign lines just adds to the noise. ‘Think Different’was an emotive and imperative rallying cry, akin to ‘Make America Great Again’. In #MAGA, Trump has made his message distinctive and really resonant through tapping into the underlying emotion of his audience.
Unappetising as it is, by studying the techniques that allow brand Trump to connect, we can use them to our own ends and ensure that worthy winners come out on top based on communicating their best attributes in a way that delivers to ease. (The two are always stronger together.)
Dan Machen is director of innovation at HeyHuman and a member of the IPA's Brand Tech Group which provides an industry view on the impact technology is having on brands, consumers and agencies.