Inside Metaphor

Pixar's UP - Spotted Metaphors

2010-02-01T00:04:00.000-08:00

In this animated comedy film, retired balloon salesman Carl Friedricksen decides to escape being forcibly sent to a retirement home after an altercation with a construction worker. He ties a vast number of helium-filled balloons to his house, and flies away to South America - fulfilling a long-held ambition to rediscover the lost world of Paradise Falls. But he hasn't reckoned on coping with a stowaway - an eight year old boy called Russell.

In their book "Metaphors We Live By", George Lakoff and Mark Johnson discuss the "Up" metaphor. They say the central metaphor is the "Journey" metaphor - the journey is a metaphor for life.

Specific metaphors in the film include:

A rainbow of balloons against a a blue sky. This represents the quest for a life less ordinary - a life of adventure (written on the balloon held by eight year old Russell).

This is mirrored by the exotic rainbow bird, representing exotic (lost) lands and rare adventure - fantastic possibilities that no one believes are true.

The story book that regularly appears during the course of the movie represents the chapters and pages of life. Carl Friedricksen discovers that he appreciates each chapter with the benefit of hindsight - and that he hadn't celebrated what had been achieved at the time.

The initial adventure is to reach Paradise Falls (a reference to Paradise Lost - a lost world complete with dinosaurs and other exotic creatures). However, the lesson or moral (so often a part of children's stories) is that the goals you start off with in life are not always the goals that are the most rewarding, nor are they achieved necessarily in the way you think they will be achieved.

A life of adventure - a life less ordinary is what Friedricksen is seeking. However, he finally realises that this goal has already been achieved - this chapter in the book has been written, once he takes the time to turn over the pages. The house eventually reaches the falls after its journey - but that specific goal is no longer the point in life. He has moved on.

What gives life its meaning is not the destination - it's the journey. In the film's final scenes the house is at the falls - but he has a new life with the little boy.

Somatics and emotions

2010-01-31T23:56:00.000-08:00

Research has found just by making a face smiling – the emotion is the physical.

This is essentially what somatics is about the human body as a means of expressing emotions and feelings. By studying somatics (including body language but well beyond the Peace type of micro-expressions) we can understand more about the emotional state. Somatic metaphors provide the means of exploring how the emotions are experienced by the persons by tapping into their metaphors.

…. as a way of reading emotions and that indeed they are the emotions www.marketingsomatics.com shows original research conducted by INSIDE STORY that highlights how identity is expressed somatically. Four distinct metaphor clusters show how

Emotional marketing - at point of sale

2007-03-24T18:22:00.000-07:00

Metaphors are being used in a range of marketing applications including Point of Sale. See this innovative point of sale metaphor for Chupa Chups creating a garden of earthy delights in a supermarket. Sweets have been long thought to grow on trees and therefore this simple metaphor has deep significance.
There are also some fabulous ferris wheels and other variations such as flower pots that show how a range of emotional elements can be brought into a vital marketing area that currently lacks emotional relevant.
Also see Marketing Somatics and INSIDE STORY Knowledgement Management.

What are somatic metaphors?

2006-10-30T21:58:00.000-08:00

Metaphors pose a means of getting deeper as they enable access to feelings and thoughts that can’t be readily expressed in words. Latest thinking about emotions points to the potential importance of somatic metaphors because emotions are embodied – that is, experienced in the body. By accurately reflecting the bodily experience marketers create more powerful communications. Metaphors are perfect for this.

Some examples of somatic metaphors are: ‘step forward’, ‘over the top’, ‘hidden’, ‘surface’, ‘deep’, ‘down to earth’, ‘expanding’, ‘out there’, ‘warm hearted’, ‘blood boiling’, ‘weighted down’, and ‘backed up against the wall’. These metaphors all relate to bodily experience. They can contain clues that help researchers understand people’s emotions as well as predispositions to like and dislike ads, packs and brands.

Somatic metaphors are used in marketing somatics a new emerging area of marketing practice that leverages the knowledge with the consumer's own brain maps.

We need to widen our ‘vocabulary’ to encompass experiences that cannot be readily expressed in language. This is where metaphors became very useful and where somatic metaphors are working particularly well as a means of gaining insight.

Down metaphor now cool

2006-07-16T02:19:00.000-07:00

Down is an orientation metaphor that reflects one of the basic experiences of spatial orientation. As we have discussed there is a cultural bias towards UP and the closely associated forward - representing GOOD in our society - and a bias against DOWN and backwards arising from the fundamental human experience that we are all upright in position, see and move frontward. For more about this see Cooper and Ross World Order 1975 and the 'me-first orientation'.

Despite this - in Sydney and Singapore it’s becoming more cool to be depressed. Depression is sweeping teens and now is aspirational – for some at least.

Associated with a subculture called Emos - Emos fit perfectly into INSIDE STORY’s ‘Still Waters’ segment a segment not as much targeted by marketers but showing increasing interest more recently. We are now seeing a lot of fashion spreads in magazines like Frankie and Russh..see the May Russh fashion spread – ‘back in the USSR…go underground this summer’. Rip Curl experimented with the depressed and even played very subtly with the death wish for a while in their shop window in Sydney - though this seems to have disappeared.

The dark mood is reflected in a lot of the top designer ads for Prada and others who use the greyed out tones for their fashion shoots only highlighting the product in colour. Seemingly a smart way to maximise product impact but also a subtext which is a bulls eye to the emerging emo target. Poses are almost always reclining – metaphorically symbolic of DOWN, PASSIVE, BACK. Many of the top designers featured reclining models in their depressed states in windows in Orchard Road in April.

Up metaphor in marketing

2006-06-15T15:11:00.000-07:00

McDonalds has just launched it's Light Choices TV ad which is a classic UP metaphor. I have written about the fundamental significance of UP as a metaphor before and I won't repeat except to say it is very fundamental to our biological programming - and if we are looking to connect at a deep emotional level - we need to use the up metaphor and other somatic metaphors.

Consider what the ad would be like if it told us that McDonalds had a lot of lighter healthy choices - perhaps like McDonalds has been doing for some time. We know that information - that's information and that's good but... it doesn't connect in like this ad can.

The ads goes up and up into other higher, lighter more airy worlds featuring McDonalds Lighter almost fantasy/other world offerings without even mentioning 'healthier for you'. It is the overiding sensation that makes the difference - no need (and better not) to say much at all. We all intrinsically know what the UP metaphor is about - it intrinsically feels good - it intrinsically is good - defying all verbal description. Good one McDonalds!

Wolf Blass's eagle is also another excellent example of the UP metaphor in marketing. They don't have to use words to say what they are trying to say about the brand and trying to describe their positioning still defies words. The soaring eagle says it all to many wine drinkers. True people can't put the brands positioning into words - but who cares?

Renault Megane recently tried to own UP and register it as a trademark. I noticed the outdoor campaign but don't think many other people did except those people watching for metaphors. I applauded the registration of UP. However, it was really only a series of views looking up into the sky from an open car so it didn't really capture very much of the potential impact of the UP metaphor. It is also interesting to see that they are really clued into the metaphoric symbolism of the car - and also making deliberate allusions to "the butt" of their car in their advertising. Interested to see what they do next.

Red star rising again

2006-05-11T22:53:00.000-07:00

The iconography of Soviet communism is achieving cool status. Once associated with workers, heavy unattractive industry (and definitely not an attractive art form), the iconography is becoming increasingly seen in magazines, coffee places and things aimed at Youth. The particular favourites are definitely the more benign red star, Mao and the distinctive style of communist writing.

In Shanghai, Kommune is a one such coffee place using all the now cool iconography of the Soviet era and in youth targeted magazines such as Yen.

Little red stars are cropping up in all sorts of places.

Now metaphorically – what is the relevance and appeal of the soviet red star?

The origin of the pentagram is the human body – the head, two arms and two legs spread wide like Leonardo’s Vitruvian man. This interests me because of my interest in somatic metaphors and how bodily experiences relate to the human experience and emotions.

The Soviet red star however is said to represent the five fingers of the workers hand among other things to do with the number 5. (Apparently the origins of the star come from the red army who painted the tin stars worn by Moscow garrison solders red to distinguished them from other soldiers in retreat from WW1).

Still waters run deep

2006-03-28T16:24:00.000-08:00

An observation is that the computer is becoming an extension of the brain. The internet is blurring the boundaries between the real world and the web and it is becoming harder to discern the difference. This is particularly so for gamers where the game is reality for a time at least.

The research we are doing in Asia and in Australia on Youth identities and somatic metaphors is revealing a distinct persona (metaphorically represented by Still Waters running deep) that makes them suitable for the emerging gaming environment in Singapore and Australia and, the much more advanced markets of Korea and Malaysia.

There are a number of trends that are driving interest in multiplayer games and affinity communities. Our Still Waters persona is personified by metaphors of hiding, the past and protection has a strong desire to escape his/her own shaky and unappealing identity into another identity – be it to feel part of “my sports team” or “my band”. Gaming too potentially becomes another means of slothing off the identity imposed by their day to day lives or jobs.

Providing the opportunity to experience different identities in different gaming communities in one single night, meeting people from all over the world online and even adopting a different number of roles using MMORPS has potential appeal to their escapist tendencies.

Gaming offers a safe way of meeting people and interacting – from your own bedroom – enabling them to try out different personas and feel better about themselves. If played out in more aggressive ways, it also potentially provides a degree backlash against societies that stereotype you because you don’t have the best career prospects, best designer clothes and the widest circle of friends.

The female market is the key market for role play games - MMORPS. Fantasy is clearly better than reality for many – with make-believe now more possible, there is little doubt that this trend will continue to emerge.

For girls in particular, there is also a tendency to sentimentality. The past provides a more comfortable stage of being where there wasn’t the same pressure to be popular and cool – attractive to boys.
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Today’s consumers are faced with countless avenues of purchase, and the rising rate of inflation and cost of living is battling head-to-head with consumer spend. Consumer-facing organisations need to know exactly who their consumers are, and target them effectively and intelligently. At INSIGHTS 2006 – Re-Invigorating Research to Make Informed and Illuminating Decisions, you will hear presentations and case studies from Australian and global industry leaders. Plus! Don’t miss our executive tutorials including Liane Ringham’s (INSIDE STORY) session on Metaphor Magic: How to Turn Base Metals into Marketing Gold with Youth. For more information on this cutting edge event, visit www.iqpc.com.au/AU-3028-002/IS

Somatic metaphors and marketing

2006-03-13T13:16:00.000-08:00

What makes the difference for some packs and some ads that have that little bit of intangible something extra? What is the feather that tilts preferences in your brands direction when all things are equal?

We are learning through our research at INSIDE STORY with Youth that the appropriate expression of the body language (or in other words the somatic experience) that principally defines a person as an individual can potentially make such a difference.

Take the Toyota jump for instance. There are very good reasons why it is a jump and not a flop, a slouch or a tumble. This is to do with the fundamental and primary relevance of the up metaphor for human experience. Metaphors allow us to understand one domain of experience in terms of another.

Latest discoveries in neuroscience are showing that our identities or senses of self originate in the body and somatically defined (Damasio- Somatic Marker Hypothesis). Much of experience goes back to the primary bodily experience. This includes experiences relevant to marketers.

Our somatic or bodily experiences are the building blocks of our sense of self and also of our emotions – and finally our dispositions. All of which are of key relevance to marketers particularly when we consider dispositions towards packs, product experiences and brands.

This research is based on innovative qualitative research into somatic metaphors which reveal more hidden dimensions of what makes Youth in Asia and Australia tick and is nearly complete in Australia.

The Australian leg of the research will be presented in the IQPC conference (INSIGHTS 2006) on the 11th and 12th of April see (www.iqpc.com.au/MarketingIQ).

How to connect with 16 – 18s at a deep level by identifying your target as one of a number of somatically defined identities.

How you will know them when you see them – from their different looks, body languages and key words.

How they will know you as one of them when they see and experience your ads, packs and other marketing activities.

This is totally unique research in that is goes into the arena of body language very deeply and how these insights relate to marketing implementation and positioning.

It will help marketers in your choice of talent for ads plus assist in the selection of the shapes, colours, sounds and kinetics of your packaging. Helping to better target your activities and better activate choice through packaging, the brand and product experience.

This study is based on innovative qualitative research techniques eliciting somatic metaphors.

At the end of May I am conducting a course in Singapore to the Asian marketing community where I will be presenting on avant-garde marketing techniques and our latest research on Asian Youth conducted for the international conference organizers IQPC. You can find this course on IQPC course website www.iqpc.com.sg/AS-3317/2020.