I have lost track of the number of times the google behavioural advertising system has surprised me and amused me by its randomness. Here is the latest from today – I am discussing the football coaches here in São Paulo – how sad the São Paulo fans are the loss of their beloved Muricy… and what should appear – an advert for a coach (bus) company in Coventry. Kind of unlikely that someone in São Paulo wants to hire a bus in Coventry but should it happen i know where to turn to.

For full effect.. this post should be read whilst listening to Morrisey singing ‘The more you ignore me, the closer I get’

The More You Ignore Me…

The recent case from Brasil of the Brastemp customer who created his own one man social media campaign against the company for their poor level of service and the length of time he was left waiting for the company to resolve a problem with a product is just one of many examples from across the globe of where irate consumers are turning to social media to take their complaints.

Enough has been written about the Brastemp example and the phenomena by which mobs turn social media into their primary route for exacting revenge on unsympathetic companies. Little has been written however abut just why we are hardwried as consumers to sense such strong resntment when we feel ignored. However, a new piece of research from the USA may just help to explain why consumers turn to such extreme measures.

Given that recent research from Deloitte here in Brasil shows that one of the great problems faced by brands is not only making consumers feel wanted online it may also serve as a warning to brands about the potential implications of what happens when consumers feel that no-one is listening to them.

Professor Kip Williams has conducted a range of experiments at the psychology lab at Purdue University, focused on measuring aggressive behaviour which ostracism can stir up in someone given the silent treatment. Speaking on the BBC Radio programme, ‘All in the Mind’ he discusses why as social creatures our brains are wired to sense rejection and being ignored. The experiments also shows that even when people feel rejected or ignored by computer generated communications (in tests which involve game playing), they still demonstrate high levels of resentment. It can trigger very deep, low-level and primitive response –  we don’t thnk too much – we just care and we react. Interestingly our first reaction may be to raise our antenna and seek to please the individual or organisation which is ignoring us – however with continued exclusion or rejection this tends to quickly lead to a loss of self esteem, and a lack of control.

This is explained by the fact that as social beings we have evolved through feeling part of social communications networks and connected to other people – and thus when these connections break down – naturally enough – we respond.

There are other social animals who may even die when they are ignored. For humans this response is less extreme but this sense of lack of control can become aggressive. In one of the experiments, people who have been ostracized or ignored are allowed to add hot chilli sauce to food of the person who has excluded them. The victims on average add 5 times more hot sauce than in normal situations.

All of this should be taken on-board by companies as they increasingly seek to be part of on-going communications and engagement building with consumers in social media. It’s all fine and good to try and start relationship building with people, but what happens if you can’t maintain that relationship and people feel excluded or ignored. Sure for most they will just ignore you back, but not all. Recent research from Deloitte here in Brasil highlighted this dilemna. The survey conducted with over 300 companies shows that social media is being far more as a media of publication than for maintaining ongoing communications with consumers.  Success in social media is at present more likely to be evaluated in terms of number of users and recommendations as opposed to considering the level of satisfaction with ongoing communications. Discussions with students at my FAAP course have also highlighted the fact that one of the greatest complaints we have as consumers is when companies establish channels of communication but fail to respond. This is also born out by a study of participants at Campus Party in 2011 where one of the most constitent criticisms of Brazilian brands in social media is the slow or non-existent response to customer complaints.

The moral of the story… listen to more Morrisey if you really want to understand how to manage your customer relations. And if you want to start a conversation with your consumers… try not to ignore them.

My reason for asking is related to some of the themes I tried to speak about / would like to have discussed more during the event… about LISTENING.

You will probably hate me for what I want to say and think I’m being self righteous and yes maybe I am a little … but I wonder how many people returned from the event using public transport. I took the train from close the event to Pinheiros and then the Metro to Santa Cecilia to get back to my office.

Much of the discussion at the event focused on the possibility for conversations and for the social classes, that have for many years lived in separate spheres here in Brasil, to better interact and understand each other.  Digital media allows us ever greater access to be able to ‘listen in’ and observe the conversations of others. But when I talk about listening it’s an active not a passive listening – listening is also about participating and observing and wanting to try and understand. When I take public transport here in São Paulo – something which I almost always try to do whenever possible – its not about feeling self righteous about saving the planet its about wanting to be part of this great city and to interact with my fellow Brazilians (if my visa ever arrives – only 5 years of waiting) and to be part of a public discourse.

Its easy to consider the great transformations in media when we consider the opportunities for coming together as a society but lets not neglect the opportunities offline. With all the discussions of infrastructural investment in Brasil because of the Olympics and Copa are we overlooking other changes in the physical environment (such as the new Metro lines) which could open up greater opportunities for social mixing.

Listening isn’t easy – it’s not as simple as paying for someone to monitor the number of times your brand is tweeted about – its an investment. I took an extra 20 minutes to return to the office in comparison to my early morning journey to Santa Amaro via taxi (shame on me). But this time for observing and listening is priceless to me. How else would I have encountered the family with their 7 week old baby on the train going to the medical centre on the other side of the city. Where else would I see the man wearing a Polo-Shirt with the word ‘Hampshire’ written across it and asked myself when will this craze for polo shirts with the names of English cricket teams come to an end? Or have observed that women tend to use their headphone attachments of their phones in just one ear whilst men use in both ears – is this a question of spatial conscienceness, security and ownership in public space.

I think it is wrong to expect that research will deliver is Meta-Insights that will lead to instant success. Its hard work and it’s the combination of Micro-Insights that we get from our time in public space which can be as important as those ethnographic field trips.  It may seem like hard work to make that decision to invest those 20 minutes (now im just being smug) but every time we do not choose to encounter the people with whom we share the city – let’s just remember that we are making a conscious decision not to do so.

Finally if I hadn’t walked to the station I would not have seen this great example of social communications – yes im of a generation for whom graffiti was not commercial street art but walls were actually made of cement and perfect for such forms of self-expression.

A small selection of their offerings and photos here …

Eduardo Zanaletto: “A casa é um simples retângulo de concreto ao qual atribuímos uma porção de significados. É “lar” quando falamos de nossa família. É “status” quando dizemos nosso endereço. É “atitude” diluída em cada um dos detalhes da decoração.”

Marcella Lemos Arcuri: “Para mim, pouco importa o tempo que você passa ou passou em certo lugar. A partir do momento em que você se sente bem, acolhido, confortável; em um lugar onde você é você mesmo e tudo que está ao seu redor mostra isso, ele torna-se seu lar.”

Camila Rossi: “É onde encontro meu silêncio e ganho minha pausa de mil compassos da cidade frenética, é nela que recebo os sorrisos dos amigos ao redor de uma boa mesa, é aqui que moram meus livros, crescem minhas plantas e cultivo meus dias…”

A new piece of research undertaken by academics in the USA has identified the phenomenon of regional accents in the way we Tweet. The study is great, not just because serious measured research of Twitter behaviour is extremely limited but also because it throws up some interesting broader questions about the interaction between communications on and offline. TWR undertook a massive project of twitter monitoring during the World Cup reading hundreds of thousands of Tweets in Portugues. One of the most interesting things about undertaking the project was observing the different language uses amongst different ages and between men and women as well as the different regional accents and use of specific words depending on region. So we firmly believe that the processes identified in the USA have relevance here in Brasil too. How about you and your own tweeting – do you observe differences amongst your friends and followers? Lets us know here or tweet us …

I’ve just been listening to an interview on the BBC with an academic from Amsterdam who has completed an interesting academic study which has just been released as a book – an ethnography of beauty and cosmetic surgery: Pretty Modern: Beauty, Sex, and Plastic Surgery in Brazil. The author posits plastic surgery as part of a new modern experience of beauty outisde of previous studies which dealt with the subject which reflected broader social phenomenon such as class and race. On a personal level its quite obvious that the Brasilian culture values and promotes an importance of beauty – at times not separable from bigger health based issues. I remember being surprised by the number of consumer magazines reflecting the market for aesthetic surgery

As the book highlights, plastic surgery touches on all levels of brazilian society. The research associates plastic surgery with issues of female empowerment / social mobility / improve marriage hopes / social capital but also a means of potenntialy disrupting existing social hierachies. One of the key features of the discourse of beauty is its significance as a defining feature of the cultural mixing in Brasil. Two of the trends identified in the book have strong links to racial identity - skin lightening and body sculpting are both sought to replicate supposed (european) and (african) elements of beauty. The findings of the ethnography argue that Brazilians don’t want to totally remove their african traits- unlike in other south american cultures which seek to distance themselves from more indigenous body traits. Im not sure if the book deals with male plastic surgery here in Brasil…could be an interesting follow up subject?

we have now offically started the brasil@home project…
brasil@home é um projeto único para explorar as diferenças e as transformações nas relações que os brasileiros têm com o ‘lar’

Full instructions are on the site – we’ll keep going with some updates here over the next few weeks

Spotted this yesterday in São Paulo. Hells Angels now have websites?
It seems a long way from the bad old days back in Hollister, California.
Is this a Brazilian phenomenon?
Anybody with some evidence from other countries?