The Need To Survive

In the book Building A Storybrand, Donald Miller states that we, and more importantly, our brains are designed to help us survive.

When you think about all of the data your brain needs to process each day, and I’m not just speaking about advertising, but every piece of information it must take in, process, and then decide which is vital and not vital for you, at that moment, is astounding.

Paul Reber, professor of psychology at Northwestern University, explains at www.scientificamerican.com that a human brain’s memory capacity is roughly 2.5 Petabytes, which translates roughly to over two and a half BILLION megabytes of information. 2.5 Billion!

And, I’m not just talking about advertisements and articles, which in itself is estimated that our brains consume 34 GB of data every day just from advertisements alone. That’s enough information to overwhelm an ordinary laptop in a little over a week. I’m referring to all of the data that our brains must consume daily. Data such as colors, sounds, objects, intentions, movements, textures, the list is endless, and every waking moment the human mind is consuming this information. Even when you are asleep, your brain is still hard at work, continually processing and crunching this data. Over and over and over again.

It is determining with each piece of data, what is needed, and what is vital to your survival.

The Path Of Least Resistance

Survival. That is the keyword. In the book Building A Storybrand, Donald Miller states that our brains are designed to keep us alive. We must survive. Even though we’re not consciously thinking of survival, your brain is searching for the easiest path to burn the least amount of calories it can and keep you alive.

Our brains are designed to continually look for order and sequence continually, and when something is confusing or doesn’t make sense, it requires us to “think” more, which causes us to use more calories.

Think of yourself as an example. If you are looking at a website and it either doesn’t make sense right away or is overly complicated, and you just don’t “get it,” what do you and I commonly do? We keep on scrolling.

When it comes to the internet, you could say that when the “going get’s tough,” your brain just automatically orders the “Next!” command, and we tend to move on.

As explained in Building A Storybrand, a narrative story is a natural process that we use to internalize information and then process it. It provides our minds with a logical order that allows our brains to process what we are experiencing at that moment and then retain it for further use.

The story is such an essential part of our daily process that even when our minds are at rest, we daydream. Our brains are always engaged in a story. Story is how we make sense of multiple information points, prioritize it, categorize it, file it, and, most importantly, remember it for your business, all for the sake of survival.

Simply put, our brains are designed to constantly ask – What’s in it for me? And how is this going to help me survive?

So now that you know what your customers think when they come to your website, how do you think that should affect the message you use when promoting your business?

You are not the hero. Keep reading.