The Inner Voice Experience™
Reaching audiences in a noisy world
How do we capture our audience’s attention and leave a lasting impression in a world of ever-increasing clutter and noise? Many have tried by shouting louder, with little success. Maybe we should try speaking more quietly, or be silent, even. What if we could reach our audiences through their own inner voice?
The Inner Voice Experience™
Debut’s proprietary Inner Voice Experience™ is a carefully designed communication sequence that introduces audiences to their own inner voice and delivers important messaging in a deeply personal way that inspires behavior change.
Imagine that you are trying to deliver a message about climate change to inspire environmental action in your audience. The Inner Voice Experience™ achieves this using a four-part communication sequence:
1. Introduction to the inner voice
2. Empathizing with audience’s concerns
3. Instilling hope
4. Restoring purpose and inspiring behavioral action
The science behind the Inner Voice Experience™
What makes the Inner Voice Experience™ so effective?
Let’s meet Sasha, a typical member of your audience.
If you want Sasha to remember and act on your key message, he must first pay attention! Human attention is a limited resource that acts as a gatekeeper to memory. The Inner Voice Experience™ uses insights from research on human cognition to boost Sasha’s attention and memory which increases the chances of behavior change.
• Make it personal
Rogers, T. B., Kuiper, N. A., & Kirker, W. S. (1977). Self-reference and the encoding of personal information. Journal of personality and social psychology, 35(9), 677.
Sasha will pay more attention to information that is personally relevant. Sending a message through Sasha’s Inner Voice rather than from an outside source heightens the personal relevance of the message.
• Make it emotional
Hourihan, K. L., Fraundorf, S. H., & Benjamin, A. S. (2017). The influences of valence and arousal on judgments of learning and on recall. Memory & cognition, 45(1), 121-136.
When information evokes emotion, it will capture Sasha’s attention and lead to better memory. The Inner Voice Experience™ taps into emotion by identifying audience concerns and inspiring hope.
• Make it immersive
Braddock, K., & Dillard, J. P. (2016). Meta-analytic evidence for the persuasive effect of narratives on beliefs, attitudes, intentions, and behaviors. Communication Monographs, 83(4), 446-467.
Studies show that delivering key messages embedded in a story-like context lead to better outcomes. Sasha’s beliefs, attitudes, intentions, and behaviors will be shaped more by the narrative style of the Inner Voice Experience™ than typical forms of corporate communication.
• Make it fresh
Takeuchi, T., Duszkiewicz, A. J., Sonneborn, A., Spooner, P. A., Yamasaki, M., Watanabe, M., ... & Morris, R. G. (2016). Locus coeruleus and dopaminergic consolidation of everyday memory. Nature, 537(7620), 357-362.
Sasha can easily tune out the mundane corporate types of communications we often receive. But research shows that novel and unexpected experiences grab our attention and leave a mark. The Inner Voice Experience™ is a way for your communications to stand out in a fresh and compelling way.
The results are in, the Inner Voice Experience™ works!
To start, we have implemented the Inner Voice Experience™ to fantastic reception from both live and virtual audiences. We have also scientifically tested its effect on cognition in a randomized control trial (RCT), comparing its effectiveness to traditional communications like corporate memos and talking head videos (sound familiar?)
In our RCT, 218 adults living in the U.S. and Canada were randomly assigned to view a message about environmental sustainability from a fictional company, Oceans Agricorp. The message was viewed in one of three formats: a text-based corporate memo, a video from the CEO, or via the Inner Voice Experience™.
The Inner Voice Experience™ outperformed the traditional communications for every outcome-of-interest, boosting measures of attention, mood, and value internalization by up to 16%. At Debut, we refer to this trifecta of positive effects as “cognitive resonance” and it’s one of the key components we use to ensure audience engagement.
Beyond its impressive effects on cognition, people who received messages through their inner voice also reported greater concern about climate change in the environment. This change in attitude is a critical step toward a change in behavior!
How can companies use this discovery?
What would it mean for you to have 16% more of your audience bought into your messaging? What would it mean for the happiness of your employees? For the effectiveness of your teams? For your bottom line?
If you want your message to break through the noise, stop shouting from the rooftops. Engage your audience on a more intimate psychological level with the proven effectiveness of the Inner Voice Experience™.
Get in touch with Debut (info@DebutGroup.com) to design an Inner Voice Experience™ for your next event or communications campaign. Let’s build an experience for your audience that will cognitively resonate and drive meaningful behavior change.
