• by J. Walker Smith , Op-Ed Contributor, Yesterday

From all my years in research and consulting, I think I’ve learned a thing or two about marketing worth sharing. Enduring fundamentals, mostly — yet often overlooked.

So, over the course of my biweekly column this year, I want to share some snippets for your consideration. I hope they’re helpful.

This week’s thought: Reference points line up everything.

It is impossible to assess our situations in the world in the absolute.

We need reference points: something against which we can compare our situations to see if they’re good or bad, worse or better, proper or improper. Reference points line up everything.

This is the overarching idea of social psychology. It’s called social — not individual — psychology for a reason.

It is about the study of social effects on everything — perceptions, beliefs, values, judgments, motivations, decisions, actions, biases, morals, charity, etc. We calibrate and judge everything relative to reference points.

We’re familiar with all the famous psychological experiments showing the power of social context and social effects.

The Asch experiment— we conform to fit in even when we know that group consensus is wrong.

The Stanford prison experiment — we behave in accordance with cultural roles and expectations.

The Milgram experiment — we obey authority.

Learned helplessness — we internalize external experiences.

Cognitive dissonance — we change our opinions based on our actions and our environment.

The Hawthorne effect — we adjust our behaviors when others are watching.

The bystander effect — we hesitate to help when others are not helping.

The halo effect — we rate others more highly if they have socially desirable characteristics.

There are other well-known psychological findings that could be added to this short list, but you get the point.

Social context — which is to say reference points — lines up everything.

I have an old friend who has been very successful. He made a lot of money and is well-recognized in his profession, with a great family, great children. The epitome of success. And yet, he thinks of himself as falling short. His peer group is other successful entrepreneurs and professionals, many of whom have made more, live in bigger houses, drive fancier cars and take more lavish vacations.

That’s his reference point, relative to which, he feels unsuccessful. (He should compare himself to me — then he’d feel a lot better!)

This sort of self-inflicted sense of perceived privation is well-known in social psychology. The hedonic treadmill is the phenomenon by which no matter how well off we become, we eventually get so accustomed to our situations that our satisfaction flags — thereby keeping us running, futilely, on the treadmill of advancement.

We seem to have a set point of happiness that no amount of achievement can change. But we can change the context. We can put our set point in a better or worse light, thereby changing how we see ourselves and we feel about our situations.

The field of positive psychology — largely, the study of happiness — was founded by Martin Seligman, the psychologist who developed the theory of learned helplessness.

Seligman reasoned that if we can learn helplessness, we can learn happiness, too. From his work and that of others, a number of proven techniques have been developed. One, in particular, is Seligman’s Three Good Things exercise.

Three Good Things is a writing exercise that is good for everyone, but especially for people experiencing emotional exhaustion, depressive symptoms or other unsettling life situations. 

The exercise is that each night before bed, a person should write down three good things that happened during the day and reflect on each one before going to sleep. This exercise has proven its value in clinical trials, in some cases outperforming drug therapies.

The mechanism involved is reference points. When a person has had a difficult day, this exercise changes their reference points on the day. It wasn’t all bad. There were good things that happened.

Over time, people begin to see that every day, no matter how discouraging, is always filled with at least three good things.

This exercise has the effect of changing the reference points people use to judge their lives and assess their situations. People see things in a different context, one that is more heartening and positive.

Advertising works in the very same way. Ads work with reference points to line up everything. Ads work by giving people new reference points to assess their situations and emotions.

Ads present alternative reference points for people to consider. Is your kitchen counter as shiny as this? Do you look as fashionable as this model? Is your car this fast or this fuel-efficient or this sleek? Wouldn’t this brand be a better badge to show off to your friends? Isn’t this a cheaper price or a better value for the money?

Think Small. Think Different. Have it Your Way. The Quicker Picker Upper. All the News Fit to Print. I’m Lovin’ It. Like a Good Neighbor. Bet You Can’t Eat Just One. Better Ingredients, Better Pizza. What’s in Your Wallet?

In every case, these ads are asking people to look at what they have, do, believe or buy in a different way. Against a different reference point. The point is to show people a meaningful gap between an aspirational reference point and a current lifestyle situation.

Without the new reference point, people would never know there was a gap.

Only a shinier countertop can show you that your countertop is not shiny enough. Only better ingredients can show you that your pizza’s ingredients aren’t tasty enough. Only a good neighbor of a company can show you that your old neighbor of a company isn’t good enough.

Ads work by changing reference points. This is why marketing is inherently aspirational. Marketing is about showing consumers something better, something to aspire to. Marketers offer consumers new reference points, which changes how people perceive their current situations.

I’ve long forgotten where, but I read an ironic comment once rebutting complaints about cultural imperialism. The essayist made the point that people in developing markets never knew how bored they were until TV showed up — which, this writer asserted, was the real reason Western culture had become dominant. In other words, he was arguing that it was simply better cultural fare.

I am not arguing pro or con about this. I’m simply making the point that we only know ourselves relative to reference points. Until something better comes along, we don’t know that our lives and our satisfaction could be better. That’s what advertising does — it shows us something better.

Reference points also help us understand much about the political divide in our current culture. Like our aspirations, our understanding of the state of the world and the need for change is informed by our reference points.

In today’s fragmented society, we no longer share common reference points. People look to different authorities and then assess the world around them relative to different standards or validation points.

The dismal state of trust worsens this. There are no facts without authorities to validate them as true.

Nobody can know or interrogate everything. Of necessity, at some point, we must trust others to tell us what’s true and what’s false. But authorities have fallen into disrepute. No authority carries weight with everyone any longer.

This means no common set of reference points around which public opinion could coalesce and unify.

Except maybe for advertising. Marketers speak to everybody in a vocabulary of aspiration and inspiration that promises something better.

People give ads a dubious eye, yet ads still persuade because people want something better, and marketers offer that to people by using reference points to line up everything.