Sure, companies want to know that their marketing efforts are going to succeed before they begin. Analytic minds want logic to justify their investment.  The reality is, that’s not always possible because sometimes quantitative analysis just isn’t practical.

But that doesn’t have to mean you can’t be decisive. Just as we firmly believe that emotion plays a huge part in b2b purchasing behavior, we also recognize the role human insight can play in knowing the right thing to do when it comes to marketing a product or service.

In his book Emotionomics: Leveraging Emotions for Business Success, Dan Hill explains how human beings actually have three brains: the sensory, the emotional and the rational. In terms of evolution, the sensory brain is the oldest, followed by the emotional brain. The rational brain is a more recent development. According to Hill, the emotional brain sends ten times the information to the rational brain than the rational brain sends to the emotional brain — a “trade imbalance ” that results in the emotions having 10 times more influence in decision-making.

It’s no wonder, then, that people feel before they think and that 95% of all decisions are made intuitively — with the gut — and then justified rationally. Hill underscores this point by citing findings by the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising that show how emotional-based advertising, in a broad range of categories, is more effective than advertising with a rational appeal.

So the takeaway is this: If you’re going to be a creative marketer, you need to hone the ability, through non-linear thinking, to find those “emotional triggers” that can end up being key to your brand’s success. And then you need to have the confidence to move forward accordingly. If you know your business — and really get to know your customer — these aren’t just hunches. They’re more reliable than the analytic mind might think. Sometimes, it pays to just “go with your gut.”