PODCAST EPISODES

Nudges and choice architecture are complex and advanced topics. During my master’s program, I had an entire course on choice architecture, so…

Today’s behavioral economics foundations episode is all about the optimism bias. I hope you’ve got your rose colored glasses, because here we…

I recently took a trip down to College Station, Texas to visit the Human Behavior Lab at Texas A&M University – which is (at the time of recording) the largest human behavior lab in the world. Today’s behavioral economics podcast gives you an inside look at what happens inside of a laboratory like this.

What happens when our brains get overwhelmed? What is the impact on decision making? Today’s behavioral economics podcast is going to focus on these foundational topics. Businesses always ask people to take some sort of action (buy this, click here, download that). It’s a good idea to be careful not to overwhelm your potential customer. An overwhelmed brain will move on and file your business in the “maybe I’ll look at this later” pile.

Mirror neurons are the topic of today’s behavioral economics podcast. We are really going to get into what they are, how they work and why they matter in any business. Mirror neurons are the key to empathy and our ability to learn from observing others instead of only by doing things ourselves.

This episode is relevant today because of the current status of the stock market, which had a tumultuous 2018 to say the least, as well as the recent rise and fall of cryptocurrency.  In this episode, I will cover optimism bias, overconfidence, herd mentality, time discounting, and emotions like envy and excitement.

Why is it so hard to keep our resolutions even when we have the best of intentions? That is what this episode is all about. I am going to dig into 5 ways we have all been approaching resolutions wrong, and give you the strategy you need to change that in 2019 once and for all.

This behavioral economics podcast episode is the final installment of my series on the five senses. We’ve already talked about sight, smell,…

Today’s behavioral economics podcast is all about the sense of hearing and sound. As a vocalist, avid music lover and podcaster, sound and the sense of hearing is very near and dear my heart. I talk about the basics of hearing and how the brain interprets signals from the ear. Similar to the sense of smell, sound can have a huge impact on what the brain perceives. I share some fun studies and articles that involve music, pop culture, branding, and I even play some some branding sounds for you to guess. As always, everything ties back to how you can use sounds to make your business more appealing to your target market.

Today marks the halfway point in our series on the five senses – we have already talked about sight and smell…and today we are digging into taste. Smell is directly tied to the emotional center of the brain and also closely bonded to our memories. Taste is not as strong in that department, but it still has more of a link than some of the other senses. In this episode, I talk about parts of the sense of smell that are closely tied to taste. We dig into mirror neurons for the first time. In case you don’t know, I explain what anosmia is and tie everything into ways to increase and improve your business.

This behavioral economics podcast continues our series about the five senses. Last week, I talked about the sense of sight. This week I’m talking about the sense of smell. No matter what type of business you have, these episodes will apply to you. The senses are all powerful and create memories the brain uses to make decisions, and decision making is a big part of successful business.

This is the beginning of a series on the five senses – beginning with sight and moving through sound, touch, taste and smell (not necessarily in that order). I am starting with sight because it is the most powerful of our senses by far and the things I am going to share with you in this episode are going to just blow your mind.

Reciprocity is the perfect topic to talk about this time of year. Today’s behavioral economics podcast is another foundations episode, and it’s all about reciprocity. I explain how our brains process gift giving and why we often give reciprocal gifts of higher value than the original gift.

This behavioral economics podcast is building on the most recent foundations episodes to really dig into the power of habit. Last week I really went deep into what habits are and how they work. Today, I am going to share a bunch of examples of ways businesses use habits to their advantage (and how you can too!). I talk about how 95% of purchases are habitual and how this habit formation can be combined with reciprocity and loss aversion. I give several examples from big companies and my personal life. Then I break it all down so you can apply the same principles to your business.

This behavioral economics podcast is about habits and habitual buying. It is another one of my behavioral economics foundations podcasts. When a lot of us think of habits, we focus on bad habits, but we actually have more good habits than bad. Our subconscious does about 99% of the brain’s processing and this applies to habits and buying habits.

Today’s episode on defaults is going to absolutely blow your mind. You probably don’t realize it, but defaults are everywhere. Basically, every choice has a default. Think of the default as what happens if you do nothing – or if your customer does nothing. More often than not, when presented with a series of options people will go with the default. Listen in to learn how critical it is to consider the default option, complexities of choice architecture, and more.

Herding is the topic of today’s behavioral economics podcast foundations episode. This concept is similar to the way animals herd and for many of the same reasons. For safety, being in the center of the herd offers protection from predators. There is also an assumption that if everyone is running in the same direction they must know where they are going. During this episode I will give examples of how to use herding to your advantage in business, and how herding can go terribly wrong.

Today’s behavioral economics podcast is another foundations episode, and it is all about priming. When primed, your subconscious remembers it recently heard a number, or a statistic or something and that influences the next assumptions it makes – even if they are not even remotely related. I share examples of how easy it is to trick the brain into thinking and answering something wrong with just a little priming.

I talk about the power of numbers in today’s episode. I get in to some of my most frequently asked questions (including ending prices in 99 or 97). I also talk about pricing strategies like using random or “interesting” numbers. I share research, examples, and how you can apply framing using numbers in your business.

 Framing is one of my favorite behavioral economics podcast topics. In the past few weeks, I have covered foundational topics like…

Today’s behavioral economics podcast is about availability. This is another foundational episode that ties in to last week’s episode about scarcity. Similar…

Fall is a favorite season of mine and probably a favorite season to many of you. It’s also the time of year…

Mindset is something that everyone struggles with from time to time. Whether you are experiencing a lack of confidence or stuck with…

Our brains use relativity to make comparisons when assigning value. Relativity is one of my favorite concepts and part of the behavioral…

Today’s behavioral economics podcast is another foundational episode focusing on anchoring and adjustment. My last foundational episode was Episode 9 – Behavioral Economics…

In this behavioral economics podcast it is time to apply what I have been talking about in the first 9 episodes through…

Because this is a behavioral economics podcast, it is time to build our behavioral economics foundations. This is the first in a…

I’ll be talking about the meaning of value on today’s behavioral economics podcast. The past three episodes have been dedicated to the…

The past two weeks have been dedicated to my “it’s not about the cookie” framework, which shows how the experience and all…

Last week, I talked about The Truth About Pricing, you might want to listen to that episode before we dive into today’s episode…

Pricing is a top concern for most business owners, service people, and sales people. Today, I’m going to tell you the truth…

I am so excited about today’s episode. Why? Because I love questions. I love asking them, being asked them, evaluating them, and…

All over the place these days – they offer you something for free, you fill out a form and get onto their…

What are the Top 5 wording mistakes? This was a highly requested topic when I did a survey on The Brainy Business Facebook…

 Welcome to The Brainy Business Podcast. My name is Melina Palmer. I am super excited to chat with you every week…