Welcome to the Kleber & Associates blog! Here’s the latest on Marketing Home Products Through Facial Expressions


If consumers really said what they were thinking, marketing to them would be so much easier, wouldn’t it? Forbes.com recently debuted an app that takes us one step closer to getting inside the mind of the consumer. The facial expression reader app, developed by Affectiva and the MIT Media lab, asks participants to turn on their Web cams and watch video ads while the app gathers data about their facial expressions and reactions.

This technology was originally developed at MIT to help people who have difficulty reading emotion, but is now being commercialized with the potential to aid marketers with everything from their calls to action to analyzing and changing product offerings based on how users respond.

Imagine if every company with an online presence had the ability to implement this technology on its website. Businesses would essentially be able customize what each user sees. For example, say a user is watching a video with information about granite countertop “A,” and he smiles; the facial recognition technology analyzes that data and could send the user to a page with more information about that particular product or even directly to the purchase page. The same situation could apply if a user looks confused or discouraged; the app reads the expression and adjusts information accordingly by changing products, providing additional information or sending the user to a different page. With this technology, organizations will essentially be able to sell online almost the same way they would in a face-to-face setting. Being able to read an expression and adjust your “pitch” through a website would be revolutionary!

Additionally, the analytics that would result from this technology would be incredibly beneficial. Organizations would be able to gather data about what products, pages and/or information that viewers are most interested in, least interested in, most confused about, and where the drop off occurs. Being able to gather this data and build a better offering gives online business a new dimension. Every industry, including the home and building industry, could greatly benefit from the opportunity that this face recognition technology could provide.