We have decided that “Retro Digital Agency” should be everything that we suggest to clients and potential clients to work for themselves, their business, their brand – to be a media. That content comes from their marketing channels of communication that will provide additional value to what they do. That’s why we start with the interview column.
On the first topic we agreed easily, because all marketing activities are aimed at one single goal: acting on one’s behaviour – and human patterns of behaviour have something to say to psychiatrists. Google helped us to select an interlocutor, and based on the search of the term “Psychiatrists Novi Sad”, the choice fell to Nebojša Baračkov (did you read our article on the importance of positioning on search engines?).
Retro Digital Agency (further: RDA): In preparing for the interview we saw your presentation in which you stated, “The language is becoming scarier and attention is getting shorter.” Our profession is interested in how to win attention in such conditions?
Nebojša Baračkov (further NB): Research, but also daily, demonstrates that our attention is getting shorter, the messages we send are getting shorter and I have the impression that those who create messages are further bucking the trend and further strengthening it. If I add that Google and other digital tools or channels assume my interest and throw certain, abbreviated messages at me – it impoverishes us all, it limits us quite a bit.
Attention must be chosen from personal experience with skill, sometimes a different approach, creativity. I’m often able to hold drug prevention workshops for high school students. In a classroom where there’s noise, racket, everyone is watching something of their own (quite similar to social media today) I haven’t been able to outvote them, to be louder than them. I applied the exact opposite. I shut up and I look at them. The silence begins, they remind each other that I’m here and in a short time I have silence, I have their attention. I didn’t give them any, I didn’t offer a reward if they went quiet or punished if they kept the noise. Just a different approach.
When you find good interlocutors, i.e. those who are interested in your content, your message, there is not much need to raise.
I also have experience from the Serbian Medical Society where I am secretary of the Sexology Section. I am able to participate in the organisation of seminars where colleagues usually come only to record presence and thus earn points. They often leave such classes in the first minutes. When we created a lecture on Madonna and her sexuality, and as a different theme of “Sexual Aids” – we had a crowded hall.
People generally want good information, but noise and oversaturation often can’t always pick out what’s important to them. And when you find good interlocutors, i.e. those who are interested in your content, your message, there’s not much need to raise.
RDA: When we were able to fight for attention and send a message to the target group, our next question is: how many people are willing to believe what we tell them, and will they have emotions or rationale in their decision to listen to us?
NB: It is clear to me how all this data can be used. As someone who has years of psychiatric practice, I can quite accurately define different patterns of behaviour. I can do this in relation to the number of patients (I’m talking about personal experience) and in relation to answers to some questions (by which I recognize patterns of behaviour). Now imagine millions of “patients” and an almost infinite number of responses with laser precision that can define a pattern of behaviour (our behaviour in the digital world).
“Kada algoritam prepozna anksioznu, depresivnu osobu postavlja se pitanje: hoće li mu biti poslata poruka da mu je potrebna pomoć ili će takva osoba biti stimulisana da kupi auto. Hoće li algoritam „praviti“ takve osobe jer su one sklonije manipulaciji?“
There is virtually infinite power and the possibility of manipulation and it is only a question of who possesses that data and tools for manipulation – how reckless, rude and what it wants to achieve, what its intentions are. It’s a huge responsibility.
The, in ’60, ’70 – various researches were conducted, practically social experiments in prisons in some communities, so it was declared unethical and all this was suspended, forbidden. Today, ethics are lacking and everything has an excuse for the goal.
When an algorithm recognizes an anxious, depressed person, the question is whether they will be sent a message that they need help or if such a person will be stimulated to buy a car. Will the algorithm “make” such people because they are more prone to manipulation?
RDA: You said it was the emotion that triggered the motivation. How do you transfer her?
NB: Definitely in this “fight” cynicism is mostly elsewhere. We use cognicia for defence mechanisms (“it won’t do me”, “it happens to others”). When we put the story in the first person, we can get a strong emotional inflow, and there’s the energy to change your behaviour. Here’s an example from HIV prevention workshops: everyone knows how to transmit HIV and knows what risky behaviour is. And do you know when I see they’re ready to change their behaviour? When I bring them an HIV-positive person to tell them their story. We also have a workshop where participants enter the roles of those who are discriminated against. Only then are they ready for a real change of behaviour, then they are motivated to learn more about everything.
RDA: Can we conclude that to attract attention we need creativity, innovation and the message we want to convey in the context of the story, the experience to influence the emotion of the person to whom it is intended.
NB: Exactly. I can agree. We also have to hope that someone who collects all our data, patterns of behaviour, has good intentions. And that he didn’t get up on his left foot, or that someone didn’t hold a grudge against him. Therefore, I support clear legal regulation in this sphere and the right to avail information of public importance. availability of information of public interest.
