Your Brain on Business: Why You're Doing Marketing All Wrong (A Magician Explains)
Your Brain on Business: Why You're Doing Marketing All Wrong (A Magician Explains)
So there's this guy. Professional magician turned marketing VP. Created something called the "Magic Script."
And before you roll your eyes at another marketing framework with a cute name, hear me out.
Because Jimi Gibson just spent 40 minutes explaining to me why your brain is literally wired to respond to connection, curiosity, and closure—and why ignoring this neuroscience is tanking your conversion rates and burning out your relationships.
Also, he broke down the entire framework using his five fingers. Which sounds gimmicky until you realize it's actually brilliant.
Let me explain.
The Three Neurochemical Phases Your Marketing is Probably Skipping
Jimi trained with a Broadway director at a pristine Canadian lake where motor vehicles weren't even allowed. (Yes, this is relevant. Stay with me.)
And this director broke down something that changes how you think about every business conversation, sales pitch, and email you'll ever send:
Your brain releases three different chemicals when you're connecting with someone.
Not metaphorically. Literally. And if you skip any of these phases, you lose people.
Phase 1: Connection (Oxytocin Release)
When you walk onto a stage—or into someone's inbox—you have seconds to make them think: "I kind of like where this is going."
That's oxytocin being released. The trust hormone. The "I feel safe with this person" chemical.
It happens when someone feels SEEN. Understood. When they realize you actually get their pain or their situation.
Skip this step and go straight for the sale? You're done. Because you just triggered their fight-or-flight response instead of their bonding response.
Phase 2: Curiosity (Dopamine Release)
Once you've got connection, you can start playing around a little.
Is the hero going to get the girl? Will they beat the deadline? Can they overcome this obstacle?
This is dopamine territory. The craving for closure. The "I need to know what happens next" feeling.
(Side note: This is the SAME mechanism that makes social media addictive. Your brain craving the reward of someone liking your post. We're just using it for good instead of evil.)
Here's the mistake most people make: They keep you in curiosity mode FOREVER. No payoff. Just endless "what if" and "stay tuned" and "coming soon."
After a while, you're just exhausting people. Confusing them. Wearing them out.
Phase 3: Closure (Serotonin Release)
Finally, you need to actually GIVE THEM SOMETHING.
Answer the question. Provide the solution. Close the loop.
That's serotonin. The "ahhhh, everything's right with the world" chemical. Satisfaction. Completion.
Without this, people feel like they wasted their time. Like you blue-balled their brain chemistry.
If you're not designing your messaging around these three phases, you're fighting against how human brains are literally wired.
The Five-Finger Framework (That's Actually Not Cheesy)
Jimi calls this the "Magic Hand" and I was skeptical until he walked me through it. Each finger represents something crucial about human connection and messaging.
The Pinky: Passion
Show genuine excitement about what you do. Not sanitized corporate enthusiasm that went through 17 rounds of PR approval.
REAL passion. The kind where people can tell you actually give a damn.
When you strip that out—when you sanitize it into "professional" blandness—you trigger the uncanny valley effect. People get that creepy "is this even a real human?" feeling.
And once that happens? Trust is GONE.
Remember: Neural bonding is a real thing. When you tell a story with passion, the listener's brain activity literally mirrors yours. They feel your emotions. Empathy isn't optional—it's physiology.
The Middle Finger: Defiance (Yes, Really)
Who are you AGAINST?
What's the villain? What are you standing up to?
If you truly believe your product or service can save customers from a bad choice, you should call out that bad choice. Name the dragon.
This isn't just about creating drama. It brings people TOGETHER.
Your employees rally around defeating the dragon. Your customers form a community around a shared enemy (bad practices, outdated systems, harmful competitors, stupid industry norms).
Sports are a gazillion-dollar industry for exactly this reason. Opponents make things interesting. Tension creates meaning.
If you're so "professional" that you won't take a stand against anything, you're boring. And boring doesn't build relationships or drive revenue.
The Index Finger: Focus (The Pointy One)
Remember those Uncle Sam posters? "We want YOU."
You need to know who you're talking to. Specifically. Intimately.
If you don't know who you're pointing at, you're not talking to anybody about anything.
Jimi's philosophy: Every communication should be directed at ONE person, centered around ONE big idea, with ONE solution and ONE call to action.
Otherwise it gets muddy. Confusing. Generic.
Human to human means ONE human to ONE human. Not "one brand to whoever happens to be reading this."
The Ring Finger: Relationship
(Okay, Jimi didn't explicitly break down the ring finger in our conversation, but I'm extrapolating here because it's obviously about commitment and long-term relationships.)
This ties into something he said that made me want to stand up and applaud:
People are trying to do things really, really short-term. Quick results. They're not investing in long-term relationships.
You can't skip the trust-building. You can't go straight for the close every single time. That's disrespectful. It treats people like ATMs instead of humans.
The ring finger represents commitment to the relationship beyond the transaction.
The Thumb: Approval and Legacy
Thumbs up: Great job. Do this. This is working. Thumbs down: Don't do that. This isn't working.
It's about guidance. Metrics. Measurement.
But it's ALSO about legacy: What thumbprint are you leaving on the world? On your customers? On your employees and vendors?
Your thumbprint is unique (fun fact: Jimi's got three sets of twin nieces and nephews who can unlock each other's phones with Face ID but NOT with their thumbprints).
You should be proud of what makes you uniquely you. And you should be intentional about the mark you're leaving.
The Magician Advantage (And Why You Need It)
Here's why Jimi's magician background matters:
Immediate feedback.
When you're on stage and people fall asleep, start looking at their phones, or walk out? You know instantly that something's not working.
Most marketers don't get that luxury. They post something online and wait days or weeks for metrics. They send emails into the void and hope for the best.
But the underlying principles are the same. Connection → Curiosity → Closure. Oxytocin → Dopamine → Serotonin.
The brain doesn't change just because the medium does.
What This Means for Your Scaling Company
If you're in B2B health tech, med tech, SaaS—anywhere relationships actually matter—you can't afford to ignore this stuff.
Your competitors are out there spraying content everywhere, wondering why it doesn't work. Burning bridges by pushing for sales without building connection. Creating "professional" messaging so sanitized that nobody believes a real human wrote it.
You have a massive opportunity to do something different:
Build actual relationships by understanding how brains work. Use the three-phase structure in EVERY interaction. Apply the five-finger framework to your messaging strategy.
Stop treating people like conversion metrics and start treating them like HUMANS whose brains release specific chemicals when you connect with them the right way.
Watch the Full Episode
This conversation with Jimi went deep into performance psychology, why faceless corporations can never win, and how to structure business conversations that actually respect how human beings are wired.
He's been doing this for 25+ years and has zero patience for marketing that treats people as targets instead of humans.
Your audience's brains are waiting for connection, curiosity, and closure.
Stop skipping steps. Start respecting the neuroscience.
P.S. If you're reading this thinking "this is too touchy-feely for B2B" or "we just need to focus on features and ROI," you're exactly who needs to hear this message. Your "professional" approach is probably triggering the uncanny valley effect and destroying trust without you even realizing it. The chemicals don't lie. Oxytocin, dopamine, serotonin—they happen whether you acknowledge them or not. The question is: Are you designing your messaging to work WITH human biology, or are you fighting against it and wondering why your conversion rates suck? Also, Jimi literally holds up all five fingers when explaining this framework, and I'm now doing it unconsciously when I explain it to other people. It's annoyingly effective. You'll do it too after listening to the episode. Don't say I didn't warn you.
Karl Pontau hosts The Human Connection Podcast, where we talk about the stuff that actually matters in business: the humans running it. Because whether you're B2B or B2C, it's really H2H—human to human. Subscribe so you don't miss the next episode where we probably say something that'll make your HR department uncomfortable.
