Rhyme for your life

“How is Nancy Ramgopal?” “Ohh...you remember my cowokers?” Your partner is touched. “Of course, honey. It's important to me.” You go for a hug ‘It rhymes with ‘She is kind of dull‘. Which she totally is,‘ you think.

Are you also a smooth player? You simply must read this article.

This article is inspired by The Illusion of Choice. A book written by Richard Shotton about cognitive biases in marketing and everyday life. Read another article from this series.

Imagine…

It’s been a long day at work. You’re low-key exhausted. But you’re not going home. Oh no. Let’s grab a well-deserved beer first. It’s been your first month living in London, after all. You have to ce–le–bra–te, bro!

Local pub Chez Dude is the place to be. You sat down by the bar and ordered your drink. Beer is not the only thing you're getting tonight, though. It’s quiz night, and one group is missing a player. Of course, you’re gonna save their shirts!

You’re on top of your game. You won by a long run. And the first price is a nice bottle of whiskey. Let’s open that puppy! Shot after shot, you’re forgetting your tough day alongside with the ability to walk straight.

Finally, it’s the last call, and you’re smart enough to reject the offer to continue in a parking lot. (Wow, you realised those kids were younger than you thought. Nowadays, anyone could grow a beard, I guess.)

Enough about them. You have to take care of yourself. One foot at a time and sloooowly march. One, two. Don’t fall! Go. It took another hour, but you are at your doorstep. You took out your keys. Let’s focus now. You’re so happy nobody sees you. They would wonder why that nice person be stabbing them doors?

On your 45th try, you got it. However, you’re not winning yet. There’s another door leading to the corridor, and this one is secured by a code. You look at the numbers and then punch in the correct code without hesitation: 546 823 949. You got the buzz.

It took you another half an hour to find your floor, get to the apartment and go straight into bed. But the main question is: how did you get the code correctly on the first try?

A. Jesus led your hand.

B. There’s no code set. Any code would be okay.

C. You developed a little rhymed riddle to remember the code.

Already know your answer? Let’s hear it from the experts if you have guessed it correctly.

In 2000, Matthew McGlone and Jessica Tofighbakhsh from Lafayette College showed two groups of 50 participants a list of 15 proverbs. They wanted people to rate proverbs according to how “accurately they describe a human behaviour”.

One group got proverbs that rhymed, the other one proverbs that didn’t. Check out the examples below.

Rhymed version	Non-rhymed version
Woes unite foes	Woes unite enemies
What sobriety reveals, alcohol conceals.	What sobriety reveals, alcohol unmasks
Life is mostly strife	Life is mostly a struggle

As you can see, both groups got the proverbs with the same meaning. Also, it’s not the most common proverbs, so participants could create an honest, fresh opinion on them. 

So let’s think about it. It seems like the unrhymed versions just described the meaning of the original proverbs in more human language. We could consider them more approachable and reliable because of that.

Imagine you’re going on a first date with a person, and you can choose between reading a 100-year-old chronicle about their noble family versus checking out a dude’s Instagram. I know what I find easier to understand.

However, the participants felt differently. The average believability of the non-rhyming proverbs was 5,26 on a 1-9 scale. In the meantime, the rhyming forms got 6,17 on average. They performed better by 17%. 

Keats Heuristic

Information that is easier to process is more believable. That’s how we roll. 

We find information in rhymes more accurate and truthful. Rhymes makes every statement feel complete. It gives a real nice pun to it and psychologically leaves no room for doubt. 

If I say “Birds of a feather flock together“. It’s a banger. Full. Stop. But what if I said: “people seek out similar people to hang out with.“ You would be like “,Yeah, sure. But I have a friend who is nothing like me so…“

Rhymes make things feel definite. Even though nothing is. But let’s talk about the uncertainty of life some other time. 

These findings are summed up as Keats heuristic according to John’s Keats famous rhyming aphorism:  "Beauty is truth, truth beauty - that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." 

(Almost the same goes for alliteration, by the way. People will believe more in “be a worthy worker and the work will come” over “be a valuable worker and jobs will come.”)

Source: Sketchplanation / X.com

The memorability lane

What is believable is also memorable. In 2017, Richard Shotton and Alex Thompson asked 36 media staff to read 5 rhymed statements and 5 non-rhymed ones. Later that day, they asked them what they remembered. And results? Lovely 29% of rhymed statements were recalled compared only to 14% of non-rhymed ones. It’s clear then. Use rhymes to make people remember your words. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Famous rhymes in advertising

Rhymes in advertising are used across all categories and industries. See examples of the most famous ones below:

• Dunkin' Donuts: America Runs on Dunkin

• Wikipedia: Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia

• Jaguar: Grace. Space. Pace

• Pringles: Once You Pop, You Can't Stop

• Jell-O: Watch It Wiggle, See It Jiggle

• Apple Mac Pro: Beauty Outside. Beast Inside.

• M&M's: Melts in Your Mouth, Not in Your Hands

Source: Minerva Info Tech

Like rhymes, alliteration also supports the credibility and memorability of the message. Alliteration describes the deliberate repetition of syllables or words. One of the strongest marketing examples comes from Kit Kat.

• Kit Kat: Have a Break, Have a Kit Kat

Source: Minerva Info Tech

Why there's a decline in usage?

However, I think we all feel the decline of rhyme usage in the public space. According to Shotton, in 1977, ads in The Sun and The Times contained a rhyme in 10% of the cases. By 2007, it was only 4%.

We remember sayings, which are decades old at least. Isn’t that every marketer's dream? To be memorable?

Well, of course. But we all have an ego as well. Which means we are trying to make our work look hard and sophisticated. No way a simple stupid rhyme will win you a Cannes Lion! 

In conclusion, people know simple things work. And the same people don’t respect simplicity as we think what’s easy to consume must have been easy to create. 

​​The Locksmith paradox

I'm gonna share that old locksmith story that will hopefully shatter the illusion of simplicity for good.

It’s midnight. You go outside to get your night owl newspaper and the door locks behind you. Daaaamn! You scream for a good minute. Luckily, you have a phone with you. So you call a locksmith.

He’s there in a sec. Click and Clack. The door opens instantly. You’re so happy. But then the locksmith asks you for 200 dolla, fella!

“You kidding me? For 2-minute play?” The words just shot out of your system too quickly. The locksmith rewards you with a little smile and a sneaky question:

“Would you rather call my newbie assistant to do it? It will take him half an hour to unlock the door. He will openly struggle and may even damage the lock a little.”

You are standing there completely confused. “You see, bro, ” the locksmith continues, “you are paying for not seeing the effort. I can make it look effortless because I've been practising for the past 20 years. You’re paying for the expertise.”

I wish more people would see that the easiest-looking things are sometimes the hardest to create. There would be less overly complicated teenage sonnets about “irretrievable cosmic love, death and stuff” in the world. 

The great defence

Rhyming can be a great persuasion tool in political speeches. It also could be used to make advertising slogans more memorable.

There’s nothing wrong with a little word’s play, but we all now know it’s not that innocent. So how can you defend yourself against simply saying “word. bro!” after an aphoristic slay?

Try to rephrase shared content in non-rhymed words in your mind. Do you still believe the message without any questions or notes? I doubt it. 

This won’t protect you from remembering the rhyme. So, the next step you need to make is to come up with a contra rhyme that resonates more with your values. Remember that rhyme instead of the original message.

I know it’s a lot of work. Overcoming biases always is.

Don’t forget – knowing about the power of a cognitive bias does not make it disappear. 

This does not mean I encourage you to be scared of every poem.

Let’s just enjoy the play with words we call a rhyme and switch off our brains once in a time.

Don’t make haste decisions based on a pretty line. And I promise you’ll be fine. 

Correct answer: C. You developed a little rhymed riddle to remember the code.

Source: Richard Shotton | The Illusion of Choice, Minerva Info Tech

Read more: The Gener_tion E_ffect