companies should pursue emotional connections as a science—and a strategy.

feelings that drive customers’ behavior. We call them “emotional motivators.”

We ultimately assembled a list of more than 300 emotional motivators.

Applying big data analytics to detailed customer-data sets, we first identify the emotional motivators for a category’s most valuable customers.

We find that customers become more valuable at each step of a predictable “emotional connection pathway” as they transition from (1) being unconnected to (2) being highly satisfied to (3) perceiving brand differentiation to (4) being fully connected.

Emotional motivators for a given brand or industry vary with a person’s position in the customer journey.

social media can have a big impact on emotional connection.

Our analysis showed that although fully connected customers constituted just 22% of customers in the category, they accounted for 37% of revenue and they spent, on average, twice as much annually ($400) as highly satisfied customers.

Embracing an emotional-connection strategy across the organization requires deep customer insights, analytical capabilities, and, above all, a managerial commitment to align the organization with the new way of thinking.