Multimodality and Neurocopywriting as Digital Commercial Narrative Strategies

Abstract

The article discusses the strategies and tactics of the commercial narrative, which enable a pragmatic influence on the cognitive, emotional, and volitional sphere of the addressee-potential consumer. In a commercial narrative, verbal and non-verbal components form one visual, structural, meaningful, and functional whole. The purpose of our research is to analyze the techniques and tactics of implementing multimodality and neurocopywriting strategies in the English-language digital commercial narrative. In accordance with the set goal, the tasks of the article are: - Present the types of commercial narrative; - Determine the main tactics of neurocopywriting and multimodality in sales texts in the conditions of digital commerce transformation; - Analyze lingual and paralingual means of implementing commercial narrative tactics. We consider the commercial narrative as a combination of modes in the stereoscopy of semiotic and cognitive approaches. The development of Svitlana Zhabotynska was chosen as an appropriate methodology for the analysis of multimodality, and the definition of storytelling tactics is based on the main positions of David Herman. The elements of the method of quantitative calculations made it possible to generalize the obtained results. The success of the commercial narrative in its two types (branding and sales storytelling) is achieved through the interaction of different modes of sensorics, which change states of consciousness and participate in the receiver’s decision-making. The simultaneous combination of the codes of different sign systems to construct the recipient’s emotions and decisions is the essence of the multimodality strategy in the commercial narrative. The article analyzes the tactics of creating a commercial narrative with a certain construction of meaning through the interference of a complex of lingual and paralingual means. The cognitive dominance of the commercial narrative (conveying familiar information in an unusual way or from a new perspective, focusing on the advantages of the object of the offer: “Elaboration, Extending, Questioning, Combining” according to S. Zhabotynska) should cause a certain emotional reaction (surprise, expectation, trust) in the consumer, constructing a certain image. The purpose of creating such an image is to set the consumer in a positive mood and create motivational incentives. It is for the purpose of stimulating neurotransmitters that there is a need for the design of sales storytelling using specific linguistic means: allusions, emotionally-tinged vocabulary, unusual combinations of words, various resources of intertextuality that stimulate sensory sensations, and, in turn, is the task of the neurocopywriting strategy in commercial narrative. Table Landscape of responses made it possible to determine the digital reputation of the commercial narrative (concentration of meanings, general awareness, and recognition (authority), and the analysis of sales reports on the official companies’ websites and reviews in social networks visualized the result of the audit of the success of the commercial narrative. The study of the pragmatics of multimodality strategies and neurocopywriting in the modern digital space of commercial communication is an actual and promising research field in linguistics.