Book launch ·
JD Pincus brings emotional needs into the buying conversation.
JD Pincus and Ken Beller have published Why They Buy: The Emotional Needs Your Marketing Ignores. The book maps twelve emotional needs behind buying decisions and asks a question marketers too often skip: why can two people with the same age and income choose completely different brands?
I’ve worked with JD and the AgileBrain team for years. His work has shaped how I approach brand strategy, coaching, and customer understanding. What I value is the discipline of examining the need behind a decision before choosing the message or tactic.
From AgileBrain to Clarity to Conversion
AgileBrain’s image-based assessment gives us a way to explore emotional needs alongside the evidence and conversations we already use. AgileBrain documented my work with the assessment in a December 2023 case study. I earned Professional Practitioner certification in January 2024 and later spoke with JD about emotional needs and his book The Emotionally Agile Brain for the Marketing Accountability Council.
That collaboration helped shape Clarity to Conversion, the consulting offering I developed with Wendy Wilder. We connect AgileBrain’s emotional insight with Wendy’s BASE3 method and my strategy work to clarify positioning, messages, and the customer’s path to action. JD’s new book brings the underlying question to a wider marketing audience.
Support the new book
Robert Cialdini calls it “a rigorous and useful addition to the persuasion literature.” Randall Rothenberg describes it as “psychotherapy for brands.”
Get Why They Buy on Amazon. If you read it and find it useful, leave an honest review.