The Memory Fact Every Marketer Needs to Remember
Backed by Neuroscience
Have you ever wondered why you can remember a phone number broken into chunks, like (123) 456-7890, but struggle with long strings of numbers? Or why are bite-sized summaries more impactful than walls of text? The answer lies in a cognitive phenomenon known as chunking (also known as Cognitive Segmentation or Information Grouping).
A Note From the Nerd Student
If you’re wondering how I know so much about chunking, it’s not just because I’ve read the research—it’s because I’m studying it! As part of my studies in Industrial-Organizational Psychology at Harvard Extension School, I’m taking a course called Cognitive Neuroscience. Let’s just say that learning about memory and information processing while managing marketing campaigns is the ultimate multitasking. Every time I organize my grocery list into "vegetables," "snacks," and "chocolate" (obviously it’s a separate category), I’m basically a neuroscientist in action. 🤓
What Is Chunking?
First introduced by psychologist George A. Miller in 1956, chunking refers to the brain’s ability to group individual pieces of information into larger, more meaningful units, or “bit”, or “chunks.” Miller’s famous theory posited that our short-term memory can hold 7 ± 2 chunks of information at a time. More recent studies, such as Gary Jones' 2012 research published in Frontiers in Psychology, emphasize that chunking is not only crucial for memory but also plays a significant role in cognitive development. Jones’ work highlights how breaking information into meaningful clusters enhances comprehension and retention, regardless of short-term memory capacity.
Whether the limit is 7 chunks or closer to 4 (as suggested by newer research), the principle remains clear: simplifying information into digestible units leads to better understanding and recall.
For marketers, this is pure gold. By leveraging chunking, we can deliver messages that resonate, simplify complex ideas, and guide prospects seamlessly through the buyer’s journey.
How Chunking Works in Marketing and Why You Should Care
It turns an information overload into “Oh, I get it!”
Marketing is often about translating complex products, services, or strategies into understandable, actionable content. Chunking lets you break big ideas into manageable pieces. Remember that one colleague who tried to explain their entire SaaS platform in a single PowerPoint slide? Yeah, don't be that person. Here's what I learned the hard way:
Instead of explaining every feature of your product in one go, group them into 3 main benefits.
Use visual separators like bullet points, headers, or infographics to structure information.
Examples:
Bad: "Our AI-powered, cloud-native, blockchain-enabled platform leverages machine learning bla-bla-bla algorithms to optimize cross-functional team dynamics while maintaining regulatory compliance."
Good: "We help teams work better together in three ways:
Automate the boring stuff
Catch mistakes before they happen
Keep the legal team happy"
Improves Retention
Remember when you couldn't get "Shake It Off" out of your head? That's because it's chunked into perfect, bite-sized pieces. Your marketing should work the same way:
Instead of: "Our comprehensive solution offers 15 unique features designed to maximize efficiency..."
Try: "Three ways we save you time:
Smart automation
One-click reporting
Team templates"
(Bonus points if you can make it rhyme, but please, for everyone's sake, don't force it.)
Enhances User Experience
Chunking aligns beautifully with skim-friendly digital behavior. Most users don’t read—they scan. Breaking content into headlines, short paragraphs, and visuals makes your material more approachable and engaging.
Practical Applications of Chunking in Marketing
Let's get super specific about where chunking can save your marketing (and possibly your sanity):
1. Landing Pages
Structure content into clear sections:
What’s the problem?
How does your solution address it?
Why should the audience act now?
2. Email Marketing
Break emails into 3-4 concise sections: an attention-grabbing headline, a brief introduction, a list of benefits, and a clear CTA. Remember: less is more.
3. Social Media
Before chunking: "Excited to announce our revolutionary new platform that helps businesses streamline operations, increase productivity, reduce costs, improve team collaboration, and enhance customer satisfaction!"
After chunking:"
✨ New Platform Alert
✨3 things it does:
🚀 Cuts busy work in half
💰 Saves $10k/month
🤝 Teams actually use it
Click for details → [link]"
(Notice how I didn't even mention "revolutionary" once? Your followers thank you.)
4. Content Marketing
Write blogs with subheadings that guide readers. For example:
"5 Reasons You Need Account-Based Marketing"
Each reason becomes its own “chunk,” complete with supporting data or visuals.
5. Data Visualization, or How to Make Your Boss Read Your Reports
Remember that time you sent a 50-slide deck of metrics and your boss replied with "looks good" three minutes later? Yeah, they didn't read it. Here's what I learned from my neuroscience studies about making data stick:
Group your metrics like you're organizing a high school cafeteria:
The Popular Kids (Key Performance Indicators)
Revenue growth: +25%
Customer acquisition cost: Down 30%
That one metric your CEO is obsessed with
The Overachievers (Growth Metrics)
Month-over-month improvements
Year-over-year trends
The Supporting Cast (Everything else that matters).
Usually goes into “deep dive” slides and is used when people start asking questions like “What did we do to get here?” and “What should we do to keep the momentum?”
Real story: Long time ago I once presented 37 different metrics to our leadership team. Complete silence. Next time, I chunked it into "Money In, Money Out, Money Tomorrow" - and suddenly everyone had questions.
Why Chunking Works
Chunking taps into the brain’s natural efficiency. By organizing information into meaningful units, you reduce cognitive load and improve processing speed. It’s not just about making things easier to remember—it’s about making them feel manageable and actionable.
In a world overloaded with content, chunking could be your secret weapon for cutting through the noise. Whether you’re designing a demand gen strategy, crafting an email campaign, or presenting a quarterly report, chunking helps you deliver clarity and impact.
Real-world application—another cool example, this time about explaining the new product features to the sales team. Instead of doing what we usually would do—draughting a 12-page document—we chunked the information into what I call the "PSB Framework":
Problem it solves
Solution it offers
Bragging rights (competitive advantages)
Our sales team used it. One rep even said, "Finally, something I can explain without sounding like I'm reading from a technical manual written by robots."
But here's where it gets interesting - my professor explained why this worked: When information is chunked properly, it creates what neuroscientists call "cognitive fluency." Translation from nerd to normal human language: it just feels easier to understand.
The Science Behind Why This Works
Here's what's happening in your audience's brains (I know because I am prepping for an exam on this):
The "Oh No" Phase: When people see a wall of text, their amygdala lights up like a Christmas tree. (Think of the amygdala as an emotional alarm system—it alerts you to potential threats, but other parts of the brain decide how to respond)
The "This Isn't So Bad" Phase: Chunked information activates the brain's reward centers - it literally feels good to understand things easily.
The "I Got This" Phase: Once information is chunked, your working memory can actually process it without having a meltdown.
The Bottom line
As someone who spends their days crafting marketing campaigns and their nights studying brain function, I can tell you this: Chunking isn't another marketing buzzword to add to your LinkedIn profile. It's a scientifically proven way to make your message stick.
Three things to remember (see what I did there?):
Your audience's brain is like a full inbox - it needs help prioritizing
Information in chunks is like digital tapas - easier to digest and share
When in doubt, break it down until your grandmother could explain it to her book club
Want more marketing insights from my weird double life as a marketer-turned-neuroscience-nerd? Subscribe to The Funnel Fuel, where I translate complex brain science into marketing strategies that actually work.