Scent Marketing

Scent Marketing: Introduction

Marketers are eager to bridge and profit from the advertising gap between sell, memory, and mood. Scent marketing is a strategy used to draw in consumers based on the subtle scents of a particular space or environment. Developers have been careful to create scents that will lure consumers into the store whilst creating an open sense of well-being. The scents placed in store spaces are subtle and almost undetectable. All industries, ranging from hotels to car manufacturers, have caught onto this strategy and its implementation. Firms have also been able to establish a “brand scent” for themselves that will allow consumers to associate certain smells with a specific brand.

Scenting companies offer four major scent triggers that are able to lure the customer inside or are able to highlight a special promotion.

                                  A Warm Welcome: developers scent the entrance of the designated space with a selected scent that relates to the target audience

                                 A Warm Welcome Plus: developers scent both the entrance and center zones of the designated space
                                     A Memorable Signature: developers scent all areas of the shop to create a warm welcome for customers

                                               Product or Zone Scenting: developers scent specified areas (i.e. departments, product areas) to attract consumers that specific promotional area

-          Sandy

Scent Marketing – Retailers 

      The primary goal of any retailer is to get customers in its doors and keep them inside for as long as possible. The longer they stay inside, the higher the chances of them purchasing the particular goods and services that the store has to offer. Hence, retailers have begun venturing into a new frontier of scent marketing, wherein firms utilize the immense power of smell to influence consumer behavior. Brands that use scent diffusion technology have a singular aim: to put people in the mood to spend. Pleasant and subtle scents have been found to lift moods and enhance consumer behavior. Given that smell is the most powerful and emotional of all the senses, scents trigger poignant responses and help build an emotional connection with the brand.

     Why does scent marketing work in the world of retail? The impact of the “right” smell can lead to a host of positive consumer effects:

  

·         Improves brand perception

·         Enhances perceptions of product quality

·         Increases positive shopping behavior (consumers buy more)

·         Express more positive intentions to return

      Discriminating consumers respond to retail spaces that are fun, exciting, and inviting. As a response, retailers are now utilizing the power of smell to create the ultimate customer experience. Not only is every aspect of the consumer experience mapped out and created with a great deal of attention, most of the techniques used are extensively researched, tested, and optimized.

      Aside from stimulating purchase behaviors, retailers use scent marketing in order to distinguish themselves from other brands. Let’s examine some notable examples of how big-name brands have employed this strategy:

Abercrombie & Fitch

      A&F pumps its “Fierce” fragrance in healthy doses throughout its stores, with the goal of exuding a lifestyle packed with confidence and a bold, masculine attitude. This strategy aims to associate the scent with its array of good-looking models and staff, essentially creating an aspiration within consumers to attain this level of “beauty.”

Victoria’s Secret

      VS stores waft the brand’s signature scent in the air to increase the sensory and emotive connection with its customers.

Hugo Boss 

      Hugo Boss, one of the earliest retail adopters of scent marketing, spent two months tweaking the formula of its signature scent before finding the right fit. The rich tamboti wood scent pumping through its stores aims to create an atmosphere of luxury and sophistication, traits that characterize the brand.

- Leo

Scent Marketing: Influencing Supermarket Purchases

Scent marketing is becoming an increasingly popular marketing strategy. Nicknamed “The Smell That Sells,” retailers are now going through your nose to get into your wallet. I am sure you have all heard the saying, “don’t go to the grocery store when you are hungry,” marketers are now using that to their advantage. Scent Marketing is a technique being used throughout grocery stores to influence consumers to purchase more than they intended. Many people go to the grocery store with a list intending to stick to purchasing only the items on their list, but seriously when does that ever happen. To encourage the consumer to buy even more, supermarkets have been installing specialized scent machines to mount on the walls that fill the air with artificial food aromas enticing consumers to buy. Scent Air, the company responsible for these machines offer 350 different kinds of smells to choose from.

- Chelsea

Scent Marketing: Hotels

The hotel industry has quickly adopted the concept of scent marketing by infusing certain scents into their properties. This unique concept allows patrons to develop an emotional connection to the hotel’s scent and eventually make you link a certain hotel with positive memories and emotions.

“The hotel industry is capitalizing on smell’s ability to instantly cue memories and conjure up certain emotions, and turning that moment into a branding opportunity.” Scent marketing strengthens brand loyalty and produces repeated guests.

While scenting today is limited to a hotel’s public areas, its expansion to guest rooms is in the near future. According to Harold Vogt, founder of the Scent Marketing Institute, “…soon you’ll check in and select a scent, and by the time you open the door your room will smell the way you want it to: fresh citrus or spring lilac or light winter wood. Or, of course, no scent at all. There are delivery systems in development that will give you up to five scent possibilities. And the remote control in your room will allow you to trigger your wake-up scent wirelessly.”

Major hotel chains like the Holiday Inn, Marriott, and Ritz-Carlton diffused their unique aromas throughout their properties and are capitalizing on this concept by producing custom scents and candles to sell to patrons.

Some examples of hotels using scent marketing are: 

The Westin: Offers a light and refreshing white tea scent

The Refinery Hotel: Relies on a stress-relieving lemongrass and jasmine fragrance to sooth weary travelers.

Thompson hotels: Custom-designed scent, Velvet, which conveys the deepness of aubergine, hints of black leather, fresh tobacco, and smoky cedar wood. The custom scent is designed to portray the aesthetic of casual luxury. 

 

- Vanessa  

Scent Marketing: Cinnabon

It’s been proven that the use of scent increases sales, builds brand loyalty and improves customer experience. I’m sure many of us have walked through a mall and some how ended up in a Cinnabon or a Wetzel’s Pretzels or even a Potato Corner. Believe it or not, it’s not because we spontaneously had a craving for a cinnamon bun or pretzel or French fries, it’s because of the intoxicating aromas that lure us to those food court stands.

For example, Cinnabon stores and kiosks have ovens placed at the front so that just baked smell drifts towards potential customers. Cinnamon buns are also baked every 30 minutes to ensure the air is constantly perfumed with the scent. In some cases, operators even bake sheets of just brown sugar and cinnamon to get that signature, mouthwatering Cinnabon scent.

- Ashley