When you walk into any retail store literally everything around has been designed in a particular way to make you want to spend. The music playing in the background, lighting and layout of the store have all been designed to match the store’s brand identity and encourage you to feel comfortable and excited to buy.
Now days, retailers are also tapping into customer’s sense of smell and although you may not realize it, they are trying to convince you to purchase. Scent marketing works on the premises that if you introduce fragrance into a shop it will encourage the customer linger longer.
Scenting in store
The idea is that if a customer is relaxed and enjoying the atmosphere of the store they are likely to browse for a longer period of time. The longer a customer is in the store the higher chance is for of a sale. Scenting is a highly effective way of doing this.
Scenting can also be a means of luring people into the store that otherwise may walk past. The subtle yet pleasant aroma may incise that somewhat skeptical customer to take a peek inside. This technique has been particularly successful in fashion stores.
Why is scenting so effective?
Our sense of smell is the only sense that connects to the memory and emotion section of the brain. Our sense of smell is so powerful it is believed to be responsible for 75% of our daily emotions.
Research confirms that we are 100 times more likely to remember something we smell than something we see, hear or touch. Standing out in the crowd of hundreds of retailers can be hard so scenting a fragrance has been a particularly successful way of achieving this. Scent marketing is the competitive advantage retailers have been searching for.
Learn more about scenting in retail here.