“People spend money when and where they feel good”
– Walt Disney
Most brands and products are now interchangeable. This sad statement emanates from one of the fathers of marketing, Philip Kotler.
That a brand is identified, recognized and understood in its values is the core of any strategy, the persistent problem of every marketing director.
However, in a competitive environment where the use and functional value of a brand (a product or a service) can be easily copied or duplicated, what is left to stand out from the crowd? How can customer preference be activated to ensure customer loyalty? How can you build, retain or strengthen the bond that will closely link your brand with the consumer and put you ahead of the competition?
These are questions that sensory branding answers: using the senses (and their impact on consumer perceptions) to enrich the experience of the brand and build its uniqueness and personality, while paving the way to affection, consumer preference and loyalty.
Sensory branding (and sensory marketing) fills the gap left by traditional marketing theories when it comes to responding to today’s consumer mindset. This new type of thinking has its origin in the 90s, with the change from the rational mentality that previously prevailed in the consumer’s decision-making process to the emotional and hedonistic search that now drives their desires and acts of consumption.
In reaction to an increasingly virtual and pressurized industrial world, people have started looking for a way to reconnect with reality in their private sphere, a way to re-enchant their world. The individual values of pleasure, well-being and hedonism emerged alongside a truly new concept of consumption that exposed the limits of traditional marketing theories.
Consumption today is a way of “being”. Like any leisure activity, it becomes a place to express a part of your personality, where you share common values with a small group of other people (a tribe). And perhaps more than anything else, acts of consumption should be analyzed as “felt” acts, as experiences capable of providing emotions, sensations and pleasure.
The acts of buying are driven by this desire for sensational experiences that rekindle the senses and drive the emotions. As effective as a product may be, it is its hedonistic and emotional added value, as well as the distinctive experience it offers, that drives consumers to buy and build loyalty.
What does it mean from a brand point of view?
First, it means that price and functionality are now taken for granted (or, in other words, not different enough). Now it is the intangible, irrational and subjective attributes of the brand offering that are the new success factors.
Second, it highlights the fact that sensations, new experiences and emotions must be part of the brand experience. It is through these 3 channels that the brand can generate greater differentiation, influence consumer preference and ensure their affection.
In short, focusing brand strategy on rational arguments about its functional value is no longer enough to ensure success. What is clear is that empowered brands are those that manage to deliver hedonistic and emotional attributes throughout the brand experience. This is where brands can add meaning and therefore value and meaning to products and services, transforming them from interchangeable products into powerful brands.
This is where sensory branding comes into its own: exploring and revealing how brands can connect with people in a more sensitive way, on this true level of senses and emotions. To put it more clearly, it focuses on expressing and empowering the brand by exploring hedonistic and emotional potentials.
In this theory, the sensations prevail because they are a direct link with the affects of the consumers. The senses are directly affected by the limbic part of the brain, the area responsible for emotion, pleasure, and memory. In a way, it’s not a huge surprise. It’s about going back to basics, to what really attracts a human being on a day-to-day basis. Meaning is a vital part of our human experience. Almost all of our understanding and perception of the world is experienced through our senses. A growing body of research shows that the more senses your product attracts, the greater the brand experience.
While communication and visual identity focus primarily on sight and sound, a precise multisensory identity that integrates touch, smell and taste, where appropriate, sends a more powerful emotional message to consumers, multiplying connections or touch points through which consumers can be attracted, convinced and touched by the brand. It enables and encourages consumers to “feel” and “experience” the brand (product or service) with their “emotional brain”.
As Martin Lindstrom, author of the best-selling book Brand Sense, states, success lies in mastering a true sensory synergy between the brand and its message.
The first brand to intuitively implement sensory branding theory was Singapore Airlines. Like any other airline, Singapore Airlines communication and promotions focused primarily on cabin comfort, design, food and pricing. The big breakthrough came when they decided to incorporate the emotional experience of air travel. The brand platform they implemented had a simple but quite revolutionary goal as its goal: to introduce Singapore Airlines as an entertainment company. From then on, every detail of the Singapore Airlines travel experience was scrutinized and a new set of branding tools was implemented: from the finest silk and colors chosen for the staff uniform, to the makeup of the attendants from flight that had to coincide with Singapore. Airline branding color scheme; from the drastic selection of flight attendants who were to be representative of the “archetype of Asian beauty”, to the way they were to speak to passengers and serve food in the cabin. Everything had to convey softness and relaxation to transform the Singapore Airlines travel experience into a true sensory journey. Right after turning the Singapore Airlines flight attendant into an iconic and iconic figure of the brand (the famous “Singapore Girl”), they once again broke the marketing barriers by introducing a new dimension to the brand: a signature scent. They specifically designed a signature scent, called Stefan Floridian Waters. This olfactory signature was used by the crew, mixed with the hot towels served to passengers, and soon permeated the entire fleet of aircraft. Described as smooth, exotic and feminine, it was the perfect reflection of the brand and achieved instant recognition from Singapore Airlines upon boarding the plane. It soon became a unique and distinctive brand of Singapore Airlines, capable of transmitting a set of memories linked to comfort, sophistication and sensuality.
Another example given by Martin Lindstrom is Rolls Royce. To bring back the feel of the older “rollers” and maintain the luxurious aura that surrounds the brand, Rolls Royce analyzed and recreated the unique scent of materials such as mahogany wood, leather and oil that permeated the interior of the Silver Cloud. 1965 Rolls-Royce. Now every Rolls Royce that leaves the factory is equipped with a diffuser at the bottom of the car seat to convey this unique brand identity.
What we learn here is that only when all the sensory touch points between the brand and the consumer are integrated, evaluated and leveraged, can a true enrichment of your brand identity be achieved. In the future, it can become the most innovative tool to stand out from the crowd, driving the brand experience and eventually influencing consumer loyalty.
Today, few brands are truly integrating sensory branding into their strategy, while forward-thinking companies are already implementing it successfully. Adding a sensory dimension to the brand experience is surely about to become the next competitive asset.
In the future, brand building for marketers may lie in a simple question: how does my brand feel?
For more information on sensory branding services, whether in China or internationally, you can visit the Labbrand website.
Vladimir djurovic