From the course: Advanced Consumer Behavior
Colors, shapes, and sounds: How our brain makes sense of it all
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- We live in a world overflowing with sensations. Wherever we turn, a symphony of colors, sounds and odors bombards us. Some of the notes in the symphony occur naturally. A loud barking dog, the shade of the evening sky or the smell of a rose bush. Others come from people like the person who sits next to you in class with swirling tattoos, bright pink pants and over powering perfume. And marketers certainly contribute to this commotion. Consumers are never far from pop up ads, product packaging, commercials and billboards, all clamoring for our attention. Each of us copes with this sensory bombardment by paying attention to some things and tuning out others. And the messages we do pay attention to often wind up affecting us differently from what the sponsors intended. We each put our personal spin on things as we assign meanings consistent with our own unique experiences, biases and desires. Sensation refers to the immediate response of our sensory receptors to basic stimuli such as light, color, sound, odor and texture. Perception is the process by which people select, organize and interpret these sensations. The study of perception then, focuses on what we add to these sensations to give them meaning. Let me give you an example. When guests at Omni Luxury Hotels visit the hotel chain's website to reserve a room, they hear the sound of soft chimes playing. The signature scent of lemongrass and green tea hits them as they enter the lobby. In their rooms, they find Eucalyptus bath salts and sensation bars, mini bars stocked with items such as Mojito flavored jelly beans and miniature Zen gardens. Welcome to the new era of sensory marketing where companies think carefully about the impact of sensations on our product experiences. From hotels to car makers to brewers, companies recognize that our senses help us decide which products appeal to us and which ones stand out from a host of similar offerings in the marketplace. Each of our senses plays an important role in how we evaluate products. Marketers communicate meanings on the visual channel through a product's color, size and styling. Evidence suggests that some colors, particularly red create feelings of arousal and stimulate appetite. While others, such as blue, create more relaxing feelings. American Express launched its blue card after its' research found that people described the color as providing a sense of limitlessness and peace. Odors stir emotions or create a calming feeling. They invoke memories or relieves stress. This form of sensory marketing, takes interesting turns as manufacturers find new ways to put scents into products including men's suits, lingerie, detergents and even aircraft cabins. The way a word sounds influences our assumptions about what it describes and its' attributes such as size. For example, consumers are more likely to recognize brand names that begin with a hard consonant like a K such as Kellog's or a P such as Pepsi. Encouraging shoppers to touch a product encourages them to imagine they own it. And researchers know people value things more highly if they own them. In one study, participants who simply touched an inexpensive coffee mug for just 30 seconds or less, were willing to pay more for it than those who didn't. Remember our sensations are just the raw data we start with. It's how we interpret those through the process of perception that determines how we experience the products around us.