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  • Marketing is everywhere, screaming for your attention in lights and in your headphones.

  • But while traditional marketing assaults your eyes and ears,

  • there's another industry quietly fighting for your attention

  • and they're doing it through your nose.

  • So, scent marketing is the idea of using scent and incorporating to all the touch points of the customer experience.

  • It's very subconsciousso it's not like a logo

  • or something where you can see and everybody sees it the same way.

  • Depending on people's experiences and their upbringings, and their history,

  • they might perceive the scent to be a little bit different.

  • It's more emotional.

  • Chances are, you've already experienced scent marketing --

  • and know it can have a profound impact on your mind.

  • Research has found that combining scent with visual marketing strengthens our memory of it in the long term,

  • which can affect how we feel in a very physical way.

  • For example, an ambient coffee scent can emulate a feeling of alertness even if you haven't had any coffee,

  • and scents that we commonly attribute to cleanlinesslike lemon or tangerine

  • could make a messy store seem cleaner.

  • Various research over the years also found that shoppers in scented environments may linger longer,

  • perceive the merchandise as better and are more willing to pay higher prices.

  • And when casinos started pumping smells into the air to negate the stench of cigarettes,

  • they saw slot machine usage double.

  • People are actually more comfortable, they feel warm they feel invited, they feel welcomed.

  • It's really about creating an amazing experience for customers when they walk in.

  • Using scent to enhance an experience is actually pretty common.

  • For example, Museums have used "scentscaping" to intensify their exhibits

  • like adding the smell of gunpowder to a civil war exhibit

  • and hospitals use scentscaping to create a more soothing environment for patients

  • but scent marketing is a bit more complicated.

  • Scent marketing and branding is about using one scent for the whole experience.

  • If you're a millennial, the first thing coming to mind might be...

  • Abercrombie and Fitchor Hollister.

  • These stores are the most extreme form of scent marketing called billboard scenting.

  • Every store smells the same regardless of where you are,

  • and chances are, it's really overpoweringlike an oversized billboard.

  • But when you separate that scent from the store,

  • you can start to understand exactly what they want you to feel.

  • It smells very masculine. Male clothing store.

  • Sexy.

  • Manly.

  • Smelling this, kind of, weirdly, makes me feel intimate.

  • Believe it or notto an ex-boyfriend I had.

  • It smells like an Abercrombie model, you know.

  • You see, the scent matches the visual branding

  • and there's a careful process behind that.

  • So we have to learn a lot about the brand, the history, what sets them apart.

  • It's a Men's spa?

  • Woman's spa?

  • Is it in a country club?

  • Is it in a luxury hotel?

  • Who their target demographic isthe people that are coming in.

  • And then it's really about understanding their aspirational attributes,

  • and then capturing those qualities as adjectives and turning them into a scent.

  • In most cases, the scent is carefully diffused through the storesometimes through stand alone systems

  • and sometimes directly through the HVAC systems.

  • It's a delicate process designed to release just a hint of aroma into the air.

  • Because in general, overpowering people with an aroma isn't a good thing.

  • This is why with most places you won't even realize there's a particular scent,

  • unless, of course, it's completely out of place.

  • In the same way that scent marketing can generate a positive experience,

  • when the aroma doesn't match the demographic, location, or brand identity, the public reaction is often negative:

  • In 2006, Got Milk? Ads dispersed at bus stops in San Francisco were equipped with cookie scented strips.

  • While chocolate chip cookies smell delicious, placing that scent at a bus stop completely backfired

  • and the company pulled the scent marketing one day after releasing it.

  • Then, in 2008, Starbucks had to put the sale of breakfast sandwiches on hold.

  • The sandwich smell was competing with the coffee aroma, ruining the ambience.

  • Think about that: If a coffee shop doesn't smell like coffee, would you still start your morning there?

  • Once you start to be conscious of it you'll notice that it's everywhere.

  • when you walk into certain banks, when you walk into certain malls,

  • when you walk into storesall types of businesses are using it.

  • And if it's working properly, scent marketing is helping to create a positive experience for both the business and the customer.

  • The reason why people stay longer in a store is because it's a better experience.

  • So they're happier.

  • Their mood is lifted and who doesn't want to have their mood lifted and be happier?

  • Hey, thanks for watching The Goods and thanks to our sponsor American Express.

  • AmEx has a credit card feature that gives you choices for how to make payments, big or small, called "Pay it Plan It."

  • "Pay It" helps reduce your balance by making small payments throughout the month.

  • And "Plan It" can help you split purchases over $100 up over time.

  • You can check it out at americanexpress.com/payitplanit.

  • And thanks again to American Express, their support made this series possible.

Marketing is everywhere, screaming for your attention in lights and in your headphones.

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