Increasing Brand Awareness Using The 5 Senses

Increasing brand awareness using the 5 senses

Contributed by Idea Collective Member:

Lisa Raebel

Rebel Girl Marketing, LLC

How do you get customers to Remember you and/or your brand?

Aside from gorilla marketing, which is being anywhere and everywhere (example “one call…”), thus having to spend a boatload of money, there is a better way to gain brand awareness, and it is much less annoying!

Most people think that colors, logos, taglines, and ads are what marketing consists of; however, those only consider 1 sense: sight. What about the other 4 senses? Your five senses are tied to emotions…and emotions are tied to memory.

Here are the six baseline emotions and examples of the industries that like to trigger them:

Happiness – food or greeting cards
Sadness – funeral homes
Fear – home security systems
Disgust – animal protection agencies
Anger – politics
Surprise – party stores

Out of these six baseline emotions, which one(s) do you want your audience to feel when they think of your products or services?

Emotional Branding

According to an article in Harvard Business Review, tying emotions to a brand can have a huge payoff, yet the pinpointing the exact emotions connect to your brand is a bit of guesswork (as well as science), because a lot of the time consumers don’t know what emotion they are feeling in the first place.

Have you ever bought one product over another based on your ‘gut decision’ vs logic? This is where emotion overrides logic in your buying habits. The relationship between a brand and a buyer that is tied to emotion is more likely to withstand temptation to defect solely based on price or convenience.

Sensory Branding

You can build brand awareness by using the 5 senses and tying them to your customer’s emotions. These are just a few examples of using the 5 senses in your marketing.

Sight

Color, images, text, graphics, video

Networking: physically showing up at networking events on a consistent basis will help with brand recognition and create a sense of trust and familiarity with other members of the organization.
Using the same color palette and logo on all of your marketing increases brand recognition by 80% - find something you love and stick with it!

Example: In an article by Adeo, they show how using color brings out emotion in some popular brands:

Sound

One voice for audio ads/voiceovers, sound effects, theme music

Networking: your own voice will be recognized when there is consistency in your networking efforts.
Using the same voice for videos and radio ads also helps with brand recognition. Organizations often use one spokesperson or actor for their television ads. You don't even need to be looking at your TV when an ad comes on to recognize the voice and often the brand associated with them.
Jingles have been around since 1927 when Wheaties used on in their radio ads. Since then, they have been causing earworms in our head.

Example: I bet a dollars to donuts you can finish the words to these jingles:

“Give me a break, give me a break, break me off a piece of that…”
“The best part of waking up, is…”
“Like a good neighbor…”

Touch

Soft, rough, metallic, wood, wet, dry

Printed collateral - is your paper collateral simply printed on plain 8.5x11 paper? Or does it have a unique shape, thickness, and texture to it?
Branded giveaways like pens, journals, stress balls, insulated cups, and phone accessories are common items that offer tactile sensory impressions with your audience. Give away something useful that will be used over and over again or put on their desk, this way your brand is front of your audience regularly.

Example: Two mortgage companies sending direct mail to customers, one mailer is stand rectangular size, yet the other is made of thicker paper and dye cut into the shape of a house. Which one would you look at?

Smell

Sweety, woody, citrus, pungent, mint, savory (to name a few)

Scents can be strongly tied to emotions. This technique is especially good for brick and mortar locations. Using scents and fragrances to either calm or excite your audience - it all depends on how you want them to act when they get there.
The human nose can distinguish more than 10,000 different odors, and studies have shown that 75% of emotions are triggered by smell.

Example: A spa uses calming scents like lavender or eucalyptus to relax their customers as they walk in. Meanwhile, a restaurant will use savory and sweet scents to turn on the taste buds.

Taste

Mmm, food – in your best Homer Simpson voice

This would be for you in the food and beverage industry...obviously.
Using sight and sound to entice your audience to buy your product is key.

Examples:

The sight of melting chocolate oozing out of a cake on your Instagram
The crunching sound of potato chips in a TV or radio ad
The aroma of freshly brewed coffee that hits you when you enter your favorite café
I mean, how many times have you come home from the grocery store or Costco with items that you never intended on buying because the samples were so good?

Increasing brand awareness using the 5 senses

This blog only touches the tip of the iceberg when it comes to how you use the 5 senses in your marketing, yet my hope is that you gained a better understanding of how emotions and senses are used to increase brand awareness and recognition.

Pro Tip

On average, it takes 5-7 encounters with your brand before someone will remember it, so use a mixture of senses and emotions to increase brand awareness. Take a look at your current marketing and see what emotions it triggers. Are they the right ones?

Until next time, happy marketing. If you’d like to talk more about your branding, join the Idea Collective and benefit from the brilliant minds of its members.

Contributed by

Lisa Raebel

marketing strategist

As the Founder, Speaker & Chief Storyteller, I use my 28+ years of experience to help business owners who know they need better sales and marketing strategies yet have no idea where to start.