The One Thing You Need to Change Is Emotions: The Effect of Multi-Sensory Marketing on Consumer Behavior

Abstract

Retailers are increasingly aware of the importance of store atmosphere on consumers’ emotions. The results of four experimental studies demonstrate that the sensory cues by which customers sense products and the amount of (in)congruency among the sensory stimuli of the products affect consumers’ emotions, willingness to purchase, and experience. In the presence of moderators such as colors, jingles, prices, and scent imagery, when facing sensory-rich experiential products (e.g., juice, coffee, hamburger, soda) with different sensory cues, consumers’ emotions, willingness to purchase, and experience depend on affective primacy and sensory congruency. The results (1) facilitate an improved consideration of the role of the interaction of sensory cues on customer emotions, (2) have consequences for outcomes linked with sensory congruency and affective primacy, and (3) help clarify possible incoherence in preceding studies on cross-modal outcomes in the setting of multi-sensory marketing.