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Following our first instalment on sensory marketing in OOH that began with Sound, today we look at the psychology and strategies for integrating Taste. This sense can be tricky to integrate but when done well, Taste in OOH can prompt strong emotional reactions and memory recall.
Within the media industry today, there is compelling evidence suggesting that brands must tap into the emotive cues in advertising to connect with their consumers, to build a lasting brand preference and to stay competitive. Recently, Les Binet and Peter Fields released new research ‘Media in Focus’, which assessed campaign effectiveness in the digital age. The data confirms that emotional campaigns build long-term brand preference and are more effective than short-term activation campaigns. In addition, the Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman, says that people mostly make purchases based on intuition rather than rational decision-making. 

The Psychology of sensory marketing

Our senses play a key role in memory encoding, and sensory experiences do not always require conscious information processing. Many of our daily experiences are processed by our reptilian brain, causing System 1 responses and bringing up instinctive and emotional reaction; for example a scent that reminds you of a place you love to visit, or a taste that you remember from your childhood.

OOH puts your senses on alert

People spend an increasing amount of time outside the home, in the Active Space. There, people are in a positive mindset; they are especially receptive and responsive to the environment;  all of their senses are on alert as they experience the real world.
OOH, the key medium in the Active Space, now occupies over a quarter of urban people’s media contact time. Standing out in this visually-dominated media landscape can be challenging. Brands who integrate sensory aspects into their campaigns offer a personal experience within this mass-marketing arena.
Emotions create familiarity, which in turn, builds brands. Campaigns that go beyond logos and colours and integrate other senses than vision create even more intimate experiences, building deeper connections with consumers and standing out among the competition.

How to create tasty campaigns

Taste can be a tricky to integrate into a campaign and many brands shy away from it. However, this is an even better reason to use it because the brands that do, stand out that much more.
The most natural taste integration in a campaign is sampling; this is an experience for consumers to try the product for themselves and become convinced about quality or its new and unique taste. This method works especially well for product launches.
Our sense of taste is also closely linked to our sense of smell, which is known to trigger memory. This emotive cue is a great tool for brands to build an emotional connection by allowing consumers to tap into their memory and create a sense of nostalgia.
Although taste campaigns are a natural choice for food brands, this is no reason for other product categories not to use it - the key is a right strategy. For example, brands can integrate taste and gamification where treats are distributed as a reward. The positive association between the personal recognition by a brand catches attention, builds brand approval and boosts consideration among audiences.

Get it right

Taste campaigns can be an exciting and unique proposition for consumers, but they must be harmonious with the surroundings and the behaviour of its audience. Also, when building multi-sensory campaigns, brands can make the most of the superadditivity – whereby a multisensory experience is greater than the sum of individual sensory parts. This gives brands a great opportunity to pick complementary senses and take their campaign to 'the next level'.
In the end, however, food brings people together! So a simple, inclusive, fun and tasty campaign can build emotional connections to help brands be the deliverers of cheer in the daily lives of urbanites.  

About JCDecaux Creative Solutions

Creative Solutions is an international division of JCDecaux that brings innovative Out-of-Home (OOH) concepts to on-street reality. Creative Solutions campaigns grab attention and build a dialogue with target audiences.
Whether special builds or Dynamic Content, dedicated teams around the world use the latest technologies to optimise campaigns across all OOH environments.

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Published in For brands, about #food, #multisensory marketing