Since I’ve been obsessed in recent months with marketing techniques and the social psychology of shopping, Dmitriy T.M. sent me a video found at Time; in the video Martin Lindstrom argues that sound can be used to encourage shoppers to buy more items.
So if you need to increase sales in your store, get a bunch of babies and have them sitting around giggling. You don’t even have to pay sound licensing fees!
NOTE: I see that a lot of commenters are discussing their personal lack of reaction to the sound of giggling babies, etc. I totally get it–I raised an eyebrow as well. But we should keep in mind that there may be a difference between actively reacting to something or caring about it greatly (say, loving kids) and being indirectly influenced by sounds that might vaguely evoke some element of it. Of course, from the video we don’t know if any business has actually been successful at getting people to buy things by using sounds similar to babies giggling (or water being poured), only that people seem to react positively to those sounds in the lab. So I don’t know how much legitimacy there is to this, but I know marketers have definitely tried to use smells to influence people to linger in an area, hopefully then leading to higher sales.
Other posts on marketing and psychology: restaurant menus and the meaningless discount.
Gwen Sharp is an associate professor of sociology at Nevada State College. You can follow her on Twitter at @gwensharpnv.
Comments 15
cb — March 23, 2010
Well I'm glad to know it's not just me who absolutely melts at a baby's giggle. I guess being in my 20s with my body telling me it's baby-havin' time probably doesn't help either.
Otogizoshi — March 23, 2010
Babies just freak me out, period. I hate that women are supposed to find them adorable, but then again, maybe I'm just weird. Nevertheless, I would never enter a store full of giggling babies because the mere thought makes me shudder. (Also in my mid-20s).
Jennifer — March 23, 2010
Martin Lindstrom is kind of a cutie...
Leslee Beldotti — March 23, 2010
I'm a biological woman and I have no attraction to the sound of babies giggling, either.
Apparently when maternal instincts were being given, I stepped out for a coffee break.
Shinobi — March 23, 2010
Late 20s, female, Do not like babies. My friends say things to me like "My body wants to have a child." And this, to me, totally foreign.
On the other hand dogs of any shape and size I adore.
KarenS — March 23, 2010
Early 40s, never had a desire to have my own babies, but I love my nieces to pieces. I find the sound of a giggling baby to be adorable.
Sara Pulis — March 23, 2010
I guess I'm weird because I smiled at the baby giggling (not that I want one - I hate the sound of babies screaming), but I cringed at the sound of liquid being poured into a small container. I HATE THAT SOUNDS SO MUCH! It's difficult to watch Mad Men since you hear it ever 30 seconds and I always mute the Brita commercials that air on my TV. How can anyone like that sound?
JoyfulAnn — March 25, 2010
You guys saying that you have no reaction to the sound of babies giggling, note that you may not feel that you have a reaction, but in that lab they were measuring the brain wave response to the sounds. So while you may feel like you don't respond to babies giggling, or don't respond well to babies giggling, you can't be sure how your brain waves react to it. I've been hooked up to a biofeedback machine before with devices measuring my brain waves, and it's really amazing how once you can see what the waves look like you can start to control them. However, without that kind of practice I don't think we're generally aware of how our brain is unconsciously reacting to things.
Also, if I recall he said that babies giggling was the most powerful sound, which could mean it just had the highest response (not necessarily a positive or negative response), and that also that it was just the most powerful out of the ones he tested (which I'm not sure how many that was). The study seems interesting, though I'd like to see more in depth how they performed the tests and what brain waves they were measuring.
Katarina — March 25, 2010
This is really interesting. And now, of course, I'm trying to think of sounds that affect me emotionally.
I love the sound of happy babies, but it seems so overused on TV ads here (Spain) that it doesn't sound as wonderful as it used to. Of course, that's my conscious brain talking. Is the brain's immediate response counteracted by another one that arises from the knowledge that marketing arsehats are using crude manipulation techniques?
Hearing the clink of cups and water being poured from a kettle makes me feel good, because I associate it with a cup of tea in the offing.
Crows cawing make me think of desolation, but I don't know if that's something I learned from reality or TV.
The sound of small planes flying overhead and of lawnmowers inevitably bring me down. I don't know if that has to do with loneliness and isolation or with hours and hours of childhood lawnmowing.
stagename — March 26, 2010
In retailing, the litterature on the subject is vast. If the subject interest you, see for music: Chebat,Gelinas-Chebat, and Filiatrault 1993; Hui, Dube, and Chebat 1997; Morin, Dube and Chebat 2007, for scent: Chebat and Michon 2003, for colors: Valdez and Mehrabian 1994; Babin, Hardesty and Suter 2003.
I suspect all of these have been studied in advertising as well.