Brand Sense: Sensory Secrets Behind the Stuff We Buy

The author provides many good examples of leading companies which utilize sensory branding to their advantage, including Microsoft, Apple, Disney Mercedes Benz, and Singapore Airlines. The author also provides useful “action points” at the end of chapters. They suggest how to apply the material, referencing back to chapter material.

Aside from the general premise that leading brands should evoke (more of) the five senses and many examples to illustrate, this book could be much shorter and concise, even as a long article. There isn’t much more in the way of methodology or applications in it. For a more technical understanding of why the senses respond in the way they do we recommend The Buying Brain, reviewed by Senteo.

Did you know that the gratifying smell that accompanies the purchase of a new automobile actually comes from a factory-installed aerosol can containing “new car” aroma? Or that Kellogg’s trademarked “crunch” is generated in sound laboratories? Or that the distinctive click of a just-opened jar of Nescafé freeze-dried coffee, as well as the aroma of the crystals, has been developed in factories over the past decades? Or that many adolescents recognize a pair of Abercrombie & Fitch jeans not by their look or cut but by their fragrance?

In perhaps the most creative and authoritative book on how our senses affect our everyday purchasing decisions, global branding guru Martin Lindstrom reveals how the world’s most successful companies and products integrate touch, taste, smell, sight, and sound with startling and sometimes even shocking results. In conjunction with renowned research institution Millward Brown, Lindstrom’s innovative worldwide study unveils how all of us are slaves to our senses — and how, after reading this book, we’ll never be able to see, hear, or touch anything from our running shoes to our own car doors the same way again.

An expert on consumer shopping behavior, Lindstrom has helped transform the face of global marketing with more than twenty years of hands-on experience. Firmly grounded in science, and disclosing the secrets of all our favorite brands, Brand Sense shows how we consumers are unwittingly seduced by touch, smell, sound, and more.

This book will be of interest to marketers, brand managers, and managers of multinational companies, or those interested in theory and what the major companies are doing to engage the senses.