With slow music sounds, customers stay longer in the shops, with French wines they are more likely to choose the right wine – a scientist from Lüneburg comes to interesting conclusions. And he presents them in an unusual way.
Professor Monika Imschloß not only fascinates her listeners with the results of her studies on shopping behavior, she also packs them well. The 38-year-old has been successful several times in the so-called Science Slams, a kind of short science lecture tournament with audience evaluation, most recently with two first places. In one study, Imschloß was able to show, for example, that food retail customers spend more time in a wine department when slow music is played. I am fascinated by how sensory stimuli work, says the marketing expert from the Leuphana University of Lüneburg.
We humans have no other way of perceiving the world than by smelling, hearing, looking and tasting, emphasizes the Ansbach native. No matter how digital the world may be, we experience it through our senses. He has explored the question of how music can influence buying behavior.
In a study with pharmacies, the scientist was able to show that customers have a little more confidence in the advice given by staff when so-called high-reliability music is played. These are sound worlds composed by specialist music providers, created from surveys of what confidence might sound like.
He finds it particularly interesting that most people believe they are too rational for music to affect them. If we believe we won’t be affected, we don’t react, says the economist. There’s even a study from the 1980s that found that shoppers with fast background music walk through the supermarket even faster than with slow sounds. This can mean that many people feel more comfortable or more relaxed with slow music, says Imschloss, who studied psychology and wrote his thesis in economics — on multisensory marketing.
If you want to draw customers’ attention to certain products specific to a country, for example, you need to play music typical of that country: if you listen to Italian or French music in the supermarket, for example, customers often look first at the products from These countries.
Imschloß does not see this as manipulation, but rather as inspiration. It makes the decision easier. Which the trade could definitely use. The question is, is the potential reseller making the most of its options? It must differentiate itself from the Internet. But there’s often no music in the shops, and the smells aren’t always inviting either, he finds.
