Emotional marketing components

Visual – People everywhere are visual creatures. Imagery is a smart, subliminal way to “sell”.  According to the Travel Industry Association, most online reservations are still made from the picture gallery, or one click later. Yet, most guests think their decision was intellectual, not emotional. You want your product to be remembered, so choose colors wisely. One Xerox Corp. study found that color boosted attention spans and recall 82%. With correct imagery, guests will feel like they’ve touched the velvety-soft pillows, smelled the gardenias outside the window and tasted the béarnaise sauce on the juicy steaks. Voila! They have bonded with your product. Images that convey cold facts aren’t nearly as compelling.

Some newer hotels incorporate “visual” literally, from Washington’s Hotel Murano Tacoma, full of glass art, to the 21c Museum Hotel in Louisville, Ky., literally a contemporary museum. Others feature artist-designed guest rooms or DIY exteriors.  Now, we’re seeing hotels venture into other art forms, such as film and video production that become the identity, vibe, and the intellectual soul of the hotel. This summer, the future Cosmopolitan Hotel in Las Vegas is the site of an innovative public art series called Pause, a digital art installation/marquee used to create a buzz around the hotel’s official launch in December.

Scent – Among all five senses, smell is the most powerful trigger of emotions and memories. Hotel “scentvertising” could be the stimulation of jasmine at a boutique, or the relaxation of lavender in the lobby. These scents should be barely perceptible, almost subliminal. They are meant to lull guests into a serene state – prompting them to relax, buy more and, ideally, remember the brand. “Scentvertising” has evolved from branded scents and signature candles (Westin), to perfume (The Plaza). Now, Omni is kicking sensory branding up a notch. The chain is making a lasting emotional impression on guests with customized scents “based on the destination’s particular ambiance.” They refer to this as the “local color” experience at each hotel.

Audio - Fine-tuning the sound of products satisfies the consumer while subtly ingraining a brand’s intrinsic quality. For years, major department stores used soothing music to slow down shoppers and induce them to look at all the merchandise displayed around them. Specialty boutiques may play anything from old French jazz to soundscapes such as laughing children, birdsongs or lapping water. These appeal to specific audiences for fragrance or sports or formal wear, for example.

The Hard Rock Café chain and Buddha-Bar embody their musical heritage in hotel concepts. Music is often instrumental to hospitality branding. W Hotels employ a “global music director” to sell the brand’s sound via compilation CDs. They recreate the aural vibe of the W experience, “be it the hustle and bustle of W Hong Kong, the seaside cool of W Barcelona or the private paradise of W Retreat & Spa, Vieques Island.”

Touch - If customers handle merchandise, they tend to develop an affection for it. That makes them much more likely to buy. Natural décor, featuring tactile, green elements, seems to be the way forward in interior innovation. Botanical facades are not just artistic installations anymore. They are suitable for growing, and even eating. Take a peek at the work of Patrick Blanc, award-winning artist and research scientist. London’s Athenaeum was the first hotel with a “Living Wall,” a colossal garden installed vertically up the side of its exterior. Similar innovative concepts, such as hydroponic edible wall gardens – not to mention grass tiles and turf pillows – are being installed in kitchens and throughout homes by Window Farms, Green Fortune and Jungle Walls in Miami.

Taste - Marketers are using taste to differentiate their brands. Starting in the 1980s, DoubleTree Hotels began building a welcoming reputation with their signature cookies. Warm chocolate-chip cookies were handed out with room cards at check-in, while travel agents received cookies with their commissions. Now, passion for these cookies is global. Christie Cookie Company, a Nashville bakery that supplies DoubleTree’s cookie dough, sells them online.

Major hotel chains built brand recognition through food for years, snagging some of the world’s best and most famous chefs to design menus for high-end hotel dining.

Claridges in London, New York’s St. Regis, Hotel Plaza Athénée in Paris, and Tokyo’s Mandarin Oriental, to name a few, all feature restaurants with Michelin star chefs. These iconic stars attract discerning gourmets to sample the cuisine. You’re known by the company you keep, and there is no higher rating than Michelin stars to create a top branding halo.

Lately, celebrated chefs and vintners are opening their own luxe hotels. These are giving gourmets and sightseers a glimpse into the personal tastes and gastronomic offerings of each proprietor. Chef Raymond Blanc’s Le Manoir Aux Quat’ Saisons, in Oxfordshire, England, features rooms and gardens as carefully tweaked as meals in his gastronomic two-star restaurant. Meanwhile, chef Alain Ducasse and vintner Vittorio Moretti have co-created L’Andana estate hotel in Tuscany’s Maremma region. Marqués de Riscal, among the oldest wineries in Rioja, Spain, opened a flamboyant 14-room luxury hotel and restaurant designed by Frank Gehry that echoes the Bilbao Guggenheim.

Hotels and restaurants must consider creating emotional ties to help people connect through food. Communal tables, small plates, food halls, bar dining, and Yelp.com meet-ups all can play a role. Above all, sharing is a common link because emotional resonance is the desired result.

(….an excerpt from our recent Luxury Travel & Lifestyle Trends newsletter: “Tapping the Senses to Sell Luxury Travel“)