A healthy work-life balance has always been a challenge for many individuals all across the world. In the past, employees had a hard time trying to maintain the balance between their career and personal lives. However, nowadays it is a norm for established companies to offer various non-monetary employee incentives such as free snacks, paid vacations and even egg freezing.
Many companies are embracing the idea of offering their employees various perks in a bid to enhance performance. Those bringing the home experience to the office are definitely the ones winning. We’ve seen the top brands bringing virtually everything found in the home setting to the office. We’ve seen lounge areas featuring gaming systems with larger-than-life HD screens, fully stocked kitchenettes, free meals, free gym, showers and free laundry. Every company is working hard to make their employees feel at home.
If you got free laundry, meals and shower areas, you might be thinking ‘well, that’s all I need!’ Especially for one Google employee who literally lived in a truck. How about that feel-at-home-ambiance, wouldn’t it be nice? Of course! Employers know it and are spending thousands on scent marketing. This is not a new concept, as ancient Royals have used it, but it’s getting the job done.
Scent marketing explained
Scent or aroma marketing is a simple marketing concept that takes advantage of the fact that we carry our noses everywhere. These scent facts make aroma marketing a viable option for marketers to influence your decision or mood. As smell comes second after sight in order of importance to humans and smell prompts 75% of emotions. There is no running away from this. Furthermore, data-backed research has it that pleasant scents improve your mood by up to 40%.
Most top companies such as KFC, Nike and Hugo Boss have been using scent marketing as a branding tool. To improve customers shopping experiences major brands are reportedly using particular scents and signature fragrances. At the workplace, it’s not different as specific scents are used in various office areas such as the lounge or the gym. Carefully using selected fragrances to set moods directly affects productivity.
For example, bank tellers may smell of mint and fresh apple to keep employees alert. They may even try lavender to calm angry customers. The staff lounge will then smell completely differently. Certain smells like baby powder or freshly laundered clothing can create space transitions. They also place employees in a completely different mind frame within their work environment. With functioning amenities and familiar smells, creating a home-away-from-home work environment doesn’t seem to be too far out of reach for most companies.
The right scent equals better productivity
Settling for the right scent to trigger the right emotions is key to better productivity in the workplace. From past research, at least 35% of employees said the scent is always the first thing they notice once they enter a premise. At least 93 percent felt more appreciated working in a scented environment. 93% of employees believe ambient scenting directly affects their working attitude, morale, and productivity. In the same report, 98% of the employees reported that lousy odor increased their chances of making bad business decisions. They also mentioned it reduced productivity in the office.
Although we might be reluctant to acknowledge the fact that different scents have different effects in regards to productivity, it is a hard fact that most scenting companies rely on when creating new products. For instance, from recent research, three fragrances were used in an office to determine the effect on productivity on typists. It emerged that 20%, 33% and 54% of the typists made fewer errors when lavender, jasmine and lemon scents were introduced respectively.
Scent marketing benefits in the workplace
Scent marketing in the office is essential as it makes your employees happy and happy employees work better according to the Harvard business review. Employers should expect at least a 37% increase in sales, 31% increase in creativity and overall productivity.
With the average employee spending at least 90k hours of their life working, it’s imperative to ensure employees are happy and in return work better. Other than increased productivity, employers should expect a high employee retention rate, reduced stress levels for employees, better health for employees translating to fewer sick days off and cheaper insurance.
Scent marketing is a billion-dollar industry projected to net more than 45 billion in 2018. It has an estimated annual growth of 15%. This goes to confirm that it offers real value for employers and business owners alike.