In the last two installments of The Biz, I told you origin stories about my life in the New York ad agency world, including fake vampires, Schlep-Rock bosses, phone stabbings, death threats, and furniture throwing. Just in time for Black Friday, I take you inside the in-store shopping experience, specifically the music that plays while you shop.
Most people think the music in your local coffee shop or corner retain chain is just elevator music or something off of an easy listening station that's people piped in. After my New York ad agency days, I went to work for my father (another set of long stories for another day), and then I went to work for the largest swimming pool supplies retailer in the world.
"Swimming pool supplies?!" you say...
"Small potatoes!" you exclaim...
Nothing could be further from the truth.
When I was there, the world's largest swimming pool supplies retailer had 430 brick and mortar stores in 115 retail markets across the United States. We were huge. These were the days before the Internet dominated your shopping experience. My first few years there we didn't even have a web presence. No one even knew what a web presence was.
[Cue your old guy jokes here if you like, but nothing could be further from the truth here too. Evolve or die. I have evolved and continue to thrive. Yet, I digress...]
My boss at the world's largest swimming pool supplies retailer was my cutthroat mentor. He was an old school Chicago mad man. The kind the mafia would ask and then double check if it was alright to run their reindeer games on his turf. He used to smoke a pipe and mashed the burning tobacco down with his thumb for a tighter smoke. He handled Montgomery Ward in its heyday when it was the greatest American retailer (of all goods) with $1.2 billion in sales (that's $10.5 billion in today's money). he knew retail they way Michael Jordan knew basketball. No one roadblocked him. No one was smarter. No one could ever be louder with purpose than him. He was the virtuoso of the marketing campaign. He taught me when to get upset and when to take the high road. Every move he made had a purpose whether he was playing the short game, the long game, or simply manipulating the whole system so his campaigns would have the maximum impact. The best part was he was totally ethical and always made sure I was as well.
After he promoted me and moved me from a floating desk in the middle of the insane data entry to my very own office that was more like a cave than a madison avenue corner suite with a view of the park I was used to just a few years earlier he gave me my first real assignment: Curating In-Store Music for the entire lot of outlets.
Believe or not his was no easy project. Thoughtfully crafted music strategies have the power to significantly impact our relationship to brands and deliver on business goals. In this case I was talking about a nearly a billion dollars in business and that’s a lot of pressure.
The first thing I discovered is just because customers aren't paying attention to music, that doesn't mean that retailers don't take advantage of the subtleties of musical choices as a tactic to make customers spend more. I looked into other businesses to see what work.
North, Hargreaves and McKendrick found that themed music influenced wine purchases. In one study, researchers played tunes that would be typically regarded as either French or German on alternate days around the shelves of products in a wine shop. They found that on days when French-style music was played, shoppers would be more likely to purchase French wine from the shop. Similarly, customers could be coerced into purchasing more German wine by playing German music. Disconcertingly, when shoppers were asked about their experiences in the wine shop, they said that they were unaware of the music and the effect that it was having on their purchases.
Shopping to the Beat: Track Tempo
The mood and atmosphere of a shop that music contributes to are essential in influencing customers. Specifically, it is the pace, or tempo, of ambient music that can have the most significant effect on shoppers.
In an experiment conducted in a U.S. supermarket, Milliman played various pieces of background music with varying tempos each day - some fast, others slow. Meanwhile, he tracked the speed of customers as they shopped, and recorded the supermarket's total daily profits. Milliman found that when fast-paced music was played, shoppers walked more quickly through the shop. This gave them less time to make impulsive purchases and to absorb the range of items for sale on the shelves. Conversely, slow-tempo music had the opposite effect - it slowed customers down as they shopped and people purchased more during their visit.
As a result, significantly higher daily profits were earned by the supermarket simply by playing slower background music in the shop.
Chart Toppers vs. Unknown Tracks
Shopping habits, including the shops that we choose to visit over others, depend on our past experiences in a store. Unpleasant experiences, such as overcrowded aisles, can deter people from returning to a shop. Therefore, you might assume that a shop playing a person's favorite music would make them feel at home and at ease throughout their experience.
Yalch and Spangenberg looked at the effect of playing well-known music compared to music which customers would likely not be familiar with in a shop. In the study, shoppers were given either a fixed length of time to shop or a less restrictive time allocation. As they shopped, either obscure or easily recognized tracks were played as background music.
The effect of familiarity with the background music on shoppers' behavior was surprising. Of the participants given no time limit, those who heard recognizable tracks spent nearly 8% less time shopping, whilst people who heard unfamiliar music perceived time to pass quicker.
Researchers explain this by the level of arousal which familiar music generates: when paying more attention to the music, time may have seemed to pass slower, leading to the customers hurrying their shop.
Bach vs. Bieber: How classical music makes you spend more
The type of ambient music being played in a store, regardless of whether or not customers recognize the tracks, can also influence consumers' behavior. Take classical music, for instance. The genre of classical music, with its enduring, rarely intrusive, instrumentals, is often associated with sophistication and ideas of luxury, more so than a regular chart hit by a pop artist. But can a shop manager make his or her customers feel more affluent and willing to spend more simply by playing classical music?
Areni and Kim set out to find out whether classical music could make people spend more money in a wine shop. They played either classical music or top-40 chart music in the shop on different days of the experiment. On the days when classical tunes were played as background music around the shelves of wine, customers would spend more in the shop, purchasing more expensive types of wine than when they heard chart music being played. These findings suggest that an atmosphere of wealth whilst shopping can lead you to increase your spending in line with this manipulated shopping environment.
Classical music may affect the choices wine shop customers make, but it is rarely heard in supermarkets and other popular shopping destinations. What effect do other genres of music have on customers?
Jacob et al found that romantic music influenced floristry customers and further investigated the impact of different musical genres on customers in a study of florist shop visitors. They monitored customers' purchasing decisions when either no music, pop tracks or romantic music were played in the background of the florist. The researchers found that romantic music had the greatest effect in persuading customers to spend more on the florist's offerings.
However, it's important to understand that different track selections played as ambient music can affect each person differently. A track will affect somebody to different degrees if it is a particular track that they love, compared to one that they loathe - you might rush your shopping to avoid the latter!
Apart from our individual reactions, which are based on each person's tastes and past experiences, different attitudes to music in shops have been found across various population demographics. For example, Kellaris and Rice women react to more to quieter music than men do.
Combining Music
The research we have looked at has had implications for shop managers worldwide. Analysts of consumer behavior now take into account music and a plethora of factors when creating and improving customers' experience in their stores.
But we know that ambient music is not the only influence on our shopping patterns: product variety, quality and pricing all affect the choices that we make. However, the effect of the shopping experience is significant, and it has been suggested that music has more of an influence on customers when other factors are taken into account.
One study, looked at a multitude of situations in a mock-up shop, including one situation in which Christmas music was played, another where a Christmas scent permeated the air, and another where the music and scent were combined. Researchers found that the scent alone had a negative effect on shoppers' behavior. However, when the scent was combined with seasonal music to match, a coherent, fuller experience was created, and as a result, they had an opposite, more positive effect on shoppers.
These results show how music can reinforce a message and emphasize the influence of the entire, holistic shopping experience on customer behavior.
Music and sound are at the forefront of the conversation around experience more than ever before. At its best, the right music and sound will foster brand connection and loyalty not only for customers but for employees as well.
People have been making music almost as long as they’ve been making sounds. From lullabies to war chants, music has always served a purpose in the human experience. As civilization has grown, the use of music in our lives has changed, but its influence on our brains has not.
With all of that in mind, you might wonder: why do some stores play bad music? Often, it boils down to store owners misunderstanding the psychology behind the music in their establishments. Retailers with a sound knowledge of how in-store music influences shopper’s attitudes can harness its powerful effects on the human mind. In my case, I curated a brilliant selection of summer songs ranging from The Beach Boys, Jan and Dean, the Lovin' Spoonful, Elton John, and some others.
Sales went up 9% in the first six months after installation so that was all the validation I needed.
The Ad Biz Past Columns:
The Biz: Advertising Agency Origins, Part 2
The Ad Biz: Office Stabbings and Media Guy Origins
"Swimming pool supplies?!" you say...
"Small potatoes!" you exclaim...
Nothing could be further from the truth.
When I was there, the world's largest swimming pool supplies retailer had 430 brick and mortar stores in 115 retail markets across the United States. We were huge. These were the days before the Internet dominated your shopping experience. My first few years there we didn't even have a web presence. No one even knew what a web presence was.
[Cue your old guy jokes here if you like, but nothing could be further from the truth here too. Evolve or die. I have evolved and continue to thrive. Yet, I digress...]
My boss at the world's largest swimming pool supplies retailer was my cutthroat mentor. He was an old school Chicago mad man. The kind the mafia would ask and then double check if it was alright to run their reindeer games on his turf. He used to smoke a pipe and mashed the burning tobacco down with his thumb for a tighter smoke. He handled Montgomery Ward in its heyday when it was the greatest American retailer (of all goods) with $1.2 billion in sales (that's $10.5 billion in today's money). he knew retail they way Michael Jordan knew basketball. No one roadblocked him. No one was smarter. No one could ever be louder with purpose than him. He was the virtuoso of the marketing campaign. He taught me when to get upset and when to take the high road. Every move he made had a purpose whether he was playing the short game, the long game, or simply manipulating the whole system so his campaigns would have the maximum impact. The best part was he was totally ethical and always made sure I was as well.
After he promoted me and moved me from a floating desk in the middle of the insane data entry to my very own office that was more like a cave than a madison avenue corner suite with a view of the park I was used to just a few years earlier he gave me my first real assignment: Curating In-Store Music for the entire lot of outlets.
Believe or not his was no easy project. Thoughtfully crafted music strategies have the power to significantly impact our relationship to brands and deliver on business goals. In this case I was talking about a nearly a billion dollars in business and that’s a lot of pressure.
The first thing I discovered is just because customers aren't paying attention to music, that doesn't mean that retailers don't take advantage of the subtleties of musical choices as a tactic to make customers spend more. I looked into other businesses to see what work.
Shopping to the Beat: Track Tempo
The mood and atmosphere of a shop that music contributes to are essential in influencing customers. Specifically, it is the pace, or tempo, of ambient music that can have the most significant effect on shoppers.
In an experiment conducted in a U.S. supermarket, Milliman played various pieces of background music with varying tempos each day - some fast, others slow. Meanwhile, he tracked the speed of customers as they shopped, and recorded the supermarket's total daily profits. Milliman found that when fast-paced music was played, shoppers walked more quickly through the shop. This gave them less time to make impulsive purchases and to absorb the range of items for sale on the shelves. Conversely, slow-tempo music had the opposite effect - it slowed customers down as they shopped and people purchased more during their visit.
As a result, significantly higher daily profits were earned by the supermarket simply by playing slower background music in the shop.
Chart Toppers vs. Unknown Tracks
Shopping habits, including the shops that we choose to visit over others, depend on our past experiences in a store. Unpleasant experiences, such as overcrowded aisles, can deter people from returning to a shop. Therefore, you might assume that a shop playing a person's favorite music would make them feel at home and at ease throughout their experience.
Yalch and Spangenberg looked at the effect of playing well-known music compared to music which customers would likely not be familiar with in a shop. In the study, shoppers were given either a fixed length of time to shop or a less restrictive time allocation. As they shopped, either obscure or easily recognized tracks were played as background music.
The effect of familiarity with the background music on shoppers' behavior was surprising. Of the participants given no time limit, those who heard recognizable tracks spent nearly 8% less time shopping, whilst people who heard unfamiliar music perceived time to pass quicker.
Researchers explain this by the level of arousal which familiar music generates: when paying more attention to the music, time may have seemed to pass slower, leading to the customers hurrying their shop.Bach vs. Bieber: How classical music makes you spend more
The type of ambient music being played in a store, regardless of whether or not customers recognize the tracks, can also influence consumers' behavior. Take classical music, for instance. The genre of classical music, with its enduring, rarely intrusive, instrumentals, is often associated with sophistication and ideas of luxury, more so than a regular chart hit by a pop artist. But can a shop manager make his or her customers feel more affluent and willing to spend more simply by playing classical music?
Areni and Kim set out to find out whether classical music could make people spend more money in a wine shop. They played either classical music or top-40 chart music in the shop on different days of the experiment. On the days when classical tunes were played as background music around the shelves of wine, customers would spend more in the shop, purchasing more expensive types of wine than when they heard chart music being played. These findings suggest that an atmosphere of wealth whilst shopping can lead you to increase your spending in line with this manipulated shopping environment.
Classical music may affect the choices wine shop customers make, but it is rarely heard in supermarkets and other popular shopping destinations. What effect do other genres of music have on customers?
Jacob et al found that romantic music influenced floristry customers and further investigated the impact of different musical genres on customers in a study of florist shop visitors. They monitored customers' purchasing decisions when either no music, pop tracks or romantic music were played in the background of the florist. The researchers found that romantic music had the greatest effect in persuading customers to spend more on the florist's offerings.
However, it's important to understand that different track selections played as ambient music can affect each person differently. A track will affect somebody to different degrees if it is a particular track that they love, compared to one that they loathe - you might rush your shopping to avoid the latter!
Apart from our individual reactions, which are based on each person's tastes and past experiences, different attitudes to music in shops have been found across various population demographics. For example, Kellaris and Rice women react to more to quieter music than men do.
Combining Music
The research we have looked at has had implications for shop managers worldwide. Analysts of consumer behavior now take into account music and a plethora of factors when creating and improving customers' experience in their stores.
But we know that ambient music is not the only influence on our shopping patterns: product variety, quality and pricing all affect the choices that we make. However, the effect of the shopping experience is significant, and it has been suggested that music has more of an influence on customers when other factors are taken into account.
One study, looked at a multitude of situations in a mock-up shop, including one situation in which Christmas music was played, another where a Christmas scent permeated the air, and another where the music and scent were combined. Researchers found that the scent alone had a negative effect on shoppers' behavior. However, when the scent was combined with seasonal music to match, a coherent, fuller experience was created, and as a result, they had an opposite, more positive effect on shoppers.
These results show how music can reinforce a message and emphasize the influence of the entire, holistic shopping experience on customer behavior.
Music and sound are at the forefront of the conversation around experience more than ever before. At its best, the right music and sound will foster brand connection and loyalty not only for customers but for employees as well.
People have been making music almost as long as they’ve been making sounds. From lullabies to war chants, music has always served a purpose in the human experience. As civilization has grown, the use of music in our lives has changed, but its influence on our brains has not.
With all of that in mind, you might wonder: why do some stores play bad music? Often, it boils down to store owners misunderstanding the psychology behind the music in their establishments. Retailers with a sound knowledge of how in-store music influences shopper’s attitudes can harness its powerful effects on the human mind. In my case, I curated a brilliant selection of summer songs ranging from The Beach Boys, Jan and Dean, the Lovin' Spoonful, Elton John, and some others.
Sales went up 9% in the first six months after installation so that was all the validation I needed.
The Biz: Advertising Agency Origins, Part 2
The Ad Biz: Office Stabbings and Media Guy Origins