Psychology influences marketing initiatives. This is not new and there are hundreds, if not thousands of blogs written on the subject.
Marketers, advertisers and all salespeople will use some sort of psychological tool to persuade us to act according to their targets. Their actions are grounded in scientific research. There are many proven concepts about how the human brain will react to certain words, phrases, images or prices.
An interesting element of psychology – and the focus of this blog – is how the human body produces ‘happy hormones’, and how you can link these to create positive experiences of your brand or brand message.
The science
Neurotransmitters are nerve cells in our body that communicate with each other. They keep our brains and body functioning, managing everything from our breathing to our heartbeat, to our learning, concentration and, in particular, our mood levels. There are many types of neurotransmitters, each serving a specific purpose.
Happy hormones
The most widely known neurotransmitter responsible for our happy moods are endorphins.
Endorphins have many functions, but in short, they are the body’s happy hormones, released after a fun activity, such as dancing, exercising, listening to music or having sex.
Another neurotransmitter responsible for our good moods is dopamine. This is both a transmitter and hormone responsible for pleasure linked to rewards, motivation and movement. Similar to endorphins, it is boosted when we exercise or listen to music, among other activities.
Other neurotransmitters such as serotonin can also be considered a happy hormone as it regulates our mood.
Marketing experiences
What does this mean for marketing? Well, the correlation seems obvious. Marketers can create brand experiences that target our neurotransmitters. The happiness we experience as a result of the experience will serve to reinforce a positive memory or association with the brand. This is known as experiential marketing.
Experiential marketing can take many forms: competitions, giveaways, events, product launches, etc. You can create an experience that requires your audience to dance, or a competition requiring music, and in return they can win a prize, points or a product. It targets those at all stages of the marketing funnel, from brand awareness, all the way through to customer loyalty.
It is therefore, on the one hand, a creative marketing tool, catering to all customers, activating happiness and creating experiences associated with your brand. But the effectiveness of experiential marketing can be more powerful still. It can also be used to engage your audience in your brand message, its values or stance on a particular topic.
Promoting sustainable values
The most popular use of experiential marketing we see is brands using our energy floors to help promote their sustainability messaging. And to involve their audience in taking the steps towards the energy transition. More and more consumers are becoming conscious shoppers and like to feel that they are supporting a good cause.
Case Study 1: Sustainable Corner at Albert Heijn’s Festival
Albert Heijn is a Dutch national supermarket that hosted a healthy food festival in April 2022. The festival included a range of activities, workshops and speeches. They also had a sustainability corner where both staff and members of the public could learn about the supermarket’s sustainable initiatives.
They rented our Sustainable Kinetic Dancefloor to help promote the message. And they opted for the photobooth add-on so that visitors had to generate energy by dancing to ‘activate’ a selfie camera. In essence, visitors had to boost their endorphins and dopamine levels at the event.
