November 19th, 2018 by Chris Chapman

We often take our sense of smell for granted in modern life. If you’re a business owner, it’s especially easy to get so wrapped up in how your business looks to draw in potential customers that you forget about the other details. One of the most important details that should never be overlooked is how your premises smells – a pleasant smell in a business can be a powerful marketing tool. Customers can stay up to 44% longer in a business with an attractive scent, and it can also improve your customers’ moods by up to 40%. Happy customers who are more inclined to spend longer with your business is a good combination, so how can you use smell to achieve it? Read on to find out!

Why is Smell So Important?

At a time when we’re bombarded with visual and audio marketing constantly, our sense of smell is a relatively untapped method of standing out from your competition. This is especially important in restaurants and cafes, as nice smells will make food and drink taste better. That’s why food seems tasteless when you have a cold! Our sense of smell is basically hardwired into our brains, and businesses can use this to their advantage. Bakeries should encourage a smell of freshly-baked bread to waft over their shop floor, whereas a calming sandalwood scent can create a calming atmosphere in a spa or an office.

Good Smells and Bad Smells

Good smells are proven to have a positive effect on your customers and businesses, but you should also be aware of the effect bad smells can have, too! Over time, dirt and bacteria can cause unpleasant, musty odours to build up, even if you keep your workplace clean and hygienic. As you might imagine, this is especially a problem in washrooms. Even if your front of house area is kept in pristine condition, a dingy and foul-smelling washroom will leave your staff and customers with an overwhelmingly negative impression of your business! Part of the job of pleasant scents is to mask these foul odours. Making sure your business is kept clean and hygienic – especially in the washroom – should be essential for your business anyway as it’ll help prevent these bad odours from building up too much. If you keep everything clean, it’ll be easier to make your business smell nice with a quality air freshener.

Too Much of a Good Thing

As with every sense, it’s easy to overwhelm your sense of smell. Just as you wouldn’t clutter up your business with a visual assault of marketing materials, ornaments, and other features, you shouldn’t overpower your customers with a mix of smells either. The positive effects of a nice-smelling business are largely subconscious, so you should aim for a subtle scent that reinforces your brand. If you’re a restaurant, using a fruity, zesty scent can be used to whet your customers’ appetites, while clothing shops can create a comfortable atmosphere with a subtle fresh cotton fragrance. Think about what your business’ brand is and how you want your customers to feel, and use this to pick an air freshener that subtly reinforces it. If you go overboard with your fragrances, you can actually put your customers off and distract them from what you’re trying to achieve!

How Can You Make Your Business Smell Good?

As we said before, half the battle is basic hygiene. The gradual build-up of dirt and bacteria which occurs in every business can lead to musty smells appearing. As this process is gradual, you might not notice it if you’re in the workplace every day – but your customers certainly will. You should make sure your workplace is cleaned regularly, ensuring you go the extra mile to go above and beyond your legal health and safety responsibilities. That means you should keep things looking tidy and presentable at all times while using an air freshener to make your workplace smell fresh. There is a massive range of air fresheners available so you can easily pick one that suits your business. Your main choice is between aerosol and non-aerosol air fresheners. Aerosol air freshener dispensers spray a scented aerosol into the air at regular intervals and are very common in businesses as they’re cost-effective and can usually be programmed to spray at different intervals. This means you can easily switch your air freshener off when your business is closed to reduce waste. Non-aerosol air freshener dispensers use any other form of air freshener, including scented liquids and oils and fragranced blocks of sweet-smelling material. Non-aerosol air freshener dispensers are a great choice for any business who doesn’t want to spray aerosols into the air. They’re a good choice for care homes or baby changing facilities or any business where some members of staff have breathing difficulties.

Using Air Fresheners to Increase Productivity

Making your workplace smell nice shouldn’t just be for your customers – it can help your staff, too! Air fresheners are still important even if you’re not a customer-facing business. This is because of the mood-boosting effect that pleasant fragrances can have; when we’re happy, we’re more productive and more creative, so an air freshener is a little detail that could help your office workers to work a little better! Again, you can choose a pleasant but subtle fragrance that enforces your brand – you can even find air fresheners that imitate popular perfumes and aftershaves for a classy scent!

Which Scent is Right for My Business?

Different scents have been found to have different results. The effects that different smells can have on our behaviour is quite remarkable. Lemon: A Japanese study found that the smell of lemon oil increased alertness in office workers, improving data entry performance by 54%. Fresh baking: If you work in a customer-facing business, the smell of freshly-baked goods can improve your customer service. Studies have shown that we’re more likely to help out a stranger when we smell baking and fresh coffee. This is also a good way to improve the atmosphere around the office! Lavender: Lavender is commonly used in spas and physiotherapy rooms for good reason; it’s proven to help reduce stress and anxiety. Peppermint: A minty smell can help improve alertness and concentration. Also, peppermint oil acts as a natural spider repellent, which is good for any arachnophobes in the office!