Augmenting the interplay between scent and human emotion.

Within an hour of waking, many Americans interact at least five times with company brands. Coffee, tea, shampoo, soap, toothpaste, skin cream, hair gel…sunblock… More often than not, they have chosen the brand based partly on the product’s scent. Significant studies have been done on sensory stimulation and consumer behavior. It has been positively shown that behavior is influenced by not only sight, but sound, touch, taste and smell. The more senses that are incorporated into an environment, the more influential it is.

When we think of scents we love, many are tied to an emotion. As marketers run out of ways to target perspective clients, scent technology leads the way. The psychological and physiological effect of using scents is the new frontier in branding business. The power of scent makes content extremely immersive and compelling. It creates mood, such as foreshadowing or ambiance; intensifies emotions, such as love and establishes place and season. What scent identifies and blends with your business model? An increasing number of companies today aim to attach aroma to their brand identity. Thinking of it as an aromatic logo.

Interplay with Technology-enhancing the mobile interface.

With so much of life based on electronic representations of reality, digital media not only represents our physical reality but has changed the way we perceive and interact with the world. In more than one way, technology has simplified human experience but sometimes it seems to miss out on triggering the emotional and human quality.

The recent interest and innovation in scent technology intends to change the interactive entertainment experience. Understanding that smell reaches out into a new, visceral dimension, transporting viewers, gamers, music fans and consumers into the realm of the senses. Atmosphere, mood, emotion, and products can all be enhanced with scent.

What if communication could open now on the sense of the smell? Odor in fact is so closely linked with memory that people would communicate more effectively with each other if using it.

Smell as the new layer of communication could become a new revolution of a kind.

Mobile communication has so far succeeded in transmitting audio and video, stimulating two of our five senses. One possible evolution of telecommunication could be to enhance the multi-sensorial experience of the user.

Digital Scent Technology aims to scent-enable movies, games, music, animation, or any digital media to create a more immersive and captivating environment for the audience.

Scentography promises a vast extension of sensory space, with profound implications.

New devices such as artificial noses which can capture and playback the smells in digitized format are on the verge of becoming a commercial reality-moving into food, beverage, medical, and environmental applications.

Some more examples:

Jenny Tillotson, a researcher at the University of the Arts in London, has produced the world’s first interactive scent outfit. She called her prototype dress ‘Smart Second Skin’. Just like the scent of the skin changes with emotion, the Smart Second Skin fabric interacts with human emotions whereby the aroma dimension is an integral part of the wearers wellness sensory experience. “Just as people store different genres of music on their iPods, this method offers a new sensory system to collect and store a selection of fragrances close to the body: a modern iPod of the fragrance industry embedded in fashion”.

In the near future, beside text, audio and video, communication will integrate an additional layer focusing on the sense of smell, which will help trigger memories and emotions. You may be able to capture a fragrance snapshot of your environment and send it attached to a text message or email.

On the horizon:

-Engineers at the Tokyo Institute of Technology have developed an odor recorder that can analyze scents and reproduce them by combining the 96 chemicals packed inside the device.

-Redefining the home theater experience with the sense of smell is what the SMELLIT concept is all about. So, next time a chef’s cooking a meal on TV, you know how it smells if not how it tastes.

-The latest trend in food packaging: Jars and boxes lined with “smell technology” emit molecules that push against their contents, infusing the items with different flavors.

-Researchers at the University of Southern California in LA has patented a project that would allow US Army officers to use coded smells to give orders. These can be delivered silently, in the dark and when loud noise is drowning out speech.

-An upstart called ScentSational Technologies, founded in 1997 in Jenkintown, Pa., is working with a number of food companies to harness the science of smell. The aim: to produce tasty products without sugary additives like corn syrup or expensive ingredients such as heavy cream.

-A group of Savannahians have teamed up to produce the world’s first scent-enabled music album. The first CD equipped with scent-technology is UNLEASHED by ZAN, who lives and records in Savannah. As the computer plays songs, the teapot-sized Scent Dome releases different fragrances triggered by code embedded in the CD.

The conversations that drive and define Social Media require an authentic and participatory approach. Social Media is about sociology not technology.
The future of communications introduces sociology into the marketing strategy. Technology is just that, technology. The tools will change. The networks will evolve. Mediums for distributing content will grow. The tools will change, but in most cases, people don’t.

This new conversation is about the transformation of business and communities through ideas, design, technology, integrated media.
Right now there seems to be a lot of confusion between social media and the definition of community.

Community as data hub, the new pulse of conversation.

Communities have the following characteristics:
- They are continuous, not temporal - this is not to say that people don’t drop in and out but there is a core membership that interacts together over a long period of time.
- Communities gather around a concept or common goal not around a collection of content (although content does plays a major role, it is not the impetus for the community).

Social Media is driving the communication evolution with VERY active global participation that needs to be LISTENED to.

The difference is that by listening, reading, and participating, corporate marketing will be smarter and more approachable than ever before. In this listening economy, the lines disappear.
By listening we humanize brands and form communities, create loyalty, and earn customer’s trust and business. To build a dynamic and conversational community that increases participation and response, make results open to the community, and cross platform.

To engage in community, you have to move in, not just visit. You don’t build your community; you need to find your community. Community built around consumption is fairly transitory. This is about person to-person activity. Not about speaking as “the company”, but as a person. Most companies don’t know how to do this, and it takes a lot of practice and experimentation to find that voice and feel comfortable with it. MAKE IT PERSONAL, community centric and multi- channel.

In the era of the attention deficit and social network fatigue, it is critical that we step back to realize that we are the communication bridge between companies and people.

However, we also must realize that in the era of social media, people also have amplified voices and are now a powerful channel of peer-to-peer influence. Transforming a company might take one person at a time.

Be collaborative. It’s time to shift from a mindset of monitoring and mining to one of collaboration, leadership, and justified adaptation.

And especially…give them something to talk about…”It’s not what you say that matters… it’s what they say that counts.”

Natural But Enhanced Flavors. Innovative Color.
Color is one of the most important attributes of foods and beverages. As it is often said, we eat with our eyes first. Understanding sensory differences is critical for understanding the product, and ultimately, consumer preference. Consumer demand for more ‘natural’ foods and beverages has sent ingredient developers back to nature to unearth a broadening spectrum of naturally derived food and beverage coloring options.

IFT trend tour: Color and flavor innovation
At the IFT trade show in Anaheim, Jess Halliday followed the Flavor and Color Innovation trend tour, and spoke to some of the companies showing their latest developments at the show. Watch the video podcast here.

Highlights were:
Blending taste modulation technology with traditional real fruit flavors, especially exotic berries blended with spices and herbs and on going color innovation. Current research conducted on different sources—from fruits and vegetables to plants and marine creatures—shows promise in developing new naturally derived colorings/attributes or enhancing ones already in use.

Great post from Copyblogger: Never save a good idea. When I know I have many creative deadlines to meet, it is tempting to “save” a few good ideas for later. New ideas will always come so always give your best ideas.

Ideas really are everywhere. You’ll probably find that some of your best ideas come when you are doing something completely unrelated to the idea itself…so record your ideas on the go! Liz Strauss says “The art is in training your mind to see the ideas and pull them in before your thoughts pass by them–to make your mind into an idea magnet of sorts.”

Twitter today is as wide open and uncontrolled as TV panels are closed and controlled. No longer just a platform for friends to stay connected in real time, Twitter has evolved into an important component of brand marketing. Dave Morgan posts an interesting question: Is Twitter the new black when it comes to consumer marketing research?

As more and more marketing becomes real-time, so must the tools that enable it. Twitter is a focus group/survey tool on steroids. It lets you watch, interact and survey lots of different types of people very quickly and very efficiently. As this general-purpose tool becomes more widespread, lots of ways for business to use it are emerging.