Where there's a cue, there's a way : A study on the influence of visual sensory cues on consumers’ approach behavior

Sammanfattning: Background: Today’s marketers are focusing on creating more than just a transaction place for consumers seeking to purchase products in physical stores, such as a pleasant in store experience. The reason for this is due to the increased competition that present retailers are experiencing. The implementation of sensory marketing in stores has been proven to be useful in order to influence the behaviors of consumers. To do so, sensory cues have been applied as a mean to trigger the emotions of the people visiting the stores. Scholars have stressed the importance of identifying in what manner different sensory cues affect the behavior of consumers. Moreover, there is a need to further research how a visual sensory cue could influence the approach behavior of consumers and enhance their desire to touch products.   Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to expand the knowledge of how a certain visual sensory cue in a retail atmosphere influences the consumers’ approach behavior and the desire to touch. Additionally, in order to attain valuable insights, two research questions have been designed.   Method: A mixed research methodology has been applied for this study, where the triangulation of using observations, follow-up interviews and in-depth interviews has acted as the source to fulfill the objective of this thesis. The conducted observations account for the quantitative data that have been collected, whereas the follow-up and in-depth interviews generated rich qualitative data. The main methodological focus of this study is to ensure the ability to interpret the findings. Therefore, in order to identify how visual cues influence consumers’ approach behavior and the desire to touch, an inductive approach has been used together with open questions to generate fruitful conversations and theory development. In order to obtain the required data a convenience sampling procedure was employed.   Conclusion: The empirical findings suggest that visual stimuli in the store environment can influence approach behavior of consumers. However, to what extent the visual sensory cue affected the approach behavior and the desire to touch among the participants of this study could not be accounted for. The empirical findings demonstrate that color and smell in the store environment had a positive effect on the emotions of the participants. This further influenced the approach behavior, as well as the desire to touch products.