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use lemons to increase involvement

I’m always interested in things like … why does the smell of Windex make me want to volunteer?  I came across this blog entry (and read the subsequent report that is referenced).  I pass it along simply for your consideration.

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Use Lemon Windex at Your Next Gala, Raise More Money?

Professors at Brigham Young University, Toronto University, and Northwestern University conducted a simple experiment and found that a room scented with Lemon Windex made test subjects more likely to volunteer for a charity and share more cash with partners in a trust-based exercise.

Read their paper here.

For charitable fundraisers I think it’s worth your own test. And it wouldn’t be terribly difficult.

If you do multiple similar events in a year, try one with the room scented with lemon and one unscented as a control and compare the results both in terms of dollars raised and volunteers recruited.

Or you could use last year’s event as the control, although it wouldn’t be as precise.

Likewise, event-based cause marketers could scent their events with lemon.

Lemony candles oughta do the trick.

Source: Cause Marketing Blog