Pavlovian Conditioning in Marketing: How Brands Use Psychology to Influence Buying (feat. Nokia, Starbucks, Coca-Cola)

At the turn of the 20th century, Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov discovered something that would change psychology — and marketing — forever. While studying digestion, Pavlov noticed that dogs didn’t just salivate when food appeared.

They began salivating when they heard the sound of the bell that had always preceded mealtime.

At first, food was the unconditioned stimulus (US) that naturally triggered salivation, the unconditioned response (UR).

The bell, at this stage, was meaningless. But after repeated pairings, the bell transformed into a conditioned stimulus (CS), now capable of producing salivation on its own, which had become a conditioned response (CR).

The lesson was simple but profound: a neutral cue, paired consistently with a rewarding experience, could take on the emotional power of that experience itself.

The Principles Behind Conditioning

For Pavlovian conditioning to work in practice, 2 rules matter most:

• Timing: The cue must consistently appear right before the rewarding experience. If the gap is too long, the brain won’t link them.

• Effect Transfers: When a cue repeatedly co-occurs with a positive emotion, the cue itself begins to trigger that feeling, even in the absence of the original reward.

Marketers have relied on these 2 principles for over a century, embedding sights, sounds, scents, and even people into strategies that create automatic consumer responses.

Everyday Triggers We Barely Notice

Before looking at global brands, it helps to see how conditioning works in ordinary life.

• Hot Dog Stands: The smell of meat sizzling on a cart is an unconditioned stimulus — it naturally stirs hunger (UR). Over time, the mere smell on a city street corner becomes a conditioned stimulus (CS) that can make someone hungry, even if they weren’t thinking about food.

• Toy Stores: Bright lights and cheerful music (US) trigger excitement and joy in kids (UR). Eventually, just walking past the store with its colors and sounds becomes the CS, and kids feel the conditioned response (CR) of excitement before they even see the toys.

• Coffee Shops: The aroma of freshly roasted beans (US) brings comfort and warmth (UR). Soon, the drifting scent itself works as a CS, pulling people inside with a CR of craving, even if they weren’t planning to buy coffee.

These small-scale examples mirror exactly what global brands do on a massive scale.

Iconic Sounds: Nokia and McDonald’s

Few cues work as powerfully as sound. Nokia turned a snippet from Francisco Tárrega’s “Gran Vals” into one of the most recognizable ringtones in history.

The ringtone was paired so often with the rewarding act of receiving a call — connection, anticipation, importance — that the tune itself became a conditioned stimulus for the Nokia brand.

McDonald’s perfected the strategy with its five-note “I’m Lovin’ It” jingle. Over time, those notes were paired with images of fries, smiling families, and indulgence.

Today, hearing the jingle alone is enough to spark the conditioned response of craving or comfort. Timing and effect transfer are on full display: the sound reliably predicts pleasure, and that pleasure has fused with the sound itself.

Sports, Celebrities, and Borrowed Emotions

Conditioning doesn’t stop with music. Athletes and celebrities have become powerful unconditioned stimuli in advertising. Fans feel awe, admiration, and joy when watching Michael Jordan, Serena Williams, or Lionel Messi win. Nike takes those raw emotions and pairs them with its swoosh.

The result? The swoosh itself becomes a conditioned cue for achievement and aspiration.

Coca-Cola taps this same effect through celebrity endorsements. When Cristiano Ronaldo is seen with a Coke, the excitement of watching him perform transfers to the brand. The conditioned response: Coke isn’t just a drink — it’s a taste of star power.

Coca-Cola and Santa Claus: Rewiring Culture

Coca-Cola’s holiday campaigns are perhaps the greatest conditioning success in history. By consistently pairing Santa Claus — a figure of generosity and joy — with its brand, Coca-Cola conditioned entire generations to see Coke as part of Christmas itself.

The red suit, the polar bears, the twinkling ads: all cues that trigger nostalgia, warmth, and festivity.

Over time, Coke didn’t just benefit from Christmas. It helped define it. That is Pavlovian conditioning taken beyond individuals and into culture.

KFC in Japan and Coca-Cola in India

Global markets show how flexible these principles can be. In Japan, KFC’s “Kentucky for Christmas” campaign in the 1970s paired fried chicken with the festive season. After years of repetition, families came to see KFC as the food of Christmas — a tradition engineered out of thin air.

In India, Coca-Cola ran its famous “Thanda matlab Coca-Cola” (“Cold drink means Coca-Cola”) campaign. By directly tying the Hindi word for refreshment to its brand, Coke conditioned language itself. Order a cold drink, and the conditioned response is Coke.

Starbucks, Apple, and the Atmosphere of Desire

Conditioning also thrives in retail spaces. Starbucks has trained customers to associate its brand with indulgence through the consistent cues of coffee aroma, warm lighting, and jazz playlists. The smell itself now works as a conditioned trigger for craving.

Apple plays the visual game. Its stores are white, minimalist, and drenched in glass. This environment conditions customers to see Apple products as sleek, premium, and futuristic. Even the startup “ding” sound acts as a subtle conditioned cue: it reassures users that Apple equals reliability and design.

Luxury brands like Tiffany & Co. take this even further. Their signature Tiffany Blue has been conditioned to evoke elegance and exclusivity the moment it’s seen.

Beyond the Conscious Mind: Why Pavlov Still Shapes What We Buy

From sizzling street food stalls to global icons like Coca-Cola and Nike, the mechanics of Pavlovian conditioning remain the same. A neutral cue becomes a powerful trigger through repetition and association. With the right timing, the cue locks into memory, and the emotional effect transfers — so the cue itself inherits the feeling.

Whether it’s a ringtone, a jingle, a scent, or even a color, brands are constantly wiring reflexes into our brains. Once those reflexes are set, they don’t just remind us of the product — they make us feel the product.

I experienced this firsthand without even realizing it. After watching Rocky, I started running to the film’s soundtrack. At first, it was just motivation to keep running. But after a year or two, something strange happened: whenever I heard the music, I felt an automatic surge of energy and found myself sprinting faster, even if I hadn’t planned to. The song had become a trigger — a conditioned stimulus — for pushing myself harder. That’s Pavlovian learning at work.

Another example comes from one of my favorite speeches, Peter Kaufman’s The Multidisciplinary Approach to Thinking. He explains why people instinctively love dogs and children.

No matter how bad your day was or if you treated them poorly on that particular day, when you walk through the door they’re ecstatic to see you. For those first 15 seconds, they smile, they run to you, they hug you. That consistent, unconditional response gets wired into your brain. Over time, you can’t help but feel good around them. One of the reasons everyone loves dogs and children. That’s Pavlov again: joy paired so reliably with their presence that simply seeing them triggers the same feeling.

These stories point to a deeper truth: conditioning doesn’t just happen to you — you can actively create it. Once you understand how cues and emotions link together, you can design those associations for yourself and for others. Josh Waitzkin, the champion of chess and martial arts, has spent his life studying the science of conditioning. He’s written a book called The Art of Learning that teaches you how to use conditioning to improve your performance in any area of life.

Pavlov’s century-old experiment isn’t just a story about dogs. It’s the hidden blueprint of modern marketing.

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