media update’s David Jenkin looks into the right way to go about experiential marketing.

Experiential marketing is not a recent invention but marketers are constantly seeking innovative and memorable ways to put it into action. When effective, consumers will not only carry the brand’s message in their long-term memory, but a positive moment, however brief, will have been added to their lives.

An experience to match the message

“Experiential marketing, in a nutshell, is experience-driven brand communication,” says Cas Dreijer, managing partner of Be Salt, “It’s most successful when it brings the brand or product to life for the audience in a sensory experience that makes them go, ‘Ah! I get it!’.”

It can be very simple, he continues, such as a sampling campaign for an FMCG brand to try and taste the product, or test drive a car. “… or it could be a series of urban games for students that aims to highlight the fun, community ethos, and real world connections that a quick service restaurant promises to facilitate between friends,” he says.

Engagement that drives action

Mike Silver, co-CEO of Elevator Agency, says, “Experiential marketing defines integrated campaigns that have a brand experience at the heart of them. As consumers demand more and more real life content – versus staged advertising content – experiential is perfectly placed in the digital age to provide engagement that consumers care about enough to drive action.”

Silver emphasises that the two key words in that statement are ‘care’ and ‘action’ – two elements that routinely lead to failed experiential marketing campaigns if ignored. Not just any experiential engagement will do, he warns.

“It’s a bit like screening any old TV ad and expecting traction. The same insights and strategic thinking that goes into ATL needs to be applied to these brand experiences to be able to develop engagements that actually matter,” Silver explains.

“In terms of action,” he continues, “It’s all very well delivering a memorable experiential marketing campaign but what does it achieve other than a fun consumer moment? Brands from any sector can deliver fun, but it’s the ROI, and action, that actually matters to deliver on marketing and sales objectives.”

Rich potential

Silver stresses that experiential marketing needs to be thought about in an end-to-end fashion, “from insight to measurement and everything in between.” He says experiential has been treated as the “ugly stepsister” of ATL for too long, but as consumers’ attention becomes ever more limited, it’s important that brands start giving it the energy and investment it deserves.

Writing for Adweek, marketing manager of RedPeg, Jay Selig lays out the value of experiential and its importance as part of an integrated campaign. “Marketing is not about driving singular purchases,” he writes, “But about forging lasting relationships.” It’s through those relationships that brands earn repeat purchases and, ideally, some free word-of-mouth advertising, he explains.

“So many mediums, like TV, are single touchpoint mediums. There’s no follow-up and no semblance of conversation between the consumer and the brand,” he writes. Experiential marketing, on the other hand, is completely personal. And it’s that personal touch that excites consumers and will lead them to share the experience with their friends

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*Image courtesy of Hal Horowitz/Invision for Microsoft/AP Images