Beloved Experiences Engaging consumers and influencers using multi-sensory brand experiences

A Student’s Interview Questions Are Answered

A couple of months ago I was invited to speak to students at the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale on the subject of Experiential Marketing. Shortly after I received several e-mails from students, teachers and advertising professionals alike. One that stuck out was an e-mail from an eager student who was disappointed that she missed me because she had several questions she wanted to ask for her school paper. I found her questions to be quite interesting so I thought I would share the questions and answers here. They are as follows:

Interview Questions for Wagner

1) Did Gladwell’s “The Tipping Point” influence the Experiential Marketing movement?

While “The Tipping Point” was certainly inspirational in many ways, I don’t believe any one thing served as a primary influencer. Moreover, I wouldn’t consider experiential marketing a movement. I believe this marketing methodology is the result of mass media fragmentation, human evolution and the manner in which today’s consumers are affected by brands and marketing messages. Consumers today are marketing savvy and mostly influenced by their peers and personal experiences. As a result, brands need to develop a sincere, relevant, personal and lasting relationship with consumers in order to connect with them.

2) What are ways to make target audience prospects aware of opportunities to attend and participate in these relevant experiences?

Traditional media advertising, online and social media marketing and guerilla marketing tactics, just to name a few. However, sometimes no pre-promotion is required or desired and simply “popping up” in the market with an innovative and relevant tactic, will suffice. If the experience provides an inherent benefit to the audience, they will participate and the experience will be successful.

3) Can this form of marketing be delivered in “mass marketing” ways? Specifically, can you use the internet to let people self-select to “experience” products? Can you use print or TV to drive people to such “experiences?”

Some of this was touched upon in question #2. House Party, Inc. does a really nice job in pre-qualifying consumers who express interest in hosting experiential house parties. Brands recruit consumers to act as their brand ambassadors with the trade-off being that consumers get to keep or consume a sampling of goodies and host a fun party for their friends with items provided by the brand.

4) Isn’t the ultimate “experiential marketing” simply trialing? Let someone try your product and see if they like it?

That’s one example of a very popular tactic. However, creating a true experience starts with a clear understanding of consumer behavior, psychographics and ethnographics. The resulting strategy and concept should deliver a 360 degree brand immersion for the consumer. I believe that the brand experience should be multi-sensory and personal much the same as when human beings interact with one another. Aaker’s 5 Dimensions of Brand Personality, truly identifies the humanistic layers which should exist in order for a brand to make an emotional impact on the consumer.

5) How could you apply Experiential marketing to an upscale restaurant? What sort of events/promotions/experiences would you create to get a “buzz” about a restaurant in a local area?

First of all, it is of utmost importance that the restaurant itself be a positive experience for the consumer the second he/she opens the door. Then the restaurant can deliver the brand experience to their audience outside of the restaurant. What makes the restaurant special beyond their menu? Determine the brand’s DNA and create an experience or event in the target market which immerses the consumer in the positive feeling which influences them to patronize the establishment. Sampling the menu items offsite may or may not be appropriate due to issues of quality control. However, diners go to restaurants for more than the menu items so capitalizing on what that is and delivering it to the target audience in the event is key.

6) Do you believe that experiential marketing have the potential to be a discipline by itself?

It already is. The question to ask is whether or not the discipline can function as the sole solution for a brand’s marketing strategy. I believe in a full marketing mix which encompasses multiple disciplines and mediums. It would be short-sighted for anyone to suggest that any one discipline can replace all others as a blanket solution. The new marketing world is very complex and sophisticated, so a “one size fits all” approach does not work.

7) Do you believe that marketers will return to traditional product-centric due to the current economy and base their purchasing decisions on rational comparisons?

Absolutely not. This is why traditional marketing alone no longer works as it once did many years ago. While traditional methods persuade consumers by invoking rational factors, experiential marketing modifies behavior through emotional persuasion. Everyday we are influenced by personal experiences which are visceral, emotional, mental and physical. Over the years, consumers have grown suspicious of exaggerated product claims and false comparisons, causing them to seek out trusted advice from their peers who can cite their positive or negative experiences with a product or brand.

Love at First Step

The summer I was 12, my mom bought me my first pair of name brand shoes. They were black Reeboks with white detail and they were absolutely hideous. It didn’t help that my height hadn’t caught up with my size 9 feet yet or that my mother insisted on buying shoes a size too big “to grow into.” I’ve always wondered if this had not been her mantra, would my feet would have gotten that big in the first place? Despite the fact that it looked like I was wearing snow shoes…in Florida…in July, I was thrilled with the purchase.

I had never been the kind of girl to care about tags and titles, especially not shoes, but that previous school year, I’d experienced the shame of wearing no names. They fit me and they were cute, which was more than I could say for the cheapest pair of name brand shoes my mother could find to appease me, but they weren’t enough. I’d worked hard to fulfill my side of the bargain of straight A’s to get me to the promised land of labels, but my reward was less like milk and honey and more like cheap and ugly. Next time I needed new shoes, I got Pumas and then Adidas, leaping from brand to brand with no commitment to anything but the little red sign that said “Sale.”

A few years later, I got into running. I ran when I was happy. I ran when I was sad. I ran when I was angry and that was often considering the teenage angst my hormone-riddled self inflicted upon me. It was on the pavements of my hometown of DeLand that I discovered true brand evangelism—Nike is my homeboy. Whether the shoes actually fit better, wick away sweat differently, or more effectively absorb the shock of 5’8” girl slamming into the ground for three miles than comparable brands, I do not know. What I do know, is I feel like they do. This feeling was brought about not by careful study and research, nor by that catchy slogan, “Just do it,” but by my cousin who loved his Nike’s too. Three years older and so much wiser at his 17 years, Ben was a star track athlete at his high school. He lived in another state and I only got to see him once a year, but I adored him. He told me if I was going to be a real runner, I better get some Nike’s--they were the best. Two months of babysitting later, I was lacing up my first pair of Nike’s, but had been a certifiable convert long before I ever test-ran the product thanks to my cousin’s fervor.

When the sneaker meets the pavement, it isn’t the color, the price, or even necessarily the brand that is initially responsible for true brand commitment—it’s the relationship. My Nike’s aren’t just shoes to me; they’re memories of my cousin. It’s just like how Tide isn’t just detergent, but the smell of my childhood. Every brand I care about comes not from how fabulous it is in and of itself, but the associations that give it context in my life. In this crazy world of fad and fashion, being committed to anything is a rarity. A brand that finds its audience through its relationship to them is the brand that makes it through the chaos of change.