With easy access to information on global trends, venues, cultures and traditions, event planners today are exploring global experiential venues for their events. But how one can build events based tourism in a country is a prominent question that needs to be answered and the same was the topic of the first session on day 2 of EEMAX Global Conclave 2015. Addressing the session were Santiago Corrada, President and CEO, Tampa Bay Association and Valsa Nair Singh, Secretary - Tourism and Culture, Govt of Maharashtra. Sharing his story on how the city of Tampa Bay in Florida that hosted the majestic IIFA awards in 2014, builds event tourism, Santiago Corrada said, “For us the process of landing a large multinational event begins through a primary research wherein we take a look at our competitors and if we feel that we can take up the challenge we then consider the event requirements that we will have to deliver. It is integral to dwell deep on aspects like the funding requirements as well.” Adding further he said, “Next for us is prospecting the international business the event in question will bring to us and accordingly we submit rep and become the hosting partners for the event. Succeeding it is the process of strategic operations, budgeting and the process of marketing and communication.” Elaborating further on the subject Santiago stated, “Then comes the implementation of the event but after the event has been executed our work does not stop here. We also calculate the ROI from the event hosted which is usually a process undertaken by a third party. The parameters to calculate it are the number of visitors, visitor spending, spends on hotels and media impressions created.” When asked what was the most important factor in generating tourism of events in the country, Santiago responded by saying, “Relationships are the most important. You have to be constantly connected with the city administration as well as with everyone who will be involved towards the execution of an event.” Highlighting the initiatives taken by the government of Maharashtra to build events tourism in the state, “Valsa Nair Singh said, “It was three months ago that we met the organizers of EEMA and today we stand less than a month away from making some revolutionary announcements. We are in the process of executing a single window licensing process for the fraternity in the state and we will also soon be launching a list of pre-approved venues for events. We have also launched an ‘adopt a monument’ scheme for corporate wherein we are handing over some of our historical monuments and forts to them and they will be using them as venues for their events. Talks are also on to resolve the issues pertaining to entertainment tax and additionally we have included the provision for creating of an event board in our state tourism policy.” Emphasizing on the plans of the state to boost and promote events the secretary assured the members of the fraternity that the government of Maharashtra stands in full support of the events industry and will work towards making the state as event friendly as possible.
Read MoreEvents have enormous power in themselves. While some can fail terribly to even move a single emotion in their attendees, well planned and executed events on the other hand have the ability to inspire not just its attendees but also leave a mark at a global level. ‘Turn On the Lights’ festival in Holland and the ‘ALS Ice Bucket Challenge’ are inspirational examples in this regard. But what made these two events a global brand in themselves? What worked in their favor and made them the raging sensation that they became? Well, we got the answers to these questions on the first day of EEMAX Global Conclave 2015 as Patrick Roubroeks, Founder and Partner Xsaga and Nancy Frates, Advocate ALS shared with the attendees 10 tips on creating a national brand with your event. Sharing the story behind creating, ‘Turn On the Lights’ an annual festival in 5 cities in Holland that celebrates the start of the festive season by lighting up hundreds and thousands of dynamically programmed sustainable lights on historical buildings, Patrick Roubrocks explained how a well thought out event has the power to become a global inspiration and attract media both at the national and international level. Adding further Patrick said, “I was asked to come here and speak on how to create a national brand with your event, well for me the answer lies in these 10 points; 1-Think Big- Always start of by imagining a big concept that you wish to bring to reality. You have to think of a big, never done before idea first to make it a national brand. 2-Think in pictures-You have to think about the design of your event by imagining how would it look like in the pictures. One should be able to show the grandeur of their event in one single photograph. 3-Don’t forget small ones-Small elements and details related to the event should not be neglected. 4-Incoroprate local authority-The participation of the local authority in creation and smooth execution of an event is vital. 5- Extend brand through social media- Social media amplification is integral to share information and innovation regarding any event that you create at a global level. 6-Be loyal to the main idea and build tradition around it-It is a fact that in the process of creating something new in each edition of a festival, the main idea of the event is lost. However, in reality one should always be loyal to the main idea of the event and then forge a tradition around it to make it more compelling each year. 7-Trust wow-One should always aim for creating wow factor through their events. These factors can be created through culmination of many small things by weaving them into one giant story. 8-Dare to dream-People love fairy tales and if an event should always be that ways. To build a successful national brand with your event one must dare to dream. 9-Staging brands-Allowing brands to become a part of the event and not just associate themselves with it. 10-It is not about entertaining people but engaging them- It is one thing to entertain the audiences but to truly create a brand with your event one should aim at engaging the people as their primary motive.” Nancy Frates, began her session with emphasizing on how it were the same points that helped The ALS Foundation bring awareness and donations to their efforts through the creation and amplification of the “ALS Ice Bucket Challenge”, an activity that took the world by storm last in August 2014. She said, “I couldn’t help but relate with the points that Patrick stated and how we through our initiatives managed to touch all of them to create awareness about Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis.” Elaborating on how the concept of the challenge was born Nancy said, “What we tried to do with the Ice Bucket Challenge was to tell a compelling and relatable story through a fun filled engaging activity that could be shared with people to create awareness. Apart from people getting wet in all the ice bucket challenges another common factor in all the videos of the activity was the laughter. We wanted to create something that will allow people to open their hearts first and then motivate them to open their wallets too.” When asked to advise experiential managers in India on creating such events, Nancy responded by saying” You have to be passionate and be authentic about what you are doing. Also how we drove the ALS Ice Bucket challenge was that we are proactive towards introducing it and then very reactive to the responses that were coming in. Every minute that we spent on the social media in sharing, tagging and commenting made it count. We just kept exploring the opportunity that loomed ahead of us.”
Read MoreThe EEMAX Global Conclave got off to a celebratory start on 19 September 2015 at Hotel Taj Lands End in Mumbai. Although a sudden downpour and roads peppered with traffic due to Ganesh Chaturthi carried the promise of dampened spirits, the events fraternity flocked the venue nonetheless as Mr Sabbas Joseph, PresidentEEMA (Events & Entertainment Management Association), kicked off the event to a feisty start. In attendance were event agencies from various parts of the country, besides artists, service providers and other stakeholders from the event’s industry. Rajeev Jain, Treasurer, EEMA commented, “The response has been phenomenal with respect to registrations at the conclave and participating entries for the awards. The doors to EEMAX have been opened to non-EEMA members as well as global partakers which has piqued further interest. It is great to see great minds get together in order to inspire, collaborate and create.” After an inspirational narrative of the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge by Nancy Frates, and an engaging fireside chat post that with EVP, EEMA AtulNath, the challenge was thrown open to Bollywood actor VivekOberoi, who sportingly took it up. As a twist to the plot, instead of nominating three people for the challenge, the entire audience was given the option of volunteering for the challenge by way of making a donation of $100. A group photo was taken with all volunteers as seen here: Another session was with Patrick Roubroeks, the man behind creating the ‘Turn On The Lights’ showcase at De Bijenkorf in Amsterdam.Rahul Gomes, Secretary, EEMA, conducted a Q&A session with Roubroeks to learn more about the spectacle and other campaigns on his portfolio. The evening ended with performances by The Shillong Chamber Choir and Shaan. EEMAX Global will culminate on 20 September 2015 with an awards ceremony recognizing the most exceptional work in the Indian events and experiential arena. Watch this space for more updates.
Read MoreCars are still considered to be luxury in our country and to attract buyers, automotive manufacturers are working their way towards newer alternatives for connecting with potential buyers. People are becoming more brand conscious but this is a fairly slow process. Indians are very conservative with regard to spending a huge amount for cars and that is one reason why Indian and foreign car makers are spending crores of rupees every year to form that bond with car buyers. Experiential marketing in the auto industry has a checkered history in fact. The economic reforms policies of 1991 opened the floodgates for aspirational consumers, soon after, an Indian company called Mahindra & Mahindra took a bold and risky decision: it wanted to become a major player in the Indian automobile industry (Yes, we know Tata Motors too has travelled the same path; but let's keep that story for another day!). It might sound incredible today, but M&M back then decided that "experiential" will be a key component of the marketing strategy of the company as it launched itself into uncharted territory. Back in those days, the Indian auto industry had a handful of automakers. Today, about two and half decades later, there are about 30 carmakers in the country with over 200 products on sale. Before 1991, you had not many choices to pick from. Test drives were rare and the waiting period was months and sometimes years. In 1989, the Indian auto market for passenger vehicles had reached a sales number of 200,000 for the entire year. Today, the monthly sales of passenger vehicles exceed 200,000. We are one of the largest auto markets and expected to become the third largest market in the world by 2020. Major manufacturers like Maruti Suzuki are targeting sales of two million a year by 2020.As the market has opened to several automakers, everyone is looking at ways and means to engage with the consumer. There are several different campaigns that are held prior to a new product launch, during the launch and post it has been introduced in the market. Land Rover Experience is example where the brand invites potential customers to not just drive but take the vehicle for off-roading in the natural built conditions. Land Rover has been giving an opportunity to its existing and potential buyers to drive a Land Rover in a river, down a hill and other aspects to showcase how the brand is superior when it comes to off-roading. It encourages the buyer to try different things with their SUV and at the same time highlights the capabilities of the Land Rover DNA. “One of the key reasons for Mercedes-Benz's strong brand presence and recall is its 'customer centric' approach. This is reflected in the marketing approach of the brand. We have adopted 'experiential marketing' as one of our key elements for customer engagements. We have pioneered the industry with experiential engagements like MB Trophy, StarDrive and now LuxeDrive,” stated Eberhard Kern, MD and CEO at Mercedes-Benz India. The German brand stands that experiential is leading to a whole lot of new ideation and generating content for digital engagement. They have seen a lot of content integration through our experiential events like LuxeDrive, which has generated popular content and conversations. They have engaged several celebrities from different genres including popular Indian chef VikasKhanna. Eberhardstates that in the coming few years - marketing will be driven by content and more integration with on-ground, digital, print, PR will be key to consumer engagement. The company is already witnessing this change. He states, “We have created LuxeDrive which is an ideal experiential event and combines haute couture and gourmet with the thrills of motoring. We are taking LuxeDrive to newer markets and newer customer groups." We spoke to Frank Schloeder, Director of Marketing at BMW, who stated," Experiential has always been a key pillar in our strategy. In Luxury Marketing, it’s even more important, as it’s all about direct interaction with your target audience. That is not possible with ATL. Experiential is key in Luxury Marketing and will always remain very important also in future. When you offer high value luxury goods, people want to touch and feel it and also interact with the company. You can’t replace this with anything else." Audi too has its Audi Drive Experience and then there is also the BMW Experience Tour to connect with the customers. About 10-15 percent of the marketing spends of automakers goes into experiential marketing. This percentage won’t increase, however the marketing budgets shall shoot up and so we can expect an increase in the number of experiential events. Today luxury carmakers especially the Germans spend in excess of 100 crore annually. Jaguar Land Rover is likely to touch this kind of spends in a year’s period, as they will be introducing more products. Recently, the company has launched the Discovery Sport, which is an all-new SUV that is luxurious and a serious off-roader too. It isn’t just the luxury carmakers like Mercedes-Benz and Jaguar Land Rover who are spending towards experiential; automakers in other segments too are spending a good chunk of their money to emotionally connect with the buyers. Renault very recentlyconducted – “Passion for Life” as a two-day experience drivein Raipur. The unique part of this experience was that the excited 600 participants were also handed over certificates of participation and received encouragement from the able trainers. People of all ages participated in this drive around an obstacle course. Along with the experience drive, the two-day experience also included a blood donation drive in which many people volunteered. Renault also organized a free vehicle check-up in which more than 200 vehicles were serviced. Tata Motors is one great example of a company who spends towards experiential marketing. The company conducted several campaigns for the recently launched Zest and Bolt. As the Bolt hatchback is sport, it was showcased in some stadiums during the IPL matches and many of them got an opportunity to experience the hatchback and the sedan during the match. The Zest and the Bolt were showcased to several potential car buyers at a customer clinic immediately after the 2014 Auto Expo. The brandalso participated in the Malhar festival of St Xaviers College in Mumbai with the newly launched GenX Nano. It has remained active with on-ground activities even after the launch. There is also a club called “S.O.U.L”(Safari Owners United League), which is a club for Safari Owners. There are several road-trips planned in a year for existing Safari buyers, where they get to meet and interact with like-minded car buyers. In 2013 Ford India had decided to launch the Ecosport at a time when car sales in the country had started showing alarming signs of deceleration. The marketing team had to brainstorm and come up with something innovative. Thus was born the experiential Urban Discovery campaign. Three months before the launch, the Ford marketing team identified 100 potential buyers and wove the experiential Urban Discovery campaign around them. Even the guys at Ford were pleasantly surprised by the unbelievable customer reaction. Before the campaign reached its experiential climax, more than 60 urban Indians had booked the Ecosport. That one example illustrates the sheer power of experiential marketing when it comes to the automobile industry. And marketing masterminds in the company acknowledge that. Says Rahul Gautam, Vice President, marketing at Ford India, "Experiential has been gaining popularity as a medium in the last couple of years and continues to grow. Ford’s strategy in experiential has been towards touching an emotional chord to make communication a lot more meaningful and impactful. Be it the EcoSport ‘Urban Discoveries’ campaign in 2013 or the recent Ford Figo Aspire 'What Drives You' campaign, all our campaigns draw their strength from experiences and will continue to do so in the future". Mahindra was one of the first in the country to have launched an experiential campaign called Mahindra Great Escape, back in 1993. The idea and the strategy was simple: the company encouraged customers to actually go on long drives (Indian roads back then were not even a shadow of the many expressways we see today!) to personally and first hand experience the quality parameters of their newly launched SUV. Since then, the Mahindra Scorpio has become a kind of case study when it comes to successful as well as durable brand launches in the Indian automobile industry. The Great Escape was an annual event for many years. Then, towards the beginning of this decade, M&M decided to expand the scale and scope of this experiential process. The company in fact launched an entirely new vertical called Mahindra Adventure for this strategic purpose. At the moment, Mahindra Adventure organizes 10 Great Escapes every year across the country, apart from numerous one off experiential campaigns. It has also gone global by adding Nepal and Bhutan as destinations. There are plans to take this even to South Africa and Chile where Mahindra SUVs are quite popular. The top 5 auto brands contribute to about 60% of thespends in advertising and at the moment, most of them spend about 10% of their budgets on experiential marketing. The budgets for both are on the rise, but we cannot expect the percentage to increase for regular car makers, however for luxury car manufacturers the number is on the rise and we shall see an increase in the percentage of spendings for on ground activities as buying a luxury car is more of an emotional connect than a necessity. So makers like Maruti Suzuki, Tata Motors, Hyundai, Mahindra are amongst top spenders in the market, with the German automakers like Mercedes-Benz, Audi and BMW leading the front for luxury car makers. The number of events and the budget for affordable cars is higher and even the number of people attending it are greater in number. Hence, the expense for these segment makers is on the higher side than luxury car manufacturers. As per our research, the total advertising spends in auto sector (annually) is 2300 – 2400 cr. Of this, the total spends towards experiential marketing is 290-300 cr**. Across the board, it is now acknowledged that experiential marketing will play an increasingly bigger role in the Indian auto industry. And it is not just about announcing a glitzy launch function where customers gawk more at the skimpily clad glamorous models wrapping themselves around a new car model. As advertising in traditional media becomes more and more cluttered and more prohibitively expensive, the smarter marketing teams in auto companies will keep devising new and innovative campaigns that revolve around experiential marketing. Quite simply, no auto company can afford to ignore the power of experiential marketing as a tool. The push for more and more experiential marketing and bigger budgets for this tool will gather momentum in the days to come, particularly in the auto industry which is one of the most spectacular success stories of brand marketing. More than 30 years ago, Maruti Suzuki seeded the automobile revolution in the car segment in India. Simultaneously, a joint venture between Hero Motors and Honda seeded the two wheeler revolution in the country. Back then, barely 50,000 cars were sold in India every year. And there were just three brands. Look at how things have changed since then. Virtually every major global airmobile company in the world now has a presence in the country and is fighting tooth and nail for a slice of the pie. After a few years of recession, there are unmistakable signs of a sustained recovery in car sales. The day is not far off when car sales in India will cross the significant milestone of 5 million units per year, making it the third largest market in the world. Something similar has happened with two wheelers. Hero Motors is now the largest two-wheeler company in the world. And of all delicious ironies, it's erstwhile partner Honda, which now operates independently in India, is giving a tough fight to Hero in the face to become the number one two wheeler company in India! They say competition is the mother of marketing. And the auto industry in India is perhaps one of the most fiercely competitive in the world. As companies keep launching new models to lure customers, they will inevitably invest heavily in mass marketing and advertising campaigns. But make no mistake, experiential will emerge as the arguably most important strategic tool in the armory of marketing whiz kids. After all, humans have demonstrated a strong and strange emotional connect with cars over the decades. If you have any doubts, start playing that legendary Beatles song one more time: Baby You Can Drive My Car. *This article was first published in BW APPLAUSE ** Numbers are indicative and directional but not absolute.
Read MoreThe Marriott group of hotels worldwide is known for using technology in the most interactive way to engage and involve their guests. From launching a ‘meetings imagined’ experience in India to partnering with global music giant Universal to provide a musical orgasm experience to its customers in London, The hotel has done it all. Adding another feather to its golden cap of successful experiential campaigns, the hotel has further elevated its level by launching a V Room service which is currently a part of the hotels “Travel Brilliantly” campaign. The service has been recently debuted at the New York Marriott Marquis on September 10 and at the London Marriott Park Lane on September 14. As part of this service guests can order their V Room kit through a Marriott app or on a dedicated phone line that’s printed on their room keycards. Delivered to them will be a white metal case containing Samsung Gear virtual reality headset and headphones, along with instructions on how to use them. The content of this service will feature small videos set in Chile, China, and Rwanda and will also highlight the Marriott hospitality a customer will receive once they visit the destination being showcased. So guests through this service can avail a sneak-peak experience. The campaign is without a doubt one of the most engaging experiences curated by the hotel brand for its customers and has enabled it to smartly market its other hotel properties around the world. This creative campaign by the noted hotel giants is an example of how can brands can use simple yet innovative technological as a means to engage their target audiences and allowing the product to be marketed by its own self. The Indian events industry can seek inspiration from the campaign and can also come up with a similar technology to not only promote Indian hotels and private properties but also they can use the same to promote India as a destination for more destination weddings and other social events. The Indian tourism Industry can also benefit by using the same technology. Videos of tourist attractions, historical monuments, places to must try videos can be created and displayed through this technology to promote both international tourism and in-country tourism in India. A highlight about a V Room service technology is that contrary to popular belief the technology is more economical than creating customized experience for every traveler or prospective customer. Hence, the technology can also be used heavily by event agencies who want to pitch in to bigger clients or brand marketers. Why to restrict the glorious event you executed in a PPT? When you can now show your prospective clients an experience can only you can create. Say bye-bye to manual jibber jabber because technological inventions like these are here to stay.
Read MoreThe job of an emcee is very crucial for any event. Be it a smart and elite corporate event or an out and out mass entertainment night, the onus of making sure that everything feels seamless to the audiences is completely on the person anchoring the event. But there are times when an event managers planning takes a blow and an event is heading straight towards disaster. How does an emcee react in this situation? Well this time at EE, we have two notable emcees in the event fraternity sharing their tales on how they made even disastrous events sparkle. Recalling her experience, Sheena Chohan (left in photo) says, “Once I was anchoring a corporate event for sales professionals for a brand. In the audience were thousands of people and country’s top ministers. The event flow had reached to a point where the top minister was going to present an international CEO with an award and a famous singer was meant to come on the stage and sing. Contrary to everyone’s imagination, as soon as the singer started, out of sheer excitement he jumped on one of the ministers table and stood there singing and dancing. Everyone had been looking forward to the musical performance but this put the minister at the table in a very bad mood and the performance was stopped. It was an incident which transpired very rapidly and came as a shock to the audiences as well the organizers. I however, took charge and decided to do small interactive act to handle the situation. I got them to play a game, where the important guests got on the stage and started dancing. In the end, I got the Minister and the top CEOs on stage with the singer and the singer performed 5 of his top hits with the videos in the background, and the audience enjoyed it more than ever. And the next day the Minister was so happy with the event that he could be easily spotted sharing his photos with the clients and CEOs.” Narrating her most profound experience of handling an event disaster Shefali Saxena (right in photo) says, “Thankfully for me nothing huge has happened as of yet and most events that I have anchored have went fine however there is one particular incident that still haunts me. It was during a product launch for a leading automobile brand where the main product had to be launched through the slider curtains. The moment of the launch was highly anticipated with media and audiences from all over the country gathered to witness the event. But as soon as the Chairman of the brand pushed the button for the product to be unveiled, a technological failure erupted and the slider curtains would simply not move. The situation was about to become worse as the music for the launch had started and the fog machines were also into action however the product was still not unveiled. I sensed the panic in the situation and had to step in as an emcee. Since this was the time when the Jan Lokpal Protest at Jantar Mantar was at its full force, I used the same topic to ask for more applause from the audiences. And while I was busy engaging the audiences, the event planners managed to fix the problem and the product was launched without any further delay.” When asked what prompted you to take such sudden charge of the situation Sheena says, “It all depends on quick thinking on your part and you have to take control of such situations as that is what you are hired for. Because of the way I controlled the situation the client today insists that I emcee all his events now. So it is the happiness of the clients that matters to you more than anything else.” Shefali responds to the same question and says, “Experience is the key here. You know it from your experience that when is an event falling apart and when are you required to chime in. Luckily I have been anchoring events for quite some time now so the decision on when to step in comes instinctively to me.”
Read MoreExperiential marketing is set to be a major growth area in the next few years, as an increased proportion of marketing budgets is being shifted to this emerging form. Even though it is often perceived to be an independent channel, rather than a methodology; marketing communications budgets traditionally have not allocated specific portions to experiential marketing. Experiential marketing initiatives by Indian firms hasalso grown tremendously over the last few years. There are two factors that this can be attributed to: First, due to the overuse of traditional media and the need to do something different from the competition; brands which are largely functionally undifferentiated are trying to build an emotional attachment with consumers’ desires for novelty, individuality, and added value. Second, there has been a proliferation of event marketing specialist agencies growing out of a number of related areas such as field marketing, event planning, brand management, public relations and advertising. Experiential marketing has also expanded into experiential commerce now, which tries to replicate the complete shopping experience of a brick-and-mortar store. Technology has hitherto not transformed commerce as drastically as other industries. Commerce has enjoyed some innovation till now, but there is much more in store owing to the potential of experiential commerce, which will alter the way retailers sell and consumer buy, and blend online and offline experiences. As experiential marketing continues to catch the fancy of marketers across sectors, and expand on various ways to use experiential marketing; the focus is to establish and standardize metrics for experiential ROI – which till now has been measured using similar metrics to traditional marketing and advertising – which are not suitable for measuring the success of a campaign. The challenge in experiential marketing is twofold: 1. Experiential ROI cuts across other marketing channels and therefore isolating the experiential bit is difficult for a marketer. 2. Experiential ROI is a Catch 22 situation. There is not much effort being put to standardize metrics and research for ROI because it is still an emerging field with a growing but albeit limited ad spend; and it is not getting enough confidence by marketers since there is a lack of proven ROI. Common experiential marketing jargon Experiential marketing – Experiential marketing is the process of identifying and satisfying customer needs and aspirations, profitably, engaging them through two-way communications that bring brand personalities to life and add value to the target audience. Amplification – Live brand experiences do not typically reach as many target consumers as advertising does. The reach of the complete experiential marketing campaign however can exceed the reach of many adverts by incorporating amplification channels into the experiential marketing campaign. This can be achieved by integrating any of the marketing communications channels into the campaign to amplify the big idea, which is focused on two-way interaction in real-time: the live brand experience. Sometimes with a live brand experience that is exciting and newsworthy, free PR and media coverage can be generated, making it a cost-effective solution with broader reach. Brand Loyalty – The ultimate goal of marketing, where there is the consumer’s commitment to consistent repurchasing of the brand. Brand personality – A brand’s personality is characterized by human personalities. A company will establish a brand as having certain personality traits in order to market the brand to a specified target audience. Examples of a brand’s personality could be, for example, bold, youthful, funny and rebellious etc. Brand-relevant experience – Creating an experience that is appropriate to the brand’s personality, values and target audience that will make it memorable to the consumer, facilitating brand loyalty and brand advocacy. Face to face – Face to face means engaging the consumer in the same physical location that they are in via face-to-face communication. During a face-to-face live brand experience, the consumer can interact with the brand, its brand ambassadors, and the product, in order to physically participate in the live brand experience. Interactive – A means of engagement between the target audience member and the brand, via a two-way interaction. Need for defining best practices Live marketing experiences are rarely done alone, and are typically integrated with rest of the marketing efforts utilizing a broad array of channels. Marketers go to several channels such as advertising, sales promotion, sponsorship, public relations, digital etc., where every channel has different goals and objectives. This multi – channel nature to experiential campaigns leads to complexity - therefore warranting a need to establish Best Practices that will help marketers and agencies highlight: 1. Customers they want to target 2. Various methods of interacting with these customers 3. Identification of location and environment 4. Integration with other marketing programmes For this, we have devised a 6C’s index that will act as a checklist to all brands and agencies at the outset of an experiential programme: 1. Collaborative – opportunities with brand ambassadors and other attendees 2. Creativity – creative element, USP, breaking the clutter 3. Concentration – level of immersion of all senses 4. Concerted – memorability and high impact engagement 5. Customization – individuality and one-to-one opportunities 6. Constancy – genuine benefits and message provided to consumer Summary The beauty of experiential marketing lies in the fact that the creative process will lead to different results. Experiential marketing can be implemented across sectors, from technology to music, from BFSI to FMCG. There is no one sector (whether product or service) which is more or less appropriate for experiential marketing, since the inspiration for experiential marketing ideas comes from the brand personalities and the target audiences. The emotional connection that can be reached through brand-relevant experiences transcends the selling points of the product, its features and benefits. To ensure the process is smooth right from identification of target audience to connecting with them, we propose a TRUE model: Target Audience X Reach X Ubiquity X Emotional Connect The total audience to which the firm wishes to communicate with Number of people to whom the campaign reaches Ability of firm to ensure the correct message goes to consumer with the right brand positioning Measures how many consumers connect with the campaign The debate also exists between outsourcing or using in-house resources. Our viewpoint is that it is advisable to employ people in-house for the customer experience management programme and to employ an experiential marketing agency for the live brand experiences. The intent of defining best practices is not to curtail the creativity, but to act as a yardstick that guides marketers and agencies to stay true to the core objective of experiential marketing – to engage with customers and create customer delight. By identifying and mapping these “moments of truth,” marketers can guarantee a positive action from consumers. As organizations move from a service orientation to a customer experience orientation and eventually to a customer experience orientation, we will continue to see a growth in experiential marketing, and establishing best practices will help expedite the process and ensure it is a smooth transition. (The story has been extracted from BW APPLAUSE)
Read MoreOgle, India’s on-demand streaming platform for events, successfully teams up with India’s online marketplace Snapdeal. The online portal will be the exclusive marketing partner for Ogle till the end of 2015. In addition, Snapdeal customers will get three months of free Ogle subscription when they buy smart TVs, tablets and mobiles from the website. Earlier this year, Ogle gained a lot of traction for its latest live streaming stint at the Lakme Fashion Week W/F '2015. Following the overwhelming response to Ogle’s pre-booking of subscription on its own website, this service will be now available to potential subscribers only via Snapdeal. Ogle streaming service comes with remarkable features such as buffer-less and ad-free streaming, Ogle enables online streaming across various connected devices and also caters to low bandwidth issues. Providing an array of cult online content across genres, Ogle streams buffer-Free even at bandwidths as low as 0.5 mbps. The subscription offerings come at INR 49/day, INR 249/month and INR 2400/annum. Speaking about the latest association, Pritish Nandy, Chairperson, Ogle Technology Group said, “Ogle’s one-of-its- kind association with an e-commerce giant like Snapdeal will be a great innovation for this field. This new venture will create a larger audience reach for Ogle from the subscription point of view as well as from a market leader point of view. This association will also be a favourable deal for Snapdeal. Free access to Ogle on their newly bought devices will definitely be a unique experience for the buyers. With our user friendly features, and our commitment to the association, we aim to strengthen our expertise.” Throwing light on similar sentiments, Karan Khara, Vice President, Strategic Alliances, Snapdeal said, “Ogle is a great addition to our digital entertainment offerings. With increasing consumption of online videos and growing preference for International content among the young consumers in India, we are confident that this streaming service being offered at an affordable price point will find great traction. Opening its doors across international boundaries very soon, the Ogle will enable the premium online streaming service to reach out to a larger audience and significantly change the way content is consumed online.
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