Compared to traditional forms of advertising, experiential marketing has the potential to make a greater impact on consumer action toward a brand or product.
Creative activity is at the core of this form of marketing, which allows advertisers to have direct conversations with consumers, providing the opportunity for stronger results and a greater return on their investment.
Jeff Milgrom, president and CEO of Event Marketing Strategies, says when done correctly, experiential marketing can provide a greater ROI than most traditional ad vehicles and on a lower budget.
“It’s been proven time and again, and that’s the reason many of the top respected brands have increased their budgets for experiential while lowering or holding the spend on traditional advertising forms. It’s the only form of marketing that offers one-on-one, face-to-face engagement.”
Smart Business spoke with Milgrom about experiential marketing campaigns and how to execute one on a budget.
What does experiential marketing offer that other forms of marketing don’t?
Experiential marketing, over other forms, provides the platform for companies to have long-form conversations with consumers about their products and services. Using trained and knowledgeable brand ambassadors at events opens the door to engaging conversations that can last anywhere from three to seven minutes in most cases.
This approach facilitates a stronger connection or bond with a brand because of the sensory experiences involved — touch, taste, feel, smell, sound, etc. — and that can leave consumers with a deeper and more meaningful takeaway than television or radio ads.
Why is experiential marketing an approach that companies with a limited marketing budget should consider?
Without spending much, experiential marketing programs can be highly targeted to a specific audience or demographic, allowing a company to customize the experience. Experiential marketing also presents limitless opportunities for creative ideas that do not require big expenditures, such as interactive displays, contests, photo opportunities as well as new technologies like virtual reality. Integrating social media strategies drives engagement during and after event activations and greatly increases the campaign’s reach, boosting its ROI.
For example, high-end furniture retailer, Z Gallerie, selected local events that specifically attracted its key demographic to ensure they’d reach affluent middle-aged consumers. The brand then utilized its identity in a creative way by supersizing the ‘Z’ of Z Gallerie into a large 8-foot sculpture filled with thousands of branded balls — a small cost for big impact that garnered the attention from the audience at numerous events. They tied in a social contest to encourage guests to take pictures in front of the Z and share them with their social channels to be entered to win a Z Gallerie room makeover. The social posts increased reach at no additional cost to the brand.
Check out another low budget – high impact campaign for OhioHealth here
What are the essential elements of experiential marketing?
There are four essential elements of any experiential marketing campaign:
- Develop creative interactive strategies and tactics — the hook — that grabs consumers’ attention, and keeps them engaged and involved with the brand.
- Train knowledgeable and outgoing brand ambassadors to interact with people. Being well informed about the brand and the event will promote the campaign the right way and be the key to getting people engaged.
- Execute the idea flawlessly on-site and on-brand. In addition to the right team, this requires great supporting, action driving materials, neither of which need to cost a lot.
- Add measurement and tracking elements to the program to gauge its impact.
Experiential marketing campaigns can be constructed and activated on any budget by any brand. It’s a program that requires creativity and flawless execution. Do that and expect to obtain maximum ROI while staying within budget.
Insights Event Marketing is brought to you by Event Marketing Strategies
