Aimee Howarth brings you an interview with The Yorker directors on the final day of the advent articles
Aimee Howarth speaks to YUSU's sabbatical officers about their Christmas Day routine for day 17 of the advent calendar
For the final time this term, Vicky Morris updates you on this weeks film news
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The clue is in the name. ‘Experiential’ marketers promote their goods by creating emotional experiences that the public will remember and associate with their brand. The aim is to engage consumers with the product rather than to simply inform them. Its popularity is growing. A recent survey by consultancy firm Reardon Smith Whittaker found that 61% of marketing directors are more excited about experiential marketing than other types of advert.
Experiential events have included sponsored music festivals, freebies and launch parties. Most excitingly though, advertisers are showing just how far they will go to grab your attention with a succession of crazy stunts.
This can be anything from Wrangler’s freezing of a pair of jeans into a block of ice which was then dropped onto a car, to Coca-Colas’s music and video game ‘red lounges’ that have sprouted up in shopping centers across America.
John Harrington will be filming customer responses to Wranglers ‘This is Wanted’ event in Barcelona from July 4th. The three day “invasion” will see a temporary structure built in the city centre that will host live music, show films and display modern art. The overall effect desired by experiential advertisers is summarized in their slogan “Live it, See it, Hear it.”
Harrington says: “They can position their product in a way they couldn’t otherwise,”
“You wear Wrangler jeans, listen to music and like certain films. It basically builds up a picture of people who wear Wrangler jeans as cool."
Recently, London based Carbon Marketing placed a jackknifed lorry in Covent Garden, spilling its cargo of Nestle double cream bars onto the street for passers by to grab. Carbon claimed to have reached 70,000 people through this exploit alone, 84% of who intended to buy a double cream bar in future.
“From the experiential marketers point of view it give the brand an opportunity to promote itself in a scenario that’s not necessarily associated with it,” Harrigton says.
“The industry is massive, especially in the far east. Samsung have recently opened concept stores in New York and Tokyo for no other reason than to create an experience. The only reason is to create hype, it’s like a gallery for phones but you can’t buy anything and they’re rammed full of people.”
Promotion video from US Experiential Marketing firm Jack Morton
Google ‘experiential marketing’ and you’ll get about 1.24m hits, but expect that to rise rapidly. Whilst the form currently accounts for just 1% of the total UK advertising spend of over £19bn, the industry reckons it is about to rocket. Technology and lifestyles are changing TiVo and Sky+ mean that consumers can now skip through TV advertising while Internet browsers feature pop-up blockers as standard. Traditional forms of advertising are becoming less effective.
But with developments in technology have come new opportunities. Word of mouth, already considered the sharpest weapon in an advertiser’s arsenal, has moved online and grown even more effective with the rise of social networking sites.
This is where life at York could enter the equation. Since its arrival last year Facebook has revolutionized the university experience and become part of daily life for thousands of students. With the average user spending over 20 minutes logged in per day, business hasn’t taken long to tap into the potential marketing opportunities.
If you hand people an A5 flyer they're not interested
In February Wrapid, a sandwich shop on Coney Street in York, created its own Facebook group. The company pledged that if 1000 members joined the group it would sponsor a school for disabled children in Tanzania through the charity Plan. Dedicated Facebookers invited their friends to join the group in droves, a prime example of online word of mouth. Through the simple act of joining the group the students engaged with the brand as part of their daily routine. By the end of the initiative, Wrapid claims that it donated around £300 including sponsoring the school.
Lee Hanson, the manager of Wrapid York, said: “We’re always looking at different ways to advertise as technology’s changing. A lot of it’s all just word of mouth. If you hand people run of the mill stuff like an A5 flyer they know what it is straight away and they’re not so interested.”
And Wrapid aren’t the only ones: Microsoft’s ‘I’M’ initiative has its own Facebook group with almost 15,000 members. The group asks members to download and use Windows messenger, and in exchange Microsoft will give an unspecified percentage of advertising revenue to their nominated charity. There are, of course, questions over the ethics of using charities to promote a business in this way.
Hanson added: “A couple of people said it was a bit dodgy but it was a way of actively helping people and advertising at the same time. Every time someone came in and said ‘facebook’ we’d donate 10p and every time someone wrote a comment we donated 10p. We were prepared for if they said we weren’t allowed to do it but we went unnoticed really.”
But the rise in alternative strategies might cause a dilemma for one of York’s most cherished societies. Lovesoc aims to “spread the love” and brighten up students’ days with random acts of kindness, which often involve handing out free food. Marketers are tapping into the potential of emotional association with products so the surprise and happiness generated by a random act of giving may become a common strategy. With its connection to students could Lovesoc be a marketer’s dream?
“LoveSoc doesn't really give away anything on that large a scale,” said Lovesoc Chair Sally Worby.
“If we were to give away items or objects on a larger scale that were going to advertise certain companies specifically, I think we would be far more selective than we are. It's something I would have to take to my committee about. I wouldn't like to be paid for doing what we do, and I don't see any problem in items effectively being marketed by us as long as we were happy with what we were giving out.”
While some feel threatened by this kind of stealth advertising (it’s sometimes labelled ‘guerilla marketing’), Erik Hauser, a San Francisco based advertiser, recently blogged on the issue:
“Marketers speak as though we're engaged in some sort of global war with our allies (clients) against their targets (customers) . . . Our intended audiences are not targets. We aren't aiming our arsenal of marketing weapons in guerilla campaigns against people. Smart and ethical marketers are trying to create a dialogue and win the mindshare of customers by creating enticing propositions.”
