Brand Activate

You see much written today about a technology, data and analytical driven marketing future. Whether it be location based activity or marketing automation, we are seeing swathes of new opportunities arise that allow brands to better engage with audiences.

While the talk of ethics is relevant, those that innovate and dream to create better brand future through new techniques and tools simply have a progressive view. When direct marketing boomed in the 90’s, opt-in  /opt-out legislation protected audiences and I see that this approach will also evolve in a brave new world. Governments will, or should, inform and protect their citizens. Ethical brands will support this.

Also, audiences will opt-in because they see value in doing so and I am keen to showcase the opportunity for marketers when audiences do opt-in. In particular, I want to show that data and analytics are not just for digital and mobile, but can be used in events.

I am not talking about virtual events / exhibitions or things that look to replace face-to-face. They have their time and place and events are still hugely popular. I am talking more about how people are now using the cloud to continue to build upon the equity that “event brands” have built with their respective target communities. Give event access to people who are not there and stimulate on-going engagement.

Being a passionate bodyboarder, the evolution of the International Bodyboarding Association (IBA) has really caught my eye (http://ibaworldtour.com/). With the right vision and plan they have made our sport into somethingway more accessible, yet hold competitions in some places not accessible to most of us (or most of us dream about getting to). Through the web we can now watch live feeds of the competition, access on-demand podcasts, get inside stories and share these with friends. But more than a competition, it is also an opportunity for niche surf riding misfits to stay connected and informed. It becomes a place where the community gathers. This is all built around event equity and gives the brand custodians the much needed finger on the pulse they need.

Many public events have looked to execute a similar formula. Many public events and their participants fail to capitalize on the equity they have. More so, many marketers feel that they cannot afford the investment to capitalize on the equity of their private events because of cost.

Terms such as hybrid events do not capture the essence of what is possible. The creation of apps are great, but also often hastily proposed because they are popular and the best returns-on-investments are often missed. The challenge facing marketers is that many providers are focused on providing tactical solutions as opposed creating strategic backbones that allow for community creation, broader and on-going engagement.

In a recent discussion with Kenes Asia, they revealed to me quite simply how their strategic view to how their clients should engage with audiences is creating more value for their clients. Kenes are in the business of Medical Congress Organization and Association Management. They are very clear on why the target audiences attend their client events – the content and to stay connected with their peers. What Kenes have done successfully is that they simply have made it easier for this content to be captured, distributed and used.

At its heart is a technology backbone which neatly plugs together all the elements of mobile, engagements, touch, scan and web into a cloud solution. Delegates no longer have to travel home with extra kilograms of paper. They have more room for gifts for the wife and kids so have no excuses now.

However, the strategic value lay in the ability for other community members to access this content through integration and syndication through existing communities.  Creating strategic value through the ability to provide their clients the opportunity to continue to engage with their audiences after the event and deliver on on-going education needs through such engagements as e-learning. Knowledge on personal preference and behaviour allows for improved value creation by allowing clients to design the next engagement better.

Given the on-going investments made on events in B2B and B2C marketing, there is room for improvement where marketers can create better value from their investments whether it is a corporate conference, product launch or road-show.

The view of an event as being simplyfour walls and a roof needs to change. An event is simply one engagement in a lifecycle of engagements. The engagement at event happens on the show-floor, but can also happen in the cloud. The opportunity of data and analytics is not just for better event operational management. With a long-term view on defining how events should be run, marketers can look to take advantage of the interconnected world.

And for the doctor in Tokyo who could not travel to Glasgow for the congress he attended last year. He does not need to miss out.

Early in my career I worked at a small boutique agency in Sydney called McCorkell & Associates. At the time we specialized in marketing communications for the ICT industry and during the late 90’s it was a booming business. Every year there was something new. A piece of software that would revolutionise the way we would work. A piece of hardware that was larger in capacity, but smaller in size and more secure than all the rest.  One year there was Y2K – that crafty date bug that was going to lead to Armageddon!

This was the agency where I learnt many things about my trade. It was also the place where I first begun to question how genuine a trend was or if it simply just hype. To this day, I still don’t know how much of a problem Y2K was. It certainly did not lead to a world meltdown. Was it a job well done or just a whole lot of hot air? I don’t know.

Every now and then I find a subject matter where I struggle to form an opinion on. It’s not that I am being impartial; it is simply that I just don’t see any evidence that helps me form an opinion one way or another. Today, I feel that being green in marketing leaves me in that same no man’s land of opinion.

In 2007/2008, I was working with a number of different clients on how to make their events and exhibitions greener. Virtual events were being touted as the green way forward. Buzzwords such as paperless environments or low carbon events were rampant. Being green often meant being more expensive, but many clients were willing to pay more to be green back then.

A personal observation – then the GFC hit and all has gone quiet! Cost became the primary decision maker.

I appreciate that at the time it was a matter of survival.  Discretionary spend is the first thing that gets cut. However, 3-years on and I am still not seeing any signs of sustainability practices in marketing becoming main-stream – beyond that of paperless environments. This is certainly the case in my industry and I have not observed it too much in others. Even fly-in and fly-out events are becoming popular again!

This is not to say that being green in marketing has not continued. It is simply an observation based on of lack of observations. I see huge efforts by brands to make the manufacturing of products greener and more sustainable. Is it just that these stories are taking center stage? Or is it a matter of “green blushes” – the want for marketers to be seen as authentic in their sustainable practices which makes them shy about talking about them?

What does inspire me is the effect when government legislates or mandates sustainability practices. For those brands sponsoring the London Olympics, they and their agency partners are being challenged in ways like never before by the One Planet Living concept and the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG) sustainability approach – which is a good thing. Through the creation of a necessity to be sustainable, new approaches, techniques and materials are being explored. I just hope that these just don’t stop at the end of the games, but continued to be applied elsewhere.

Event and exhibitions must be one of the least green out of all types of marketing tactics. When phrases such as build and burn are commonly used by clients to describe exhibition stand builds in Asia you know that there is a lot of room for improvement. However, I fail to believe that there could not be progress in this industry or in marketing as a whole within the region.

I do fear that we may have gone backwards in the last few years. Perhaps, it is that we lost the momentum created by government policy, corporate desire and consumer demand all being aligned and united by the global warming debate. However, I am not sure if we actually have.

I see sustainability in the CSR policy of some of my clients, but fail to see it in many of the briefs that we receive. I see the effort of some Pico teams, but fail to see an industry wide movement that has substance (i.e. not green washing). I see what happens when the weight of government demands change and what can be done as a result. I fail to see this in many Asian countries. I also fail to believe that there is not some sort of innovation taking place.

I have no opinion, but would like one.

If you have any insight or examples of green marketing practices in Asia, please feel free to share!

As a brand activator, one of the greatest challenges in my job is to create singular experiences that connect with multiple audiences.

There is great danger in targeting multiple segments in a shared environment. In trying to recognise their differences, you can make things too complex. By trying to be too many things to too many people, sometimes you can lose sight of the fact that there is only one brand. Or, in an effort to simplify things and create a singular brand engagement, the experience becomes too diluted and meaningless.

I have always admired ATL campaigns that are able to nail this balance by sparking the right emotions though copy, sound and visuals. But what about “live”? Can you really be something to everyone? The answer is yes.

The great thing about “live” is that it gives an opportunity for audiences to truly engage with a brand; so much so that they actively contribute to the experience. The creation of audience-specific journeys are great for achieving specific marketing objectives, but there is always an element of brand in every live engagement – sometimes it’s passive and sometimes it’s more overt. The challenge is in creating this common brand link.

For those who are planning their next event, exhibition, sponsorship or shopper activation that will involve multiple audience segments (or for those who feel challenged to do so); I would encourage a simple thought process in your planning, something I call the Common Denominator.

The Common Denominator is simply the activation of common ground amongst the audience members. It is more than just a shared space. It is the experience, content and messages that are delivered in this shared space. It is not just your keynote speaker, but what they talk about or how their profile appeals to more than one audience segment.

The best execution of the Common Denominator that I have seen recently was last year at a Manchester derby. Football fans, by their tribal nature, are very different. So what do you do if you’re a brand that feels it’s important to stimulate the competitive nature of opposing fans, yet remain impartial and a friend to all? You find something that you all can hate!

In their activation at the Manchester derby, Betfair focused on the fact that Carlos Tevez was a hated figure for both Manchester United and Manchester City football clubs. Fans were encouraged to “Trash” their Tevez jerseys and collect a new replacement. This simple insight turned into a brilliant way of creating common ground between two bi-polar audiences – as well as activating a brand while they were at it.

So what are some areas to look at when trying to find the Common Denominator?

Pain-point – Who is the common enemy?

Culture – Are there any common links between the audiences based on location, race or sub-culture?

Aspirations – Are there any shared dreams or places that the audiences would rather be?

Needs – Is there a common need from a product or service category that the audiences share?

Opinions – Is there a common theme in views/opinions expressed by the different audiences?

Trends – Are there any macro- or micro-trends that are impacting how the audiences live?

Whilst this list is not exhaustive, researching for insights into some of these areas could go a long way to helping design your next multi-audience engagement.

CES , the world’s largest consumer technology tradeshow, is always a highlight of the year for me. Not only do you get to see some great work from some of the most creative minds in the event and exhibitions industry, but you also get to check-out some new technologies that can be potentially used in future work.

I didn’t get to go this year so I spent a bit of time recently online trying to catch some of the action. There was a lot of buzz about Microsoft announcing that CES will not be as important in their plans beyond 2012. Related articles had quotes like “the final nail in the coffin” or “tradeshows are dead”. I think that such turns of phrase make catchy headlines, but for a topic that has been regularly discussed over the years, I was again left wanting for an intelligent argument in support of the hype.

While some event organizers are letting their shows become extinct through a lack progress or change, many are far from dead. In fact, many brands would suffer negative consequences to their business if these shows were to disappear. Someone from IBM once told me that if it was not for Sibos, he would need to work four times as hard, because the tradeshow was guaranteed to bring almost all of his clients under one roof. Tradeshow equity is, in large part, made up of how they contribute to how an industry runs.

For Asia, we can learn a lot from what is happening in tradeshows in Europe and North America because the maturity of many regional tradeshows is less than these markets. It is not that the older tradeshows are becoming obsolete; instead they are simply losing relevance to some sponsors and exhibitors. This is perfectly natural. As some exhibitors leave, new ones come along. New industries will require the creation of new tradeshows. It’s not Armageddon; it’s just life.

For would-be sponsors and exhibitors in places like North America, they get to a point where they already know who their customers are and decide that they no longer need to aggressively look for new ones. In such situations, scaling back investments or reallocating to spend to other types of events or relationship building activities makes sense. In developing markets where you need to reach new customers, then tradeshows work as a platform to introduce you to new markets and prospective customers. Or in the case of Sibos, they provide a very important part of doing business on a global scale. Sometimes simple economics explains why tradeshows are dropped (i.e. budget cuts and discretionary spend).

Whatever the catalyst for change, there is usually a negative side effect from not participating. It is simply a matter of working out which is the lesser of two evils.. Microsoft is a perfect example of this and they did the right thing by going to great lengths to communicate the thoughts and rationale behind the change in their participation in CES going forward. They realized that if they were not to show-up next year, this would send tongues wagging about why. Would it mean that Microsoft are going under?

Some within the events industry have often used hype to advocate spending on proprietary events or small targeted brand experiences. I am not saying that such events don’t have a place. My company does these for clients because they are the right tactics to deploy in the right circumstance. However, I feel that tradeshow protagonists often have ulterior motives and I question how genuinely they are concerned about your business and brand. Be warned!

The simple fact is that tradeshows offer a unique business opportunity for brands and they always will. Brands often need to work out how to make them more relevant to your current or future needs by leveraging the equity that many tradeshows have in different ways. For some, guerilla marketing efforts are popular as they leverage the draw of the tradeshow, but allow the creation of exclusive brand experiences offsite.

Ultimately, I really believe that there is an onus on brands to push event organizers to provide them what they need. Just don’t believe the hype that some in the industry are spreading! Many event organizers are willing and open to explore ways to make their shows better and relevant. Often new ways of participation are simply needed to make tradeshows a better part of your marketing mix.

On a recent retail project, my team and I stumbled upon the importance of this ingredient.  The goal of the project was to refresh the client’s retail experience to reflect the desired change in their brand position. The brand was moving from mass to a more luxury status – affordable luxury if you like. This would connect it well to the aspirations of the growing middle class in Asia. However, the change was not to be so great that we would damage the traditional business by alienating customers that go to them for choice. It has been one of the toughest briefs that I have had in many years.

Essentially, we deconstructed what was affordable luxury and looked to define how to interpret this though store-front displays and in-store experience. One of the elements reviewed was quantity and this simple item alone was a discussion point for many months. We successfully argued that for the client products, the beauty and exclusivity of individual pieces were lost in a sea of choice. That large quantity at the store-front display was an inhibitor to achieving the objective of the store-front – which should be capturing consumer attention and making them explore further. We argued that variety is better communicated through price mix and category style at the store front and that wider choice should be managed in-store by customer service. This was the easy part, but getting front line staff to change their habits is really where it gets hard.

We are at a cross road in retail marketing in Asia. With the growing middle class, the novelty of choice is still fun and can create a positive shopper experience. However, as we move on and the consumer becomes more sophisticated, some will revolt. They will seek simpler lives or need simpler solutions. Not lives where they take vows of poverty, but they will prefer shopping experiences that make choice simpler in a complex world.

Each brand and product is different. For our client there was a certain solution.  For others simplicity can play out in different ways. Technology can play a part, but the important thing is to consider at each stage of your customer’s journey where there is a fight or flight problem – from channel strategy, to location planning or in-store. Seek ways to make life easier for people like me!

Now back to my wife’s gift. I still don’t have anything and there is one-day to go. The pressure is on. Fight or flight is no longer a choice. All I can do is fight. It won’t be fun or memorable, but a necessity.Wish me luck and have a great New Year ahead.

Nowhere is the brave new world braver than in its embrace of social media. Tyronne O’Callaghan, Director of Brand and Strategy at Pico Global Services maintains that social media tactics can be a real show-stopper when used in a creative way to target and engage with audiences at events and exhibitions.

The traditional well-established order required stands, booths, stages and well-primed frontline staff to make the most of those precious few minutes of ‘face time’ with prospects. Things are different now, and the new order does not confine events or exhibitions to a start or end date. Quickly, trends evolving in the online social community are making their way to shows – and audiences are engaging with zest and enthusiasm. Events and exhibitions, bound by geographical chains for so long, have burst free from the constraints of physical walls, roofs and agenda’s.

Exhibitors, for instance, have long sought out a multitude of engagement techniques to capture the attention of famously fickle audiences – from distributing highly sought-after souvenirs, to presenting live activities to, more recently, facilitating on-stand interactive ‘experiences’ like augmented reality. Although the traditional approaches do work under the right circumstances, new approaches to exhibition floor engagement are already harnessing the modern habits of audiences to enable exhibitors to incorporate social media elements in the on-stand experience.

Understanding the power of social networks, and how they can be tactically channeled, can go a long way to generating results above and beyond the status quo. By taking key learnings from the average Facebook and Twitter user, the trick is to leverage the show environment to create experiences which engage with delegates and which they can share with their networks and beyond.

To better activate brands, messages and content at events and exhibitions, marketers can invite community networks to rate, caption, vote and comment on uploaded user-generated content. More elaborate campaigns can also be waged by using the show as the staging ground for a live versus online community competition.

A case in point is Pico client Ford, who teamed up with Team Detroit and with social game developer Zynga to host what has been dubbed the world’s largest Words with Friends – a Scrabble-like social game in which players compete against each other by creating words – to promote its 2013 Escape model. The game was made available on Facebook, as well as iPhone and Android devices; thus, in one foul swoop, the brand was proactively able to engage millions of prospects.

For one hour on November 15, from 11:00pm to midnight, fans in the U.S. could collectively play Words with Friends against celebrity Jenny McCarthy at an event in Los Angeles. While doing so, a full reveal photo of the new 2013 Ford Escape was exposed on giant screens, allowing the public to experience the debut of the Escape at the Los Angeles Auto Show.

The mechanics of the promotion were simplicity itself, with players submitting word suggestions via live-stream chat. The game was also live-streamed on www.Facebook.com/fordescape and livestream.com/ford so that fans at home could play as well.

Ford selected McCarthy – actress and model, because they wanted someone who could play the game and who fits the ‘fun’ profile that Ford wanted to project. Director of U.S. Marketing Communications for Ford, Matt Van Dyke, hit the nail on the head when he said, “By revealing the new Escape through a popular social game like Words with Friends, Ford was able to expand its reach beyond traditional social channels to mobile platforms that engage a broader audience” – a broader audience that included young professionals, who were the prime target for this particular initiative.

Ford selected Words with Friends because of its 20-million players following and their passion for the game. To drum up interest in the promotion, the auto giant prepared the ground within the game itself, which it complemented with invitations to compete on Facebook.

The Words with Friends event is a great example of what can be achieved when marketers take a platform agnostic view when designing an event or exhibition; and it illustrates how to engage with target audiences in today’s modern world.

However, what about your typical event and exhibition?  For marketers planning their next exhibition or event, these simple steps will help develop a ‘social show’.

1. At the planning stage, consider the question: What do I check, share, post or tweet in my daily life whether at work or at play? This exercise will help isolate some simple approaches that plug into the ‘normal behaviour’ of today’s show delegate.  From there, you can easily harness the power of social communities while driving focal attention to the physical presence of the brand at a particular exhibition or conference. For example, ‘checking-in’ is becoming a popular practice. Leverage it at a show to let social networks know who is on your stand or at your keynote. To encourage people to broadcast their location competitions can be used to encourage check-in. Simple, cost effective, but progressive.
2. Consider what your company is already doing from a social media marketing perspective. Many companies today conduct social media activity in some shape or form. Explore opportunities to integrate your show floor presence with the social media story for your brand. The future here is particularly exciting. With innovative companies like Salesforce leading the way, soon you will be able to tap into your company’s social connections with your customers, identify who is at the event or exhibition, invite them to your stand or VIP function and then pre-design on-stand engagements based on your profile of them in real-time. Now that would be something to talk about!

The Social Show is not a dream, but a modern day reality. Whether it is B2B or B2C, the opportunities to grow your brand’s footprint beyond the walls of an event or exhibition are ready for the taking. Challenge your teams and your agencies to view your events or exhibitions as just another social engagement between your brand and its audience.