Over the years, we've seen many innovations in the marketing industry. But whether it's a newspaper ad, billboard, television commercial or online pop-up, one thing has remained constant — every marketing effort aims to draw people to a business. Experiential marketing takes this tactic to an exciting new level.
A more unique style than traditional marketing strategies, experiential marketing is more than just reading, viewing or hearing an ad — it gives customers an interesting experience. Read on to learn more about experiential marketing and what it can do for your business.
What Is Experiential Marketing?
Experiential marketing is a strategy that aims to tell customers about your company, products and core values. What sets it apart from more traditional marketing efforts is that it uses more creative methods to drive memorable experiences for customers.
Some examples of experiential marketing include:
Kiosks and activities at trade shows
Festivals, award ceremonies and business events
PR stunts
Retreats
Hospitality lounges
Brand activations and sponsorships
Product showcases, demos or samplings
While experiential marketing normally occurs in physical settings, it can also integrate virtual and hybrid experiences. This way, marketers can incorporate online features into their company's experiential marketing strategies, like website and social media promotions.
What Are Marketing Lighting Displays?
Visual merchandising is a great way to communicate with your audience and help them understand your brand. Like other aspects of visual merchandising, good lighting plays a pivotal role in enticing customers and promoting your brand.
Whether it's taking photos for your website or social media, planning a business gala or hosting another promotional event, quality lighting is crucial. A marketing lighting display sets the atmosphere for your brand and event, attracts potential customers and encourages them to experience your space. This can help draw them to your products or services.
What Are the Benefits of Experiential Marketing?
Why invest in experiential marketing for your business? Here are six benefits to consider.
1. Increased Brand Loyalty
If executed well, experiential marketing is a great way to boost brand loyalty as customers interact and connect with the brand on a more personal level. Experiential marketing creates an authentic, sharable and memorable experience that people will remember, making it an excellent way to build loyalty.
2. Free PR
Another great benefit of experiential marketing is that it's essentially free PR for your brand. To drive word-of-mouth marketing for your business, you'll need quality products, good service and a creative marketing campaign that gives users a one-of-a-kind experience.
Once you've accomplished these elements, customers are sure to start telling their friends and family. A truly newsworthy and groundbreaking campaign can also grab the attention of the press. This can result in a larger consumer base and partnerships with other brands. Consider a creative experiential marketing strategy to help spread the word about your brand.
3. Gives People an Experience
Whether the campaign is in-person or online, your event should be interactive, engaging and authentic to give customers a unique experience. Experiential marketing differs from more traditional methods because it gives your audience an experience they'll remember for life. Additionally, 85% of consumers are more likely to purchase from a brand after participating in experiences and events.
4. Attracts the Right People
Compared to other marketing techniques like television commercials and website pop-up ads, experiential marketing is far less intrusive. Rather than pushing unwanted ads on viewers, experiential marketing does the opposite — it brings people to your brand.
This unique experience makes customers more willing to try out your business. It also helps target your desired audience, unlike a TV ad that broadcasts to nearly everyone — whether they like it or not. Experiential marketing is an excellent way to attract the right people to your brand and reach your target audience.
5. Builds Brand Awareness
The main intention behind any type of marketing is to make people more aware of a brand. Marketers want to inform prospective customers of a company's products or services, brand design, beliefs and more.
Experiential marketing uses real-time experience to show your audience what you're selling, demonstrating how your product can benefit them. This goes beyond building brand recognition — it also communicates your story, mission and values. Experiential marketing is an opportunity for brands to connect directly with consumers, thus boosting brand awareness.
6. Increases Sales
Experiential marketing attracts people to brands, generates leads and builds loyalty and awareness through a unique experience. As a result, this can ultimately drive product or service purchases. In fact, 65% of brands report that experiential events and programs are directly related to sales.
How Does Lighting Play a Role in Experiential Marketing?
A strong lighting display is important for experiential marketing. Lighting serves various purposes in experiential marketing, including:
Creates social media-worthy photos: Good lighting helps bring a photo to life. Shadows, direction, colors, intensity, softness and other factors set the stage for visually pleasing content. If you're looking to ensure your customers can take attractive photos for social media, lighting is a key element to consider.
Immerses users in the experience: There are endless opportunities to engage users with good lighting. For instance, projection mapping can be an immersive experience in many ways. It allows you to overlap video onto any surface like a road, building, stage or running water, transforming a common object into an interactive display. Once you've chosen your canvas, calculating lighting specifics like brightness level, shadows and pixel density is key to creating a delightful experience of illusion to engage viewers.
Evokes emotion: Proper use of lighting in experiential marketing has the powerful ability to elicit an emotional response from viewers. A study suggests that the intensity of light can influence how deeply you feel emotions. Lighting sets the tone for your event, affecting your customers' mood and how they perceive your brand.
Highlights a theme or concept: No matter the theme, style or idea of your event, good lighting can help you achieve it. Whether it's holiday-inspired lighting for a Christmas party, stage lighting for a concert or projective mapping for an interactive event, lighting is a great way to convey a specific theme.
Elevate Your Event With a Quality Lighting Display
Good lighting is important to enhance viewers' experience and create a memorable lasting impression. At Illuminating Design, we specialize in quality lighting services to take events to the next level. Whether it's projection mapping, custom RGB lighting services or bistro lighting for parties and events, we'll help provide all necessary equipment to design an unforgettable experience.
To learn more about how our lighting services can elevate your next event, reach out to us today!