Judging Experiential (Part 3 of 3)

The same idea can be executed amazingly or poorly. It can seem authentic and original, or gauche and cheap. It can touch millions with clarity, or just hundreds with confusion. This excerpt from the book “Real World Ideas” explores some principles which mark out the very best experiential work, which you can look for when judging a creative idea.

Integrate with reality

Experiential is at its most effective when it interweaves with reality – when it solves a real problem, provides a real service, or similarly effects something else in the real world.

Often however, experiential ideas restrict themselves to the four imaginary walls of a site space in much the same way a TV ad restricts itself to the four walls of a screen. They act out an idea superficially rather than really bringing it to bear in a manner that matters.

When looking at an idea, always ask: “Is the concept communicated here really making an impact, or is it superficial and fictional?”

Use Context

Closely related to encroaching on the real world, this principle involves making the best of your experience's environment to amplify your creative. When people build an experience in a vacuum and place it on an allotted site, they ignore the fact that all around them are things that their budget would never be able to simulate – lots of busy people, nature and so on – which would become part of their experience if they acknowledged them.

Take for instance the New Zealand Coastguard, who showed people how tough it was to find those lost at sea not by building a sea substitute, but by actually dropping people in the middle of the sea itself. The ocean became a core part of their creative idea – free of charge.

Therefore, ask the question: “Does this idea make use of the world around it, and turn unowned assets into part of its creative delivery?”

Be Efficient

Experiential marketing can be associated with high production costs. Because of this it's essential to make sure every penny is wisely spent.

For direct reach campaigns, this means ensuring that you reach as many people as possible – are those bells and whistles really worth halving your reach? Would it be better to get 20% conversion from 100,000 people than 40% conversion from 10,000 people?

For indirect reach campaigns, you need to ask, what is necessary in this campaign to get the message across? Since few people will be actually experiencing the action directly, does it need to be a rich experience at all?

Either way, the question is: “Are all of our spends necessary, or would that budget be better spent increasing reach?”

Don’t Say, Imply

Experiential actions can act much like body language for brands. We’re all familiar with the phrase “actions speak louder than words”, so we should be creating experiential ideas that speak volumes about brands without us having to labour the point.

When Adidas created the D Rose Jump store, where shoes were available for people to take, free of charge (providing they could jump the height of a regulation basketball hoop), they clearly implied that their shoes were for pro-ballers only – without being so crass as to say it directly.

This is the foundation of sustainable beliefs – beliefs that people have figured out for themselves, rather than been told.

Therefore ask of the idea: “Would this work without us saying or writing anything? Does the action automatically say what we want it to say?”.

Use Many Different Types of Reach

If your experiential action clearly ticks the implication box, then that means it will work for people who just hear about it, as well as those who actually experience it.

This characteristic then gives you the potential to spread awareness of your idea through as many channels as you can, knowing that it will still be effective on that secondary audience.

By expanding reach this way, even small experiential ideas can compete with heavy-hitting above-the-line advertising.

A great test of this spreadability is: “Would this idea still be clear and impressive if I were to describe it in the space of a tweet?”

By Alex Smith, Planning Director at real-world marketing agency Sense

[*Please Note: The above is an extract taken from the book ‘Real World Ideas: A guide to modern experiential marketing’. Click here to download a pdf copy of the book]