Love customers with a ‘total’ experience

I read with interest your article on experiential marketing (MW last week). While it brought to life some examples of its application by brands, there was a missing point. Forget the textbook definition of EM as just a subset of field marketing. The aspect that needs to be at the forefront of every marketer’s mind is how to engage increasingly demanding consumers with the total aspect of their product experience at all times.

Take Apple’s iPod. Purchase one, and you get stunning packaging enveloped in über-cool design, intended to directly play into the sensory touchy-feely, warming needs of people. This sort of holistic “total” experience delivery was once the domain of the Chanel/Louis Vuitton luxury brands brigade. Not any more.

Consumers need to be made “loved” by the products they buy, even in the mass market category. Even O2 now sends its mobiles to its customers in next-generation cardboard-engineered packaging. EM in action? Yes.

It is high time brands considered consumer psychology and provide a more holistic experience if they want to evolve – or even just survive – in competitive markets. Applied with diligence, EM can provide that edge.

Noah Smith

Director

Duplex Communications

London W1