11.01.18
By Lisa Major
Holiday experiential marketing campaigns give brands the perfect opportunity to engage and connect with consumers in a festive atmosphere. But with the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, marketers need to ensure that they are on-point when it comes to their strategy. Here are five things to consider when planning your holiday campaign.
The golden rule when planning your campaign is to keep the season in mind. Create and design your experiential events with holiday or winter themes. Also, think about what the season means to people, all people that is. For some, it’s a time for magic, for family, and giving. And for others, it can be a time of stress and hurriedness. Finding balance for all is the key. Keep your design warm and bright, brand messaging short and sweet, and be mindful of peoples’ time during this busy season.
The sights, the sounds, the smells of the holidays all stir up warm and fuzzy feelings in all of us. Stimulating the senses is a must for any experiential event, but it is especially important during the holidays with so many other things going on. Think of how holiday lighting makes everything feel magical or how holiday music lightens your mood. Finding a way to incorporate holiday-themed sensory experiences within your event will create a positive association between your brand and consumers.
Give consumers something that they will love, find useful, and most importantly, remember. Keep in mind that there are a lot of other brands trying to win customers with freebies and discounts, so you’ll need to step up your game during the holidays. Offer free products or merchandise, high-value discounts, or the most popular of all, gift cards. If you’re considering going the promotional swag route, make sure you offer something that people will actually use. Wireless charging pads, pop-sockets, and 3-in-1 charging buddies are just a few examples.
Expand your reach and your engagement outside of the walls of your activation with social sharing elements. A whopping 98% of consumers create digital or social content at events and experiences and 100% share the content. With numbers like that, you can’t afford to miss out on the return that social sharing will bring. Images, in particular, resonate with people more than anything else on social media platforms. Utilizing the power of imagery can give your holiday experiential event a boost and will keep people engaged after the event is over. Offer customized, high-quality branded visual content or personalized photo and/or video opportunities. Anything that is shareworthy is going to get you noticed both online and offline.
The competition is fierce when it comes to holiday activations and now is the time to secure your event staff or partner with an experiential event staffing agency. Your event staff will be on the front lines of your activation engaging and interacting with consumers. You’ll want to ensure that you have cheerful individuals representing your brand and those who have plenty of experience. Once you have secured your staff, make sure you give them the proper tools and training so that they can be successful on the job (and in turn, make your event a success).
It really is the most wonderful time of the year for brands. With Halloween behind us, companies everywhere are scrambling to cash in on the holiday season. Many brands will use traditional forms of advertising during the holidays and will see results, but those results will most likely be short-term. Brands that opt to utilize face-to-face engagement, on the other hand, will reap the benefits of their efforts long after the holiday season. Making real-life connections, and putting a face to your brand goes a long way. It drives trust and fosters brand loyalty and I think we can all agree that no other form of marketing can do that.
If you are planning a holiday experiential marketing campaign, you’ll need talented individuals to be the face and voice of your brand. You can count on ATN to provide you with top-notch staff that will help make your event a success!
