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Marketing In The 'Total Experience' Economy

This article is more than 9 years old.

By Alex Frias

In 1999, Joseph Pine and James Gilmore first introduced the concept of an Experience Economy. The concept is that goods and services are no longer enough for consumers – that businesses must create memorable events and experiences that capture their audience and create experiences that transforms their brand’s value proposition.

Fast forward to 2014: timelines, swipes, pop-up shops, (snap)chats. We live in a real-time digitally enhanced world where Millennials feel compelled to check their phones every three minutes to enhance their personal experiences. Marketers have never had this amount of marketplace and social noise to work through.

Consumers know what they want and are willing to pay a premium for it. In turn, we as marketers have to take their cues to adopt and leverage technology to create immersive, total-experience strategies to give them an elevated product across all touch points. Here are some things to remember as you approach this challenge:

Total experience marketing is a 360-degree platform.

Marketing is everywhere. It's digital, mobile, experiential, social and word of mouth. A brand conversation that begins on a TV campaign must continue digitally. It should become a two-way conversation and ultimately a customer springboard that the brand is curating and amplifying on social platforms.

Silos aren't loyal.

Brand campaigns can no longer live in a bubble. The days of a campaign being rolled out on only one medium are over. A Super Bowl TV ad is great, but that’s just the beginning of the conversation. A viral video is great but how do you build upon that? Understand the channel your brand is playing in but unify the silos to create truly loyal customers.

The hashtag is a utility, not a strategy.

Tagging a number sign before your campaign name is not an experience. That’s a mobile utility masquerading as a campaign. Use the hashtag as a way to corral your messaging; not as the message.

Personalization is the new change agent.

There’s A LOT of customer data out there. We know who’s in someone’s social networks, where they check-in, and how much 4G data they have on their mobile plans. Marketers who can unlock their customer data to customize and personalize their messaging will win the race. It’s as simple as that. If you can customize your customer’s experience with your brand and product you will win.

Your product’s value proposition should enhance the consumer experience.

Ultimately our mission statement as marketers is to show the customer what makes our brand special. Yes, we all want to be Apple and have millions of fan-boys. But the only way to turn our customer into a brand advocate is by enhancing their brand experience with the actual product. If you’re in the business of cheese, how we can use your brand of cheese to enhance your consumer’s brand experience? That is the question we must ask ourselves every day.

Alex Frias is co-founder and president of Track Marketing Group, an award winning brand experience company that provides brand solutions that blend live event experiences and social conversations.