The experiential you

In our do anything, buy anything, sell anything from home global info-culture, a lot of businesses, charities and entertainment destinations alike are going to have to start selling their wares, their chairs and their causes a whole lot differently.

Motion picture powerhouse Cineplex has taken this challenge on in a big way.  Since they can’t compete with $4.99 new releases right to your desktop, they are competing on experience.  Cineplex’s new 19+ VIP destinations are fully licensed and complete with the pub's finest served right to your leather reclining seat. Sure, the nachos cost about $20, but it makes for a fabulous date or girls night out.  Keys to this experience?

It’s:

• Unique;
• Remarkable;
• Higher quality than the norm; 
• More focused than ever on the customer...

...and the customer experience.

On the charity side, we recently had the pleasure of working with CNIB and a group of amazingly creative volunteers to design a new fundraising event.  

The goal:  

A remarkable experience, building bandwidth and a foundation for a signature annual event that could compete and grow in a heavily saturated market.

The result:

A swanky cocktail UnGala, complete with a blind silent auction (feel-smell-listen your way to a fabulous auction lot), and Dessert-in-the-Dark (imagine the sensory surprise of dark-chocolate-covered expresso beans and cayenne-spiced chocolate), surrounded by complimentary tastings, musical stylings in gypsy-latin flavour, and some of the most outrageous couture our formerly conservative city has ever seen.

Would you pay for that experience?  Or pay a premium for fine spirits delivered to your seat during Iron Man 2 or the next in the Twilight saga?   You might.  More importantly, you might tell your friends.

The point?

If you have a hope in Hades of your customers spreading the notion of you in an ever-competitive global market, your brand and your marketing better be all about a remarkable experience.

Don't turn your back on experiential marketing.

Unless the experience you're looking for is the unemployment line.

Comments

[Anthony Wilkinson]

Great post, Jeff and Lindsay. It is SO important to provide a better, unique customer experience. Love how Cineplex has taken the theatre experience to the next level (and also in a backwards direction to when going to the theatre was a novel social event). Went to the one at Westmount and had a great time, they didn't bring drinks to my seat though.

[Jeff and Lindsay]

Thanks Anthony! Great point about the novel social event. Being novel and noteworthy without being "gimmicky" is key. (with exception given to Vince and his slap chop - cause he's awesome )