Experiential Marketing to the Summer BBQ Lover

Barbeque season is in full swing and what better way to get people excited about your product than with an experiential marketing event which targets the summer bbq lover.  Whether you sell hamburgers or buns, paper plates or all the fixings, showing off your products and letting people test products that perhaps they have yet to try represents a great opportunity to boost profits.

Sure television commercials or social media can get consumers thinking about a brand, but that one-on-one is still very important. Building a relationship with your consumer is never a bad thing, and if you bring emotions into the mix, the decision to purchase is influenced even more.

New to the experiential marketing field? That’s ok – now is a better time than ever to get yourself acquainted. Experiential marketing is really just the act of connecting people with products in a live interaction. Whether it is through a product demonstration or a taste test, giving consumers an experience is one of the best ways to build brand awareness and increase customer retention.

The stats speak for themselves. A study done by the Event Marketing Institute found that almost 60% of customers reported that an experiential marketing campaign has led them to purchase the product demonstrated and over 80% said that these events have led to them becoming a regular customer! If you are looking to both retain current customers and attract new ones, experiential marketing is a great way to do it.

Whether you conduct experiential marketing campaigns on a regular basis or have never taken advantage of the opportunities these types of events represent, there are a few key things to keep in mind.

When it comes to an effective experiential marketing campaign, expertise is key. When planning an event, it is critical to make sure that those working the event have a solid knowledge base in order to be able to answer questions correctly and provide the information that customers need. An experienced CPG merchandising company will be able to provide the training and ensure that employees are experts.

Personality is key too. When you hold an event, you need to make sure that those working it are approachable and confident. Having individuals with previous experience working these types of events makes all the difference. Again, those staff members provided by a CPG merchandising company will be qualified and experienced.

So how do you take advantage of bbq season and conduct an effective marketing campaign that gets attention and boost profits? Harness the power of experience and let a CPG merchandising company plan and execute an experiential event!

To get started on your experientialmarketing campaign, please contact Storesupport by calling 1-877-421-5081 or visit www.storesupport.ca.

 

 

Grocery Manufacturers Association Study Reveals Why Your Experiential Marketing Should Be At the Top Of Your ‘To Do’ List!

A study released recently by the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA) stated that 70% of retail purchasing decisions are made in-store, and that 68% of purchases are made on impulse. Really, how many people actually walk into the grocery store (even with a list) and walk out with only those items they intended to purchase before entering? Not very many! There is a huge opportunity for you to shift consumer loyalty your way.

One very effective way is through experiential marketing. Experiential marketing involves your brand directly engaging the customer in the store. Some experiential marketing campaigns involve coupons, discounts, ‘give aways’ or take away samples. We believe the best and most effective form of experiential marketing campaign performed in grocery stores is live product samplings.

Live demonstrations have a high probability of converting the prospect into becoming a customer. If a customer who samples your product likes it and feels that the price is right, they are likely to purchase. Running an experiential marketing campaign in the grocery store however is easier said than done. The representatives that administer your experiential marketing campaign must be outgoing and willing to stop passers-by to sample your product. They also must be knowledgeable about your product. For example, if you sell a food product or a product that has chemicals in it, the consumer may have questions about the product’s ingredients. Your representative is a direct reflection of your brand and their ability to knowledgably interact with the consumer it vital.

Experiential marketing is a science and should not be approached lightly. Experiential marketing is not achieved simply by putting a student in the grocery store in front of a table stocked with your product. Experiential marketing campaigns represent many opportunities, especially if you run your campaigns across multiple locations. The more coverage your experiential marketing campaign has, the more consumers you can reach. This will not only increase sales and brand recognition; an experiential marketing campaign is also an excellent way to gather product feedback and intelligence about your product.

Providing the representative who performs the experiential marketing campaign with data points to capture opinions about the customers’ experiences with your product can enable you to improve not only your products but also your packaging and marketing messaging. Having a plan to mine the data and report statistically about the results from your experiential marketing campaign will help you report on the results with success and provide valuable statistics that you can use in future business cases and business planning.

One of the biggest things that the GMA study has done is validate the opportunity and value proposition inherent in an experiential marketing campaign. If 68% of purchasers are making their buying decisions on impulse and if you can capture even a fraction of this audience through your experiential marketing campaign, then your campaign will be a success! If you don’t have the resources in place to facilitate your campaign there are experiential marketing companies who can guide you through the process. Experiential marketing companies can provide you with the staff and technology to make the most of your experiential marketing campaign both in-store and afterwards.

For more information about experiential marketing please visit www.storesupport.ca or call 905-847-6513.

Spread the Love with Your Valentine’s Day Experiential Marketing Campaign

Trying to ramp up your sales and exposure but having trouble figuring out how to engage consumers? Why not leverage an experiential marketing campaign that takes advantage of holidays like Valentine’s Day to influence consumer buying! An effective experiential marketing event that influences individual purchases can yield major results.

It is easy to make the claim that experiential marketing is influential – but that doesn’t mean that you have to believe it. Need more evidence – don’t worry, we’ve got it! Event Marketing Institute’s EventTrack: Event Marketing Industry Annual Forecast & Best Practices Study found some pretty intriguing results with regard to experiential marketing. If you want to know how influential experiential marketing is, just check out the stats that they uncovered: 

-          71% of the study’s respondents reported that they felt more positive about a company or brand after an experiential marketing event.

-          58% of those surveyed said that they ended up purchasing a product after an experiential marketing event.

-          86% of those consumers surveyed said that they became regular customers of a brand or service after en experiential marketing event (That’s HUGE!!!).

So how can you leverage a Valentine’s Day experiential marketing campaign and get the most bang for your buck?? It is easy. An experiential marketing agency that offers a plethora of merchandising services can help you make the most of a Valentine’s Day experiential marketing campaign. Here are just a few examples:

Get people excited about your product. A campaign that allows consumers to interact with your representatives and sample your product is a good start. Presenting your product through a live product demonstration associated with Valentine’s Day will be sure to capture those who are excited about the season and eager to spend to purchase your product and perhaps even shift their brand loyalty. The same technique could be used for food products sold at the retail level.   

Catch those stragglers. Grab those last minute shoppers by setting up as close to Valentine’s Day as possible. An experiential marketing campaign is going to be the most effective if consumers are thinking about the holiday. Those shoppers (ahhem males – sorry guys) that typically leave their Valentine’s Day shopping till the last minute always seem to need help finding the perfect gift, so let your experiential marketing event help them 'discover' exactly what that perfect gift is!

Ensuring that you have the best front line staff is crucial where experiential marketing campaigns are concerned. This is your opportunity to influence shoppers who otherwise way not have considered your product. An experiential marketing agency that can deliver results through their merchandising services can help you achieve results, especially if you are considering a last minute campaign.  

Spread the love this Valentine’s Day by enlisting the expertise of an experienced experiential marketing agency that offers a suite of merchandising services. For more information, please contact Storesupport at 1-877-421-5081 or visit www.storesupport.ca.