Because customers are easily distracted and are forgetful these days.

We, as customers ourselves, use a lot of physical, consumable products daily. We are also are very much distracted by new brands, new products and new content seen online or offline. Typically branded products could get left out of the minds of consumers. Sure, there is still good old merchandising to promote, but it is expensive for buying prime shelf positioning and little engagement to allow products to sell on their own. So how can we engage customers better? That is when brand activation campaign can come in.

What is Brand Activation?

Brand activation is very much part of marketing and it is an art of improving customer experience for a moment, to allow consumers to interact with a brand through physical, social and interstitial spaces. Simply, the goal of brand activation campaign is to get consumer to act positively towards a brand.

So what qualities should we do focus on such campaign?

Differentiating Your Product

A large part of improving the quality cues of any customer experience is changing or differentiating the product away from the usual norms.

For example, for food consumable products, this can be changing the taste of a particular food product. However, such changes for the primary product carries risks of backlash. Even big brands like Coca-Cola, had made such product mistake before.

Coca-Cola’s new product mistake in 1985 was a classic marketing failure and lesson for marketers. It vindicated the famous phrase, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

Differentiating product does not necessary mean a company had to change or add another new product however. There is always the secondary product: the packaging.

Creativity generates Interest.

Instead of changing the “function” of products, packaging re-designed creatively can improve quality attributes your brand which to suggest otherwise. Great brands like Coca-Cola and Starbucks do “new” designs for their packaging all the time. Starbuck even create seasonal premiums as a personalised form of packaging for their customers (but of course, do get enough premiums for them to prevent “cat fights”).

With a good re-designed packaging, you can integrate your “new” product packaging with event and social media marketing, you can have an unified and seamless experience for consumers to interact with your brand.

An example would be Marmite’s “Lover vs. Haters” Campaign done in their summer season.

Its also about Social Engagement.

Nowadays, social media users (including customers) do not always post encouraging and optimistic content. However, Marmite used this behavioural norm to create a brand activation campaign. A campaign event is to reward users that had an overall positive online presence.

Lover or hater? On 4 Aug the world’s first Twitter sentiment-powered cafe opens its doors @SohoGrind! #MarmiteSummer pic.twitter.com/4Iug9c9ZKw

— Marmite (@marmite) July 23, 2015

Marmite’s “Lover vs. Haters” Campaign integrated packaging re-design, event and social media marketing on Twitter.

Marmite also opened a “sentiment-powered cafe” whereby event is arrange for their customers. Upon arriving at the cafe, a customer could be classified by the Love-O-Meter as either a “lover” or a “hater” according to their social media posts.

The differentiating rewards? “Lovers” get free summer snacks. They could also have some fun at the event.

The campaign helps draw attention to their Marmite slogan, “you either love it or you hate it”, in reference to their famous spread.

You Can Do This Too.

Thinking of how to improve your branding and PR with your customers?

Let us analyse and strategise your branding needs, and design the right campaign for you. We can creatively design your packaging in the most cost-effective ways, source for premiums, manage events and social media campaigns for you.

Contact us for today to meet up with our marketing consultants today.