Brand Activation through Live Entertainment Experiences

More and more companies are realizing the need for connecting with their target audience on a different level that brings long term, loyal customers. This need has created a new era of marketing called “Brand Activation”. Long before Marketing gurus came up with this concept Entertainment world was already connecting with their fan base using exact same techniques. Live Entertainment has been the new trend in marketing and major companies are now all on the bandwagon connecting with their customer base or rebrand their company through immersive interactive brand activations.

Let’s go back to the beginning and look at the definition of Brand Activation.

Brand Activation is basically the art of driving consumer action through interaction and experiences. The target of these campaigns is to get customers to act. Brand Activations bring brands to life through entertainment experiences and forms long-term emotional connections.

Brand activation is the process of creating or increasing awareness and engagement through brand experiences.

The end goal in everything marketers do is to increase revenue, but more directly a brand activation campaign is about raising awareness and creating an emotional connection between consumers and your brand so that it sticks in their mind and they are more likely to engage with it and become long-term customers.

Brand activation campaigns must align with your brand strategy and brand identity. A successful brand activation campaign needs the below touchpoints for it to become successful:

• Fully understanding brand identity and where the company wants to position itself in the long term.
• Research and use all available data. Your campaign should not be a guessing game. You need to use science and analysis
• Create a catchy concept-you should be able to summarize all of the campaign in one catchy sentence that triggers awareness and excitement.
• Put together wicked creative ideas to support the concept. Now detail out the whole show! What is your final content?
• Budget it out. Prepare an exciting presentation and impress your board of directors to get the budget you need.
• Put the whole process on a production timeline and let the ball rolling.
• Create consumer interest and market it
• Make sure it has sufficient time in the market before you launch the campaign.
• During the campaign, create processes to measure success and record every single detail for future analysis.

Now, let’s look at the definition of Live Entertainment on Wikipedia;

Entertainment is a form of activity that holds the attention and interest of an audience or gives pleasure and delight. It can be an idea or a task but is more likely to be one of the activities or events that have developed over thousands of years specifically for the purpose of keeping an audience’s attention. Although people’s attention is held by different things, because individuals have different preferences in entertainment, most forms are recognizable and familiar.

 “Keeping an audience’s attention” is the key here and this is where brand activation merges with entertainment.

In live entertainment for a production to be successful, you need similar ingredients as brand activation.

You need a catchy creative idea (concept), interesting theme, budget, talent, strong production,…etc. the goal is always a strong emotional connection. The latest trend is immersive entertainment and it includes your audience into the show creating unforgettable experiences.

Show producers and creative entertainment professionals are your best bet in creating these experiences since brand activation is just another form of a show. If you look at it as a production show you will naturally detail out the whole campaign as a show and it won’t be just another boring corporate event.

The best way to activate your brand is through unique brand activations via Live Entertainment. Without brand activation, your brand is basically dead and you need to create awareness and bring your brand to life through these experiences.

Now, let’s get that brand activated!!!

Also by Sinan Ulucay:

Live Entertainment Budget for Resorts, Theme Parks and Cruise Lines

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