EDITED BY // JESSICA HEATHCOTE
REPUBLISHED: SEPTEMBER 2024
In today’s rapidly evolving digital landscape, brands need to stay ahead by integrating digital tech tools into their experiential marketing activations – because as we know, brand activations are one of the most effective ways to achieve major cut through and build brand advocacy. Using the latest digital tech tools, offers brands the opportunity to not only increase efficiency and reach, but also create an engaging and memorable experience that keep your customers coming back for more.
DisplayWise General Manager – Marketing, Lisa Cachia explains.
“Ultimately brands need to invest in both an online and offline channel strategy to build awareness and encourage purchasing decisions. Each has their role, and while online channels are easy to measure and faster to implement, the importance of offline marketing should not be discounted. Offline marketing always has and will continue to play a major role in building awareness, credibility and trust.”
From leveraging social media to utilising virtual and augmented reality, integrating digital tech tools will help you create impactful brand activations and provide a valuable foundation for campaign success.
Use QR codes to drive your foot traffic
Following the pandemic, integrating digital tech tools like QR codes have become more prevalent, making it easy for brands to drive online traffic from a physical setting. Whether you’re looking to increase website traffic, boost online sales, or generate leads, QR codes can effectively engage with your customers and drive conversions. Think about the position and placement of your QR codes from in-store displays and product packaging through to print ads and outdoor advertising to maximise engagement. Consider providing incentives to scan through to special promotions or unique experiences and really transform your strategy to extend the physical customer experience.
Digital Billboards
The effectiveness of billboard advertising is undeniable, with 71% of consumers report that digital billboards are far more appealing to them than online ads (Sesto, 2018). Integrating digital tech tools like digital billboards with your brand activation campaign will not only drive impact but it will also provide an opportunity to create an immersive experience. Why not leverage the visual impact of a moving image and its attention-grabbing power to attract attention, measure performance and optimise your budgets for higher ROI at the end of the promotion.
Bounce Back Incentives
Integrating digital tech bounce back incentives are also a great way to increase conversions and drive visitation. Offer promotional codes, discounts or special products to your online audience to help them visit your physical space and vice versa. This approach will help you turn one-time customers into loyal, repeat buyers and increase their lifetime value to your brand. Data collection through incentives and re-targeting also helps you build a holistic customer profile to ensure you can maximise your future marketing efforts and unlock new revenue streams for product and services growth.
The rise of AR, VR and AI
Integrating digital tech tools such as immersive AR and VR experiences will become the norm in 2024 as customers step into the brand new world of the metaverse. Immersive experiences will go beyond trying on clothing and makeup virtually to showcasing products and brands and building virtual worlds around products. (Morgan, 2022) Think phygital experiences and no, that’s not a typo. Phygital experiences are a rising trend that blurs the line between physical and digital and are predicted to expand into new industries such as banking and insurance as well as going beyond kiosks and apps to target major purchase decisions such as cars and houses.
The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) with its lifecycle automations and data driven personalisation offer a seamless and convenient customer experience at each stage of the customer journey. From chatbot virtual assistants that provide always on customer support through to data analytics for predicting customer behaviour to boost revenue, AI is an effective digital tech strategy to consider for your next brand activation campaign.
Don’t forget the inbox
No, email marketing is not dead – it remains a powerful digital tech tool for data-based decision making in your activation strategy. With direct access to your customers, this channel can be used for gaining consumer feedback before and after events, product releases and more. According to research, email trumps paid social and display advertising by 228% in Australia, 120% higher than consumers globally (Lim, 2022). By integrating this digital tech tool into your campaign, you can leverage your database to share news and notices about upcoming events or activations, offer VIP experiences or exclusive incentives as well as drive new qualified leads and sign ups.
There are a number of ways to bring your online and offline audience together. As the digital landscape continues to evolve, so too should your brand activation strategy. By creating a multichannel strategy, you can ensure that your brand is top of mind for consumers both in the physical and digital space and throughout the customer journey.
Not sure where to start? Our team specializes in creating custom displays that bring your brand to life and maximise customer engagement. Get in touch with the DisplayWise team today and let’s create somethig amazing together!
