Understanding The Truly ‘Unified Brand Experience’
Manolo Almagro, Q Division Managing Partner
These days, there’s been an increasing trend in the type of projects that I’ve been working on. Some very sophisticated multi-modal campaigns focused on creating a unified brand experience across the entire digital media ecosystem have at least, doubled in number (at least for me). Interestingly enough, these upcoming marketing campaigns don’t put DOOH, or any other specific media for that matter at “center stage” They use a more balanced or should I say blended mixture of media experiences.
Sadly, I’m not a liberty to disclose any of the current projects that I’m working on right now (especially since they haven’t launched yet) but – I did read something on Gizmodo the other day, that illustrates the points I’m trying to make. (See below) The original post came from the Direct Daily blog, (photos credit goes to Marc van Wageningen) and Gizmodo explains how it works. The best part was, its a very simple idea – and its based on traditional and mobile media.
In my opinion, our industry tends to become “self-absorbed” when it comes to really understanding how other types of alternative medias can be used in a campaign. I’ve read all the white papers and seen the new software features, In the end – we still seem to treat mobile, on-line and social media as minor characters or “add-ons” to keep the almighty digital sign in the center stage.
The truly integrated marketing mix isn’t just about posting tweets to a larger screen in the public view. It’s not about reformatting downloads for playback on a mobile device, playing games on a big LED screen, posting messages from your iPhone, or pulling status from online social media networks. A unified brand experience is more akin to how humans use their 5 senses to experience eating food. It’s the concurrent combination of sights, smells, tastes and textures working together for richer, more emotional experience. The more forward thinking, innovative agencies and brands are just now taking time to consider just how people really experience the world using their digital devices.
September 29th, 2009 at 08:59 @416
Great insight Manolo – your 5 senses analogy of a unified brand experience is spot on – I expect (would like to hope) that as brands start to experiment more with the multitude of marketing channels available to them, that they consider the route to successful integration starts with ‘media blending’ as you so rightly mention.
September 29th, 2009 at 13:26 @602
I love your point on creating the unified brand experience. Engaging the 5 senses needs to be driven by creative. As with most mediums, our DOOH clients display too many ads that are repurposed from other media and do not take into consideration the various media channels nor the environment in which the ad is placed. I think that as our reach increases brands will think more strategically.
October 1st, 2009 at 18:47 @824
Nice piece Manolo. I’m amazed at the 70%+ growth rates coming out of the mobile advertising industry. I can’t wait to see the augmented reality campaigns that will start showing up this fall.