FEBRUARY | COVER FEATURE
experiences that will engage, inspire and
motivate increasingly informed, digitally-enabled
audiences. It’s a perspective that is at the heart of
his new venture.
“We believe that a more human-centric
design approach is required to create more
personalised experiences based on in-depth
audience insights, defined by culture, and crafted
with a more interdisciplinary and intersectional
design perspective. We want to work with
creative agencies and their clients to empower
breakthrough experience marketing innovation
and brand transformation by applying a new
strategic approach to experience design.
“After years of working in large, international
agencies it became frustratingly clear that large,
established organisations are fundamentally
resistant to change. A focus on short term
financials forces these businesses to stay focused
on doing what they’ve always done – just more
efficiently. Any attempts at innovation are viewed
as disloyal, risky and expensive and so don’t
survive. It dawned on us that rather than give up
on our passion for brand marketing innovation
in response to our rapidly changing world we
would take the advice of Mahatma Gandhi who
famously said, ‘You must be the change you want
to see in the world.’”
The festival industry has often been at the
forefront of this change, feeding back into the
experiential world. ArcTangent’s founder Goc O'
Callaghan has researched engagement:
“People now expect the experience economy as
standard and in the most parts, events are now
delivering this. But what if events were being
designed in such a way that you simply can’t help
but participate and, in doing so, you are creating
memories designed by the event producers which
they can trigger later to further facilitate that
feeling of FOMO encouraging you to return again
and again for another dose of those memory
creating experiences?”
She points to the concept of FOMO – the fear
of missing out – a modern day phenomenon
fuelled by social media that is now being
designed into events and experiences so that
if you were not there, you wish you were. “By
designing events to create that feeling of missing
out (if you were unable to attend), the events
world is taking advantage of this social anxiety
and using it as a marketing tool,” she says.
In order to achieve this, the visitor must,
according to Callaghan, have a 'transformation
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through participation'. “The more that individual
is prepared to put in, the more they experience
and the greater the transformation, the overall
experience better and the memories stronger.
In a world of increasing competition and the
expectation of consumers, some services today
are starting to look like commodities: event
concept designers are building on these new
commoditised services to offer transformation
and experience markets.
“Experiences are being pushed further still
into immersive environments. Event concept
designers now need to take this one step further
to stand out from the crowd. Experiences need to
meet the customer demands; they have to work
and be deliverable.
“A well-designed experience will encourage
participation in a number of different ways,
allowing the consumer to immerse themselves
in an experience in a way they feel safe, and
therefore enjoying it without pushing their own
boundaries beyond a comfortable level; unless of
course, that is their aim.
“Those memories which you're creating at
events and are embellishing through your
memory recall and storytelling processes have
been curated by the event concept designers, to
not only facilitate a good time but to encourage
you to come back.”
Interactivity is the key to unlocking
engagement, says Zara Kerwood, creative
technologist at George P. Johnson (GPJ)
Experience Marketing. She started her career
at Outlook Festival before moving to a digitally
focused role at Eskimo where she worked with
brands such as Mastercard and the BBC. As
creative technologist at GPJ, Kerwood champions
The Art of Storytelling
Strong & Co founder Debs
Armstrong on telling tales
At the risk of giving away all my
secrets…and only because Tom Hall
asked me nicely, here are the things I
consider when constructing an event
narrative from scratch. [Ed’s note: I
did ask politely]
1. Know your audience. What
resonates? What is meaningful?
What mood are they in? What
time of day is it?
2. Consider how the narrative
will draw them in. You
can seek inspiration from
Classic narrative structures.
Archetypes: Use of the familiar
(Secret Cinema for example, use
films people love). Use of detail.
3. Spark their curiosity.
Reveal. Surprise. Explore.
4. Allow them to lose
themselves within the
story…How can you help
them to
Relax into the moment?
Drop their guard? Shift persona
entirely (eg via costumes).
5. Don’t break the spell.
Once you’ve got them in
the moment:
The structure should be invisible.
The set-construction should
be seamless. The organisation
should be impeccable.