Brand Activation & Engagement

Brand Activation, Brand Engagement , Brand Marketing, Experiential Marketing

What's the difference?

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Often confused for meaning the same thing, each of these serve their own purpose in supporting your organization.

Brand marketing promotes your products or services in a way that highlights your overall brand. While brand activation connects consumers with your brand by cutting through traditional marketing techniques to increase awareness and engagement. Today's consumers want more than an interaction, they want a personalization, an emotional connection, they want to align with your brand values, this is brand engagement.  To connect brand activation and brand engagement many businesses will utilize experiential marketing which focuses on creating an entire experience for consumers to engage with your product or service first hand. 

 

Building a brand activation strategy that includes brand engagement activities will result in creating an emotional response that leaves a positive impression, builds lasting relationships, and adds value. Often referred to as experiential, event, or guerilla marketing, each of these can be tactics used in brand activation however, they are not synonymous. 

 

Brand activation provides the necessary awareness and engagement your business needs whether you're starting a new business, launching a new product, expanding into new markets, or rebranding. As marketing evolves so does brand activation. Traditionally, brand activation took the form of getting your physical product into the hands of your consumer base. While still a primary focus not all brands have products. Combining brand activation with brand engagement tactics will result in opening a two-way dialogue and increasing revenue.  

 

When creating a brand activation strategy you must first understand your audience. This starts with research about your industry, your company, and gathering the Voice of The Customer for better insights. From there we build the right campaign or program that mixes in different marketing disciplines from social media to direct mail and content to conferences, to help amplify the connection.  

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Examples of Brand Activation & Engagement

• Trade show program creation and management

• Corporate events

• Customer engagement & appreciation events 

• Workshops, presentations, webinars 

• Sponsorships & strategic partnerships 

• Digital media strategy - landing pages, websites, social media, email

• Hands-on, interactive experiences

• Customer Feedback - Voice of The Customer, surveys, reviews

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