Experience Manifesto

It’s the Little Things

It's 2020 and we're in the middle of a pandemic where people can't go out to eat in restaurants as we usually do. Thankfully, take out and delivery is booming!

So why do so many restaurants still not have their actual menu online??? Sometimes I can find the menu in pictures taken by guests and posted on Yelp or Trip Advisor, but the restaurant itself doesn’t have their menu available. This seems like such a simple thing to do to keep themselves going in these very challenging times. If I can't get this simple, basic information, how can you expect me to buy from you?

It’s always surprising to me how sometimes businesses miss the very simple easy things that they can do to make the sale. If you’re reading this and you own a restaurant, please make sure your menu is available!

Welcome Veda Labs!

We are excited to welcome Veda Labs as a member to the Brand Experience Lab! VedaLabs is an India based company who uses an AI platform that helps retailers gather real time insights. From their website:

Veda labs as an AI platform that offers deep insights powered by computer vision and machine learning. These insights allow a business owner to extract deep insights from any form of video data in real time.

VedaVision™ allows retailers the following:

• Real Time Reporting. A single dashboard that allows you to have a real time data on how your stores are performing based on the consumer insights.
• Actionable Insights. Move more inventory, make store design decisions, improve customer experience and product placement with consumer insights.
• Organizational Control. Having the hierarchy in control, as admin you get the right to allow who sees what in your organizational dashboard.

We're already working together on on a test of their Covid Safety Kit, a solution for retailers that allows you to monitor key parameters like social distancing, mask detection, fever screening, space occupancy & sanitization alerts in real time to keep your space safe.

We're working on their travel plans, but anticipate that they will be here by the end of the month. Please reach out to Jim Ackerman for additional information and to schedule a time to see what they're creating. I'm sure you'll be as excited as we are!

Do You Have a Bank for Times Like This

I know it’s hard to believe, especially for some of the youngsters who might be reading this, but there was a time when air travel was so much nicer than it is today. And no, I’m not talking about back in the 40’s! If you were waiting for a flight to depart and there was a problem, the airline might move you to a competing company to make sure you got to your destination. They might even do that if it was your fault, like getting to the airport late and missing your flight. Not that I have any firsthand knowledge of such a thing, I’ve just heard stories. You might have to pay the difference in airfare, but I don’t remember change fees and all the hoops we have to jump through today to change a flight. Back then, helping you get to your destination was more important and created better loyalty than the immediate loss of revenue.

Then, deregulation hit and yes, prices dropped and more people could fly. I’m not sure that made the experience better, but it did open travel up to a wider audience. But, that deregulation also came at a price, and not just monetarily. Where previously, almost all airlines realized that they needed to compete and cooperate, now they just competed. And with fares dropping, they started to add additional fees to everything they did. The said it was better for us, they really started to make a lot more money on all of these charges. In 2018 alone, airlines made a collective $5 billion in baggage fees alone. From a piece in the news today in the Washington Post:

Consumer groups have long pushed for airlines to do away with change fees, arguing they can be unreasonable, sometimes costing almost half the price of the original ticket. But airlines have steadfastly resisted because such fees have become a lucrative revenue stream. According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, U.S. carriers made $2.8 billion from reservation change fees in 2019, roughly 1.4 percent of their total operating revenue. Airlines made even more on baggage fees, roughly $5.8 billion, about 2.9 percent of their total operating revenue.

Change fees have become particularly onerous these days. I’ve sometimes had to pay more than the cost of the ticket to make a change. I think United had a change fee of $200, it was absolutely crazy.

So now that the airline industry has been hit hard by Covid, they’re starting to make some changes. Effectively immediately, United will drop change fees on all of its domestic flights.

“Change is inevitable these days — but it’s how we respond to it that matters most,” United chief executive Scott Kirby said. “When we hear from customers about where we can improve, getting rid of fees is often the top request. “Following previous tough times, airlines made difficult decisions to survive, sometimes at the expense of customer service (Emphasis mine),” Kirby said. “United Airlines won’t be following that same playbook as we come out of this crisis. Instead, we’re taking a completely different approach — and looking at new ways to serve our customers better.”

The truth is, businesses have long been screwing over customers in their rush to generate more revenue. While all airlines have had their issues, United had some doozy’s! How many of you remember United Breaks Guitars? This was a pretty big deal back in 2009 and frankly, it didn’t seem to really change much. They had a very clear philosophy - “We don’t really care if you fly with us or not.” BTW, the video below has a solid 20,000,000 views today.

And no matter how many times airlines ran commercials about how important you, the customer, were to them, but at the end of the day, we knew the didn’t really care. As long as they got money from us, they would tolerate our public griping. There were certainly times that people got individual help (over the years, I certainly did), for the most part, they never acted liked they cared one way to the other.

Now they need us. They asked for billions in taxpayer support money, which they got, but travel hasn’t picked up at all. Now it’s important to put customers first. I appreciate that they’re doing this, but after years of putting money first, they’re maybe realizing that with our customers, they don’t actually have a business.

There are examples of companies that have put customers first, but they’re really few and far between. Those companies have built bank with their customers so when something does go wrong, they have something to withdraw from that bank. far too many companies don’t have enough money in their customer accounts for times like this. They have been drawing down on accounts without putting anything back for far too long.

How is your customer balance sheet? Have you been taking with out giving? Would your customers agree with your assessment? You can’t just show up in the bad times and ask for help.

Media, Marketing, and Gen Z - It's All About the Experience

Don't forget to join us this Thursday for a fun talk about media, marketing and #GenZ. Sydney Polinchock & I will be talking about:

• The relationship between Gen Z and technology. What media are they consuming? How is this influencing the way they spend your time and money?
• What is the biggest challenge in marketing to Gen Z right now? What are marketers getting wrong?
• Who is getting it right? What marketing campaigns are resonating right now?
• What trends are you most excited about moving forward? * What trends are you not excited about?

Hit the link here for additional information and registration. Looking forward to a fun and informative conversation!

One Season Attention Disorder

I've noticed something lately as it relates to my content viewing habits. I watch a lot of shows for one season, but rarely have I watched beyond that. Even shows I really like, it just seems to be very hard to keep going into multiple seasons. I have one season attention disorder!

Now, clearly, part of the problem is me and my normal ADHD, but I also think the way content works today is part of the problem. One I was growing up, there were two TV seasons, the fall and the spring. You knew that shows generally started in September and ending maybe around May. It some ways, it was a much easier time to plan and watch TV. I mean, there were really only 6 or so channels, so there were a lot less options available. I think about how much time I scroll through Netflix/Amazon/Prime/Disney+/Hulu looking for something that catches my eye. I think of the number of times where I've watched an episode (or less!) of something, before bagging on it as it wasn't keeping my interest.

Plus, I have to spend so much time trying to figure out where the shows are that I want to watch, when there are so many options available. I wrote about that challenge here. There are days that it's been easier to not watching anything than to try and find something I want to watch.

I know that all of this content and all of the many ways we can now watch that content was supposed to be good for consumers, but sometimes I do miss the days of knowing which days I watch which shows. It was much easier on us!

Creating the Right Experience Post Covid19

 

A few days ago, I posted What will Retailers Do Post #Covid19? and started the conversation about what we need to do as an industry to recover when the coronavirus threat is over. It reminded me of a previous piece I wrote almost 20 years ago.

Back in 2001, I was on deadline to turn in an article that would be of interest to the theme park industry the week of 9-11. Needless to say, that deadline passed and it was another few weeks before I was able to write again. The challenge was that I couldn't figure out what was important about our industry in a world upside down post 9-11. Like today, we were asking the same questions:

In the weeks after the attacks, I spoke to many colleagues in the entertainment marketing field who all asked the same question: How do we go back to our business in the face of such a tragedy? What we do seems so trivial in the face of such tragedy…so unimportant. I, too, asked the same questions and wondered how I would get back to "business as usual" after these events.

Thanks to encouragement from industry friends and a great editor, Pat Esgate, I wrote a piece entitled The Great Good Places, where I talked about the important need to create fun. I wrote then:

As I thought more about it, the need for fun is a global experience. We may have fun in different ways, but we all like to have fun. Fun is one of the greatest tools we have to create a world of understanding and -- potentially -- peace. Hate can’t thrive in an atmosphere of fun.

Let’s ask how can we create experiences that bring people together to share a common, joyous activity. What we need today is more ways for people to come together and share joy—and that’s what we do. So celebrate the joy that you create.

Now that we're all forced to do most, if not all of our shopping online, what will stores do to change that behavior once this is over? While big sales may help in the short term, that's not a long term plan. Retailers and brands not planning right now for what happens when this is all over, will be far behind the curve and may not be able to catch up.

Are you thinking through the design changes that will be needed to recreate your shopping experience? Will you be merchandising the same way you've already done it?  Jim Ackerman, CEO of Unified was pretty clear on what we need - 

“Consumers after a quarantine and lockdown are going to be looking for one particular experience----FUN. It will be important for brands and retailers to make shopping fun again. Ask any Gen Zer what they will be looking for after being cooped up for weeks—it isn’t even close.”

We’ve already seen one change within the grocery industry this week. Retailers around the globe, including Stop & Shop here in the US and Woolworth’s in Australia are opening up early to give the elderly a chance to shop before the general crowds come in. In addition to protecting them since they are more susceptible to serious issues, it also means they won’t be in as crowded and stressful an environment. Wonder if that will continue when this is all over.

Additionally, Morrisons grocery stores has announced food boxes, including a selection of everyday items based on current availability, including food and essential household goods. These boxes have been designed for the audience that now can't go to the store, but that has difficulty in making online ordering work.

Companies like Two Bit Circus (pictured above) and Meow Wolf have received a great deal of press over the last few years for creating a better experience than other companies in their respective spaces have in the past. ARTECHOUSE (pictured below) has been creating unique pop-up experiences for the last year. And Showfields, which bills itself as the "most interesting store in the world,"has created a theatrical experience around retail, with actors portraying different members of the Showfields team.

I've been speaking with Jim Wiemer, head of Design for both Unified and the Brand Experience Lab, about his 25+ years of design experience and his thoughts on what retailers and brands should be doing next. He outlined some of his key ideas for me:

Connect in-home, on-line shopping with re-tooled retail experiences

Retailers will need to build on consumer’s on-line habits when they return to brick and mortar stores. We've been talking to brands, retailers, consumers and students from some of our college partners and many of them have told us that they will be looking for experiences that build on their current on-line shopping, browsing and dreaming. Retailers have a chance of delivering relevant content, products in a way that adds clarity, curated by what was “trending”, “top sellers” and offer original experiences not found on-line.

 Enhance desired lifestyle or activity

Items that complement featured products or enhance the desired activity/lifestyle will instantly connect with the consumer who has been waiting to move forward with life and the activities that they enjoy. Let’s remember a large population has been closed in for weeks, some months on end, and need an outlet to feel real again. Retail experiences, designed right, can be that outlet for them to reconnect and build relationships with retailers, their products, and the newly created purchase path. Many GenZ consumers have spent considerable funds on cell phone technology. How can that technology be used in an engaging way for them to make purchase decisions? How can they be entertained and build memories as they reconnect through physical interaction with products at retail?

Mitch Edelman, President of Unified and Principal in Brand Experience Lab, a third generation in-store marketing expert, also had some thoughts on what retailers could do next:

Re-format the display 

• Using the right material palette for display theme and proper configurations that allow for best practices like organization, segmentation and focal points that deliver engaging presentations that will connect with consumers.
• Removing clutter and focusing on featured, trending products with a connection to relevant information in video format, which will enhance and connect their experience when at home in their fuzzy slippers.

In fact, looking through the vastness that is the internet, I came across a piece from 1999 and honestly, much of the advice Mitch and his fellow experts gave in that article back then, stands true today!

Get floor space. That’s the name of the game. If you build it or show it, they will buy. It’s not an easy task. In the case of floor and counter displays, marketers for the most part pay for the display space.

Make it dramatic. The display or program must be dynamic in every element. The offer must be clear and succinct. The "shelf impact" must be arresting.

Marry product and display. The display only has three tenths of a second to do its job so product packaging and display must be inter-twined.

Seek non-traditional channels. Marketers generally focus their P-O-P guns on high volume channels like department stores, supermarkets, discount stores and category-busters, e.g., Home Depot. But the smaller, less visible specialty stores and boutiques such as salons, home craft stores, liquor stores and independent bookstores can be equally important P-O-P environments.

Be a trend watcher. Before designing the program, analyze the market and the customer. Keep an ear to the ground. Look for what turns them on.

The truth is that many of the things that have been true before are true today, but even more so. The coronavirus crisis will end, as these things always do, and retailers need to be ready to respond to consumer needs when it does.

If you're waiting until this all passes to begin planning what you're going to do and how you can get your consumers back into your store, you're going to be that much further behind.

What will Retailers Do Post #Covid19?

With #Covid19 closing everything around us, we're all either in a lock down or panic mode. In the NY metro area, everything has been closed. My daughter is home from college for the rest of the semester and everyone is trying to figure out how long this will last. Lauren Thomas, writing about the industry at CNBC, had an article indicating that retail closures could top 15,000 this year. On top of everything that's happened in previous years, I'm sure this was not the year retailers wanted.

Here at the Lab, we've been talking about the importance of creating authentic, relevant and compelling brand experiences for quite some time. What will physical stores need to do post #COVID19 to bring shoppers back in? We're currently dealing with the global shutdown these days, with almost every country having some sort of shutdown in place. We're looking at the possibilities with members of our team and will talk about them in part two of this piece.

There was some looming good news for retailers. Most studies point to the fact that Gen Z loves to shop in store. According to a study by A.T. Kearny last fall, 81% if Gen Z like to buy in-store and 73% of Gen Z like to discover new products in store.

But, their newfound desire to come into stores creates challenges for many traditional retailers. They are brand promiscuous, shopping for good deals and good service. As my daughter wrote a few years back, they are also looking for experiences, both in terms of what they’re buying and how they’re buying. She concluded:

Gen Z has the world at their fingertips and won't hesitate to change shopping patterns if a brand does not support their interests. With a few Google searches, we can find out whether or not a brand uses child labor, their pollution levels, and anything else we might be interested in. Brands need to consider their brand morality and the unique experiences they offer if they want to keep us as consumers. How can their products create experiences that transform me and the world around me? Yes, Adidas is still selling me a shoe, but the experience they created around that shoe gives me a reason to buy them over other sneaker brands, even if they cost more.

Echoing her thoughts, a study by ubimo, they stated:

Gen Z still shops online, but they’re being increasingly driven to physical storefronts by their desire for personalization in shopping, preference for experiencing products, and an expectation that brands engage with them in a meaningful, authentic way. They also want to know what they’re buying before they shell out — just shy of two thirds of Gen Zers want to touch, feel, and experience products before making a purchase.

But #Covid19 is putting a huge hold on all of this optimism. As I write this, the market is down almost 2,000 points (it was down 2,700 at one point) and the CDC here in the States is recommending no crowds bigger than 50 people for at least the next two months. The vast majority of people are now working from home - my commute has been almost empty the last few days. Grocery stores have been cleaned out. Curfews have closed restaurants all around me and, if they're still open, they are for take out only. Hourly workers are not spending money as they're afraid they won't have an income for the next few weeks. That is likely to trigger a recession, even a brief one, which will further slow spending.

Check out part 2 to see what we and others are thinking we need to do when this is all over!

Euroshop 2020

We'll be at Euroshop next week, looking for new companies to join us at the Lab. If you'll be there as well, let us know, we'd love to meet! You can reach out to Jim Ackerman or Mitch Edelman to schedule a time to meet. We'll be at the show all day Monday - Wednesday and available after hours as well. Looking forward to meeting in Dusseldorf!

You can click here to learn more about what we offer to members, including:

• Shared Space working with BEL design team
• Access to tech member network spaces while in NY
• Client support for hosted meetings
• Desks & office furniture
• Conference room facilities
• Use of the shared space to host up to 4 events per year
• Demonstration area to present products and technology
• Kitchen for your staff and guests
• Wi-fi connectivity throughout premises

Our space is just across the river from NYC, a short PATH train ride away in Jersey City. With 14,000 sf (and another 14,000 available if needed!), we have plenty of room to grow; set up your technology for live demos, meetings, seminars and getting work done in a living, breathing, future factory. It allows for you to go from concept to a real-world testing environment and get instantaneous data and feedback. This also allows our members from outside of the United States to have a US office location. We even provide staffing to present your products when you are away.

Parallel Reality at CES

Over two years ago, Paul Dietz, an old friend who used to run the Mitsubishi Electronics Research Lab, reached out about a new company who was developing with some technology that he said would blow me away. He showed me some videos and they were pretty damn cool, I had to admit, but I'm not sure I knew what they were showing me.

So Jim Ackerman and I went to visit their space in Redmond and we were just blown away. Parallel Reality was one of those technologies that was really just magic to me. This technology innovation allows a hundred or more viewers to simultaneously share a digital display, sign, or light and each see something different. From their website:

PARALLEL REALITY™ Displays are enabled by
a new pixel that has unprecedented capabilities.

These pixels can simultaneously project up to millions of light rays of different colors and brightness. Each ray can then be software-directed to a specific person.

CONVENTIONAL PIXEL               PARALLEL REALITY™ PIXEL

Outputs only a single color        Can simultaneously output up to millions
at any moment.                        of controllable rays of different colors and brightness.

 

I was really excited to see them at CES this year, showing off their tech with Delta Airlines. I took one of my tour groups there and we scheduled a time to see them. Wasn't sure they were looking forward to coming back but once they had a chance to see it, they were blown away too. In fact, a great deal of the CES press called this either the best tech or one of the best techs of the show.

The possibilities for this technology are endless. With Parallel Reality, we can create personalized experiences at retail (Jim & I saw a demo of this already) and better connect with the shoppers in a store. Or while at a sporting event in a stadium, we can all see tailored content on the Jumbotrons. Later this year, they'll be testing the tech at the Detroit airport, delivering personalized boarding information to travelers. The possibilities are endless.

Check out the video I took below and reach out to find out more about what they're doing. We hope to be able to showcase them at the Lab in the future!

TikTok and Music Discovery

Unlike most folks my age (60), I'm actually on TikTok quite a lot these days. Started as research for a client and frankly, was pretty addicting for me. In fact, I recognized Charli D'Amelio before I recognized Boomer Esiason in the Sabra hummus Super Bowl ad. She has about 1.7 billion view of TikTok, far more than most brand views I've tracked on the site.

Yes, there are a lot of things that are just silly and yes, most of what's happening on TikTok isn't fundamentally different than what's come before it. Frankly, many of the things I watch on TikTok are sort of things we did when I was in high school, we didn't record it. To be fair, according to my daughter, we just barely had electricity when I was in high school.

But one thing I've really liked is the amount of new music I've discovered on TikTok. Not surprising, given where it started, But they've made it very easy to find the songs used in the various videos and that's made it very easy to find new artists. For example, even though Roisin Murphy has been around for a good number of years, I had not heard of her until her song Ramalama (Bang Bang) became part of a dance challenge on TikTok. Once I created a Ramalama station on Pandora, that led me to a variety of artists that I had not heard of before.

I know that TikTok has issues related to privacy, but the teens who spend an average of 52 minutes/day on the site don't seem to be worried. And honestly, what SM site these days doesn't have a privacy issue? I have seen some inappropriate material and a few fake news pieces, but I'm still on the surface even though I watch a lot. And I've only posted twice, both times about dogs we have that are looking for their forever homes.

According to a recent article in Forbes, TikTok was downloaded 123 million times in the US, about a third of our population. And we're far behind both India and China in total number of users. The average time spent per day is just under an hour, and most videos are under a minute. They've had some controversies around the monetization of the music on the site and they will need to address that as they continue to grow.

You don't need an account to watch videos on TikTok, so if you haven't checked it out, you should. I've posted some of the music I've discovered though TikTok below in case you need some new artists to follow. I might start posting more, so say hi to Old Fart if you actually have an account.