On The Outside, Always Looking In
Yes, the title of this post is from a Dear Evan Hansen lyric. Which I normally would not quote and expose my slight theater kid tendencies, but in fact it showcases a large trend happening regarding the temporary re-location of experience towards outdoor experiences. It also highlights the pitfalls approaching the Fall/Winter season when this option will get much harder to accomplish and brands will need to pivot to figure out how to engage with consumers IRL.
When COVID19 caused the postponement and cancellation of most indoor and outdoor events, it left in its wake an entire industry of exhibitions, concerts, conferences, conventions and experiences in turmoil and no clear path forward in understanding how to keep calm and carry on.
In talking with many of my friends, clients and industry contacts back in March, most of us were thinking that at a minimum, business as usual would not start back up until at least September 2020. I believe this prediction was guided by a few flawed aspirations:
6 months felt far enough away and we hoped something big would be done by then to change the course of the pandemic’s effect on us
A naive understanding of just how contagious and destructive the virus was
An assumption that our government had a well thought-out plan on how to move forward on protecting people and the economy
Finally, a misguided hope that all setbacks are temporary and all opportunities are permanent
And while we are much farther away than where we hoped we would be, over the last 7 months, a lot of creativity has been shown in the marketing and experience category and given us some wonderful examples of how we pivot and create success.
Let’s explore a few:
Weather Independent
The Virtual Concert - Both Fortnite and TikTok held large scale, platform based, virtual music events that attracted millions of eyeballs with artists such as Travis Scott & The Weeknd to keep us dancing. While some of the platform concerts have been great successes, there have also been significant challenges in many, some of which I covered this May.
The Virtual Conference has been a bit more of a mixed bag. Comic-Con At Home did little to generate any real buzz or headlines, where in normal times Comic-Con would be a content and press engine. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Apple’s first all virtual WWDC event drew in 22 million people. This is an area that is still being figured out and upcoming events like CES or SXSW’21 will be interesting to watch.
The Video Game as creative driver - Whether it was AOC playing Among Us on Twitch or Travis Scott performing live in Fortnight, there is no doubt that video game culture and technology is pushing us fast forward into the future and key marketers are taking note. Check out COMPLEXLAND, a video game inspired festival coming in early December that mashes up character based navigation in a virtual world set up for shopping, music and a theater sponsored by Showtime.
Weather Dependent
The Real Concert - Socially Distant and Streamed live concerts also have been an easy go-to for brands trying to capture attention. These also have been executed with mixed success. Megan Thee Stallion @ Red Rocks for Visible was well done and utilized the viewing audience as part of her stage design while Chainsmokers in the Hamptons as a socially distant charity event ended up a bit of a disaster as a privileged audience did not party within the rules.
The Return of the Drive-In - The film industry soured on the drive-in modality years ago, but good ideas don’t die, they just evolve. The Drive-In concept became a marketing mainstay this summer as brands and producers found that people felt safer going to places in their cars than on foot. From AT&T and The Tribeca Film Festival to Netflix creating drive-up sets from Stranger Things or Tesla’s Battery Day event, this trend seems to only be growing.
The inevitable yet slow return to actual IRL experiential is coming. Whether it is The Museum of Ice Cream, The Color Factory or the Accidentally Wes Anderson pop-up that just opened in NYC, people are starting to go back to their favorite cultural and instagram powered experiences. They just look a bit different now. Here is a quick checklist on basic COVID19 compliance for events.
These are just a few of ways in which brands have addressed experiential challenges in a time as unique as the last 7 months. My primary concerns are how we adapt to a continued surge of COVID-19 cases and how the weather in half of the country limits our opportunities for outdoor experiences at a time when the industry sorely needs them.
Personally, I am less interested in going back to normal than I am in creating the new normal. COVID-19 has given us an opportunity to rethink our businesses, user experiences and marketing approaches that will yield dividends down the road, even if they are a but harder to see in front of us today. But more on that to come…
Selected shorts:
Take This Lollipop: A social-enabled web experience, perfect for Halloween. TakeThisLollipop.com
Walmart Going Zero Emissions: This is a big one. Corporations stepping in where government has not to help the planet. Walmart wants to go full zero emissions by 2040, without the use of offsets. Read about it at Adweek
Planet Word: The latest interactive museum entry, this one focusing on the power and beauty of language. A stunning set of creativity, interactive elements and physical/digital UX from Local Projects. Read about it here