{"id":3298,"date":"2018-12-11T08:53:31","date_gmt":"2018-12-11T11:53:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.alicewonders.ws\/blog\/2018\/12\/11\/brand-activation-everything-you-need-to-know\/"},"modified":"2026-10-19T11:22:58","modified_gmt":"2026-10-19T14:22:58","slug":"brand-activation-everything-you-need-to-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alicewonders.ws\/blog\/en\/2018\/12\/11\/brand-activation-everything-you-need-to-know\/","title":{"rendered":"Brand Activation: Everything You Need to Know to Innovate"},"content":{"rendered":"

Are you familiar with the concept of brand activation? Companies are constantly trying to make a good impression on their audience. Sometimes, the idea is simply to show up for these people, linking brands to unique moments that create incredible experiences. That way, through positive association, companies grow in the consumer’s mind.<\/span><\/p>\n

Interactions are always a great way to capture attention. And at many points, whether a brand is entering the market or looking for engagement, this exchange with the audience is essential. That’s why activation is a strategy that has been used for so long, especially by the biggest brands across the most diverse industries.<\/span><\/p>\n

Emotional connections, extraordinary experiences and the ability to create positive memories through a single campaign. Brand activation is all that and much more. So keep reading this post to learn more about the topic!<\/span><\/p>\n

What is brand activation?<\/span><\/h2>\n

Brand activation is a marketing strategy that aims to deliver unique, often interactive, experiences with the intention of engaging the consumer. These campaigns are one-off and usually take place in person, such as at events, parties, supermarkets and other occasions.<\/span><\/p>\n

A good brand activation will create a positive perception in the consumer. For it to be effective, brands need to identify their audience’s profile and how to be effective within their persona’s world. That way, companies create the ideal experiences, at the right moment and with the most on-target triggers.<\/span><\/p>\n

The concept of brand activation itself isn’t hard to understand. It’s putting it into practice that becomes a challenge for companies, especially when they’re new to the industry.<\/span><\/p>\n

Putting a new business in touch with its potential consumers requires a lot of <\/span>market intelligence<\/span><\/a> and a series of focused efforts. However, doing this can be particularly tricky for recently created brands.<\/span><\/p>\n

That’s because activation itself is a process that begins when users are able to recognize the value a business offers and find a role in their lives for the products it creates. In other words, it’s a process of creating experiences that ensures that, from a particular interaction onward, our relationship with a company becomes more than mere awareness of its existence.<\/span><\/p>\n

A customer who goes through a successful brand activation builds impressions, memories and emotions tied to that day and carries them for a lifetime. These impressions guide their purchase decisions when they’re standing in front of the shelves and are also a great starting point for building loyalty.<\/span><\/p>\n

That’s why we say brand activation is, essentially, the task of generating value \u2014 and you, as an entrepreneur, know this isn’t the easiest task in the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

One of the strategies that helps us most on this journey is understanding the <\/span>shopping experience<\/span><\/a> and building experiential marketing capable of setting it apart. That’s why, among the marketing disciplines, there’s one specialized in brand activation, bringing together distinctive concepts and activities that help us succeed in generating the value mentioned above.<\/span><\/p>\n

Activation marketing<\/span><\/h3>\n

As the name suggests, this is the branch of marketing dedicated to activation. It revolves around executing the marketing mix in a way that generates the best possible results for the business.<\/span><\/p>\n

Activation marketing is the creation of exclusive experiences and interactions. These campaigns can make it clear to potential consumers what the benefits are of choosing or switching to a brand. And in some cases, show them exactly what they’re missing out on by not doing so.<\/span><\/p>\n

Efficient activation marketing will allow your business to earn more and reach its strategic goals, because it’s tied to achieving returns. However, since the stakes are high when it comes to activation marketing, it’s to be expected that the discipline comes with its share of challenges to overcome.<\/span><\/p>\n

One of them is how our market constantly changes and evolves, requiring brands to be ready to respond and to reframe the experiences and values they make evident to their consumers.<\/span><\/p>\n

Today, resources such as data-driven marketing have made brand activation less complex. Companies are now basing their actions and initiatives on the data they have access to.<\/span><\/p>\n

This also makes it possible to <\/span>measure the results of these efforts more accurately<\/span><\/a>. So data-driven marketing has contributed to successful activations because it lets us understand exactly what we’re doing throughout the process.<\/span><\/p>\n

Understanding what activation marketing is, however, also means understanding what it isn’t: traditional communication initiatives and providing good customer service. That’s because this field highlights the experiences a brand can offer its market.<\/span><\/p>\n

The role of innovation in brand activation<\/span><\/h2>\n

Delighting the consumer<\/span><\/a> is one of the fundamental principles of activation marketing, and this trait alone is enough to set it apart from other techniques your team uses. Today, we have a range of resources available that make the task of delighting customers less complex for companies.<\/span><\/p>\n

Using tools such as augmented reality and holograms, for example, are smart ways to catch the consumer’s attention and bring them into your brand’s world, even if only for a few moments.<\/span><\/p>\n

The highlight here is the initial wow factor delivered by technologies like these. In other words, the way brands can use certain tools to pull consumers out of their routine and spark their interaction with a particular business.<\/span><\/p>\n

There are countless examples of how innovation can be used in brand activation and, to make this point clearer, we’ll show you some success stories from around the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lipton Iced Tea<\/span><\/h3>\n

Lipton was one of the first brands to <\/span>innovate in activation<\/span><\/a> marketing, and that’s why it deserves a spot here.<\/span><\/p>\n

With a slide more than 100 meters long installed in the city of London, the brand invited passersby to try a different way of getting to work and to their leisure activities. The inflatable, installed during the summer, encouraged people to pause their routines and have a little fun \u2014 and it was a hit!<\/span><\/p>\n