Experiential. Volume 2?

Prompted by a conversation with Andrew Southcott, I thought I’d kill further time by sharing some locked down musings, as I take a break from… daydreaming, digging, dog walking, and everything else I’ve been doing for the last nine months, I guess?

2020 has, as everyone knows, been a bad year. For those lost to Covid, and their loved ones, it’s been a lot worse than that, but for those of us still here, there remains a future, even if that future feels a way off, and very different.

What will remain of the ‘normal’ we knew? Will there ever be a roadmap to the return of ‘events’? Will our audiences rush back to our now dusty venues? Or will a slow vaccine uptake leave them vacant?

This week has seen the launch of (the hugely laudable) #wecreateexperiences campaign, led by One Industry, One Voice.

But are we one industry? Do we speak with one voice? Is that the voice our crowds want – need – to hear? And above all, do we, can we, will we ‘create experiences’?

Since March 23rd, Zoom, Teams, Discord, Skype, Hangouts, Intrado, Twitch, FaceBook and any number of other platforms, have been our desk, our office, our boardroom, our conference hall, our dancefloor, and our marketplace.

Through all of them, we’ve continued to tell the stories that our clients want told, because what matters is, was and always will be The Story. We may not have earned the same revenues, and returning the same ROI has been more of a challenge, but as an industry, we’ve not been silent. Far from it.

I don’t know the precise numbers, but at a guess, I’d say there have been thousands of ‘events’ delivered during these last 9 months. Certainly, there have been enough to warrant another season of awards, and absolutely clients have continued to stretch our capabilities, as they’ve needed to keep their messaging moving, while the economy ground to a halt.

Put bluntly, virtually everyone has gone virtual. They’ve had to, whether or not the expertise they claim to have exists. I know I have. Even now that events are ‘allowed’ again, continued social distancing measures and capacity restrictions mean it’s still far from viable to create a profitable event of any scale, or a shared, real life experience of any tangible value, so yes, ‘We do digital’.

Yes, we’re creating ‘experiences’ – it’s What We Do – but if we’re honest, it’s been a struggle to engage audiences like we used to.

It isn’t just us that’s spent 9 months, staring at screens like a bored teenager. Our audiences have too, and they’re getting tired. ‘Screen fatigue’ is real. Platforms have limits. WFH is fine, until you want just to be at home. Current creativity has a 16:9 ratio, and only 2 dimensions. Digital isn’t enough. People are desperate for more from ‘life’, craving social interaction over distance, because a digital ‘experience’ will never be the same as an experiential ‘event’. It can’t be, not fully.

But that gives me hope.

People will always look for experiences. They love stories. They particularly love stories that create memories, and our clients love stories that change behaviour. And we are the Storytellers.

There’s a vaccine coming. There are venues around the world that are already back to 100% capacity, and countries that haven’t had a Covid case for over a month. The Guardian has a piece recommending the ‘20 best Christmas lights trails’. A summer of forced VR, AR and XR has pushed the boundaries of what toys the Techies can come up with, that future ‘integrated events’ can and will offer so much more than a QR code and an @ sign.

There is hope, but fears remain.

We can’t expect audiences to rush back to save our industry. People are worried about taking the new vaccines (IMO irrationally, but that’s another story). Work/life balance has tipped, and they’re used to being at least nearer home, rather than schlepping into town. And almost everyone has less money to throw around that they had a year ago.

We can’t expect clients to help, either. Perfectly reasonably, they continue to want, need and probably deserve more bang for less buck. As they ever have done, they’ll come to us to tell their stories. We will still need to sell our crazy ideas, but it’s not their problem that the crowds aren’t as ready to listen, to spend, to engage.

It’s ours, and I see two routes to solving it.

The first, through truly hybrid events. In the past, most integrated events were live, with a digital gloss. I think there’s a future for digital events, with a live gloss. That’s not a new idea, of course, but I think we’ll do well to keep pushing digital boundaries, and keep looking for ways to go further still with ‘added live’. Telethons have been around for a while now, but remain ostensibly digital (TV) events: And yet, millions engage IRL, actively taking part, sharing an experience on domestic, local and national levels. What’s the 2021 ‘brand’ version? How can we as storytellers develop hooks sharp enough to inspire engagement, rather than rods with which to fish for it? 

The second is of a return to cunning stunts.

It’s likely to be many months until live event audiences are ‘back’, but that doesn't mean they’re not out there. Up to now, we’ve hosted our events in bars, halls, venues and fields of dreams. We’ve ‘built it’; they’ve ‘come’. There is, I believe, a way for us to take the mountain to our Mohammeds, Marks, Marys and Malachis, creating experiences where they are, rather than getting them to come to where we are. In stations. In town squares. At supermarkets and carparks. As the economy starts to pick up, so will commuting, travel, retail. As Wayne Gretsky said: ‘Go to where the puck will be’. Tell surprising stories. Create the unexpected. Deliver extraordinary.

If I was giving out the awards this year? VW in Shenzhen. Digital, enhanced by live. Surprising. Unexpected. Extraordinary.

A bit like 2020, really.