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Introduction
This fall, the streets of Boston came alive with the energy of music, trivia, and unforgettable experiences as Citizens teamed up with Motus Experiential for the Citizens Live on Tour 2024. Designed to celebrate live entertainment and engage the community, this dynamic activation was more than a campaign—it was a journey that gave Citizens Live a pulse of energy and excitement. With its iconic branded truck and interactive on-site activations, the tour captivated audiences at Boston’s most bustling locations, showcasing the exclusive perks available to Citizen’s debit and credit card holders. The result? Citizens solidified its role not just as a financial institution but as a champion of Boston’s vibrant cultural scene via a successful experiential marketing campaign.
The Ask
The mission for Citizens wasn’t just to spread the word about its program; it was to spark a city-wide celebration of live entertainment. Citizens Live, an exclusive program for debit and credit cardholders, offers perks like presale tickets, skip-the-line access, and unforgettable experiences at six premier Boston venues. Citizens envisioned an immersive campaign that blended music, culture, and event strategy to energize the community and reinforce its position as Boston’s most trusted partner in live entertainment.
The Plan
Motus Experiential planned a two-week experiential marketing campaign aimed at immersing Bostonians in the excitement of Citizens Live. At the heart of the strategy was the branded Citizens Live truck, equipped with a massive video screen showcasing content about the program’s benefits. Scheduled from September 16 to September 30, the truck’s route was designed to include twelve high-traffic locations across Boston, such as Dewey Square, the Seaport Summer Market, and Fenway Park.
The campaign was envisioned to offer a snapshot of the Citizens Live experience with a mix of creative and interactive elements, exemplifying the power of experiential marketing. Attendees would be drawn in by the chance to scan QR codes for daily ticket giveaways to premier Boston venues. Highlights of the planned activities included a Plinko game with prizes ranging from branded giveaways to exclusive items, as well as a mobile trivia game challenging participants’ music knowledge. To top it off, a green-screen photo booth was set to provide concert-themed backdrops and props, ensuring attendees left with fun, shareable memories.
Each activity was meticulously designed to drive audience engagement and spark excitement for Citizens Live, while also achieving key objectives. These objectives focused on driving awareness of Citizens Live and its six sponsored venues, establishing Citizens as Boston’s go-to partner for live entertainment, and standing out from other banks by showcasing a unique passion and commitment to the local music and cultural scene.
The Activation
Throughout the two weeks, the Citizens Live truck became a beacon of activity and engagement in Boston. At Dewey Square, professionals on their lunch breaks stopped to interact with the activation, while at Fenway Park, concertgoers heading to shows by Post Malone and Vampire Weekend were drawn to the truck’s vibrant design and lively atmosphere. The Seaport Summer Market proved to be another standout location, where families and young professionals explored the activation’s offerings.
On-site activities created excitement and kept engagement levels high. Visitors had the chance to drop tokens in a Plinko game, aiming for slots that offered branded giveaways and exclusive prizes. They could also scan QR codes for ticket giveaways, offering access to sold-out shows at premier Boston venues thanks to Citizens Live. Music enthusiasts boasted their knowledge and expertise with interactive trivia games that combined fun and a touch of Boston’s rich musical history. The truck’s large video screen showcased Citizens Live’s venues and benefits, reinforcing the program’s value to both existing and potential cardholders. Each location was carefully chosen to maximize visibility and attract diverse audiences, ensuring that the Citizens Live Tour reached every corner of Boston’s cultural landscape.
To enhance the energy and create a welcoming atmosphere, each activation included Citizens representatives and Motus Experiential brand ambassadors engaging with attendees at every stop. Citizens representatives seamlessly answered questions about the Citizens Live program and the exclusive benefits available to debit and credit cardholders, ensuring a personal and informative connection with attendees. The activation also included DJs and emcees at each spot, which were set to amplify the excitement, ensuring the tour would leave a lasting impression as key player in Boston’s live entertainment scene.
Results
The Citizens Live on Tour 2024 exceeded expectations, transforming everyday spaces into vibrant hubs of interaction and entertainment. Key engagement metrics included 1,425 QR scans and 3M social media shares or mentions, reflecting the tour’s broad reach and impact. Additionally, 4,000 attendees who participated in games or activities highlight the level of direct interaction achieved at each stop.
The tour not only raised awareness of the Citizens Live program but also underscored Citizen’s role as a forward-thinking brand committed to enriching the tapestry of the local entertainment scene. By providing exclusive access to sold-out shows and fostering memorable experiences, the campaign positioned Citizens as a vital part of Boston’s cultural fabric and a leader in experiential marketing.
Conclusion
The Citizens Live on Tour 2024 wasn’t just about promoting a program; it was about creating moments that mattered. Through creative experiential marketing, Motus Experiential helped Citizens bring its Citizens Live program to life in a way that resonated with Boston audiences. By blending entertainment, interaction, and community engagement, the tour reinforced Citizens reputation as a leader in live entertainment and cultural partnerships. From trivia games to ticket giveaways, the activation demonstrated the power of brand activation and event strategy in building meaningful connections. The Citizens Live on Tour stands as a testament to how experiential marketing can transform a brand’s presence into a lasting impression.
Clients always come to us wanting to make an impact and connect with consumers. Experiential marketing is our bread and butter at Motus Experiential, and we are passionate about creating truly and utterly customizable campaigns. Unlike TV, print, OOH, etc., experiential marketing allows you to take a business problem for a client and custom tailor a solution to meet a specific need with control over how a consumer will engage with it and how you will reach them. You can target a particular audience and get them in a way that will capture their attention. In addition, 98% of consumers feel more inclined to purchase after attending an activation (EventTrack).
Experiential marketing connects with consumers emotionally, which is highly effective in the long term. It stops people on street corners and allows brands and their offerings to be touched, consumed, measured, and discussed. But you shouldn’t just jump into an experiential campaign without first considering some key factors. First and foremost, ask yourself: Is your brand ready for experiential marketing?
Make Sure Your Timing is Right
Incorporating activations into your marketing schedule strategically is key. Make sure to give ideas some breathing room by allowing time for planning, production, promotion, permitting, etc. Rushing to get an activation off the ground that you don’t have time to promote via the proper channels isn’t going to reach its full attendance potential, for example. Similarly, themes for your events should align with the product/service you are promoting as well as the season. So, even though you may not want to sit on an idea that feels oh-so-good, timing really has a whole lot to do with the success of an experiential campaign.
Do you Have the Budget for It?
Thankfully, dollars go far with an experiential marketing campaign compared to TV or print. Unlike other forms of marketing, experiential marketing is more about the quality and depth of an experience than the amount of impressions you get. Take the time to plan, and partner with someone who will get it right. A marketer should also clearly grasp what their client is comfortable investing in a campaign. A big idea often goes hand-in-hand with deeper pockets. Selling in a campaign with all the bells and whistles, on-site staff, premiums, promotion, etc., is undoubtedly attractive. However, stick to a more minor, targeted activation if money is too tight for a higher-level investment. Or, you may want to wait until you have the proper budget for that big idea.
Campaign Strategy and Brand Value Align
Other factors that will lead to success include a campaign strategy that closely aligns with a brand’s current marketing strategy. A buzz-worthy experiential activation is ultimately the end goal, but if the content doesn’t align with a brand’s mission statement, you aren’t going to truly unlock the full potential of an activation.
Defining Success
Your return on investment is the most crucial piece of the puzzle, so setting a goal upfront is vital. What does success look like? How will you measure? Even the most impressive activations don’t always translate to the bottom line. So, while your audience is astounding, making a profitable investment is most important.
Finding the Right Partner
Finally, the success of an experiential campaign (or any marketing strategy) relies on a willing client and a skilled marketer. A brand (or even a marketer at that brand) with a history of successful activations will see the value in the investment. This makes things easier — i.e., creatively giving the agency more leigh way. That’s not to say that a brand shouldn’t hop on the experiential bandwagon for the first time; it must start somewhere! We’ve guided many clients down that path. But make sure the partnership feels right. A brand that doesn’t trust its partner agency’s leadership and expertise should disappear.
Bottom line? Before you invest financially and allocate the manpower to launch an experiential campaign, you must ensure you have the right plan to execute successfully. A cohesive partnership between a client brand and their agency is the first step, in addition to a clear understanding of brand strategy and budgets. The timing is also essential to ensure a genuinely impactful experiential marketing campaign. When you get it right, there’s nothing like a tangible brand experience to create a lasting, memorable impression for a consumer and a stellar ROI.
The concept behind experiential marketing for a brand is to create a close connection between brand and consumer by immersing them in an exciting and ultimately memorable experience. If a brand succeeds and executes a brand activation well, the outcome will evoke a positive emotional feeling linking consumers and brand hopefully for years to come. Experiential marketing is highly effective, more so than any other form of marketing. And consumers seem to see value in experiential marketing as well with 74% of them saying that live events and product demonstrations helped them fully understand a product better than any commercial or other methods could. Here are some well-known brands that excel when it comes to executing experiential marketing campaigns.
Nike
Nike has nearly always been a brand leader when it comes to producing engaging experiences that help grow its massive brand. In early 2018 they created ‘House of Go,’ a pop-up house that celebrated the brand’s recent launch of their new ‘Epic React’ running shoe. The experience popped up in cities like Chicago, Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Melbourne, and other cities around the world and featured a giant sponge area mimicking the shoe’s cushioning as well as a digital interactive art installation.
Nike Live, a members-only concept store that first launched in the summer of 2018 in LA marries physical presence with digital-savvy. Consumers can use their Nike retail app to check sizes, colors and product stock for the store. Customers can also pre-reserve shoes to try on through the app which they pick up in-store via lockers that can be opened with their phones. If you don’t have time to come into the store, you can make your purchase through the app and pick it up curbside. After the first Nike Live store proved successful, the brand incorporated elements of Nike Live into its Flagship NY store. The brand has plans to open a Nike Live store in Tokyo as well. Of the future of retail, Nike VP of Global Stores Cathy Sparks says, “At Nike what we talk a lot about is that retail is not dead, but boring retail is dead.”
IKEA
Any consumer who has been to an IKEA store knows that their in-store experience is a memorable one. Their ability to engage consumers of all ages visually, emotionally and tangibly is unique to the Scandinavian brand that’s been around for over 75 years. But the brand often relies on experiences outside the walls of its stores, and boy do they execute them well. Earlier this year, in order to promote the opening of IKEA’s new Greenwich store in the UK, the company created two life-sized boats modeled after the brand’s infamous Smakryp bath toy. Onlookers were able to maneuver the boats via remote control along 2 of London’s rivers to collect plastic and trash which was then upcycled into a sculpture in front of the new storefront.
JEEP
Auto brands are no stranger to experiential activations as a necessary means to show-off their vehicle’s capabilities. For the Jeep brand, ’Camp Jeep’ began as a solution to a less than exciting placement at the New York Auto Show in 2003. Today, the experience has grown into an exciting meeting place for Jeep fans at auto shows around the world and has turned up in 15 countries on five continents. Camp Jeep has brought together millions of consumers by immersing them in interactive off-road experiences that demonstrate the Jeep lineup’s four-wheel-drive capabilities. Professional drivers take passengers through an indoor adventure course that show-off a vehicle’s capability, scaling various obstacles, and even a flight of stairs. Each ride is approximately 5 minutes long.
Recently Jeep partnered with Wanderlust, a world leader in lifestyle yoga, for the world’s only “mindful” triathlon with legs of the race that included running, yoga, and meditation. Jeep created a lounge that was set up at Wanderlust triathlon events across 7 major European cities, offering surfset yoga, as well as test drives of the entire Jeep lineup of vehicles. The partnership helped to target women, one of the fastest-growing customer bases for Jeep.
Adidas
For Adidas, experiential marketing has also become a huge marketing tool for the brand over the last few years. Last year at ComplexCon, Adidas utilized a staff-less augmented reality app to drop new products that eliminated physical lines and claimed to be the “most fluid and democratic point-of-purchasing to date,” according to a company press release. To participate in the shopping experience, ComplexCon attendees installed the app to gain access to Adidas Originals’ augmented reality store and receive notifications on how to ‘unlock the drop.’ New products were released throughout the weekend via illuminated beacons placed throughout the venue and consumers accessed inventory in augmented reality by holding their device over the beacons to make purchases. Products were picked up via convenient self-service digital lockers that were unlocked by the app.
Another buzz-worthy product drop event in LA that Adidas sponsored was the 747 Warehouse St. event which was an immersive experience for sneaker enthusiasts. Using RFID bracelets, 18,000 attendees earned points by visiting every inch of the brand activation, which featured pro athletes like James Harden, Damian Lillard and JuJu Smith-Schuster. In an effort to eliminate lines, event-goers used points to enter a lottery for the opportunity to buy the latest sneakers being released. During the weekend Adidas surpassed Nike in social mentions over the two-day period.
Jetblue
JetBlue is well-known for transforming its terminal at New York’s JFK International Airport into a live experience for customers. This past summer during Pride week, the airline teamed up with hit VH1 show ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ to take over Terminal T5 at New York’s JFK airport. The brand activation featured photos from the show, a hair and makeup station, quotes from RuPaul and various visual displays. JetBlue went so far as to name their newest Airbus A320 “Shantay Blue Stay” after a famous line RuPaul is known for saying on the show.
Another memorable stunt from the brand a few years back deemed the “Icebreaker” challenge helped to promote JetBlue’s latest offering of a direct flight from NY to Palm Spring during the chillier months on the streets of NY. The brand introduced the “Icebreaker” challenge to celebrate the idea of going from a cold climate to a balmy one, and set up a gigantic block of ice dropped in Washington Square Park and Flatiron Plaza with fun vacation-themed prizes inside including flip flops, snorkel gear, even free plane tickets.
Experiential marketing has the unique ability to optimize the connections that brands establish with their consumers, something that’s become crucial as consumers call for marketing that leads to higher levels of personalization. The above brands are no stranger to the value of experiential marketing, and the successful activations described have helped to build brand awareness and interactive engagement for each brand.