Anyone seeing the summer blockbusters at the movie theatres in the UK this year will have most likely seen BMW’s new advert. Whilst it’s not yet available on YouTube for you to watch (the video above echos the sentiments), it follows the same plot as most BMW adverts -- selling their car as the emotional centre of a happy lifestyle. Then, as the narrator in his deep golden voice sums up the BMW experience, he remarks that BMW “know that what you make people feel is just as important as what you make.”
In a tip of their hat to the Experience Economy, BMW highlight the change that has been taking place in consumer behaviour over the last 50 years: consumers are buying according to feeling, more than need. The affluence of our society affords many people the privilege to choose what they buy no longer according to a budget of need but a budget of feeling. This isn’t just hype -- agency giant Saatchi & Saatchi created Lovemarks to track not brand loyalty, but brand love. Forbes’ Jack Trout wrote at the end of 2007, “Slowly, I’ve watched the advertising industry get very emotional.” But it’s not just about any emotion, it is about the emotional attachment. The Brand Gap marks the last 10 years of the age of ‘marketing identification’, the emotional need to belong, in other words, Seth Godin’s Tribes.
To deny emotion in marketing, branding, events, social media, mobile devices, etc, is to deny common sense. On the other side of the ditch, to claim that we are only now marketing emotion and experience is again, a mistake. Experience has been staged to elicit emotional response since the beginning of time, only now, our technology makes it richer and more accessible to the mass market.
Yet still, experience is thought of as something ethereal, intangible, and hyped up. Why? Because companies are still trying to deliver customer satisfaction, let alone think about customer surprise. When a company no longer only delivers what it says it will (satisfaction), the customer starts getting more than they paid for (surprise), and this makes that company remarkable. Who doesn’t tell their friends when they receive more than they paid for?
Given then, that companies are still struggling to grasp the basic level of satisfaction, there is a large area of differentiation and uniqueness for those who stage compelling experiences. The company / brand / charity / organisation / individual / website that is experienced by the end user stands out from the crowd.
This is why BMW’s slogan is “The Ultimate Driving Experience.” They stand out from the myriad of car manufacturers, providing a luxury that goes beyond the journeying of A to B. They foresaw that driving would become a leisurely experience in itself, and continue to lead the way.
