Experience the Message: How Experiential Marketing Is Changing the Brand World

In the naive past, advertising's goal was to place its product in front of as many consumers as possible. Lenderman's uneven book presents the new paradigm: experiential marketing (XM), a corporate form of viral marketing that connects the consumer and product in unique one-on-one situations that engage them with the brand in positive-and what the author terms ""authentic""-ways. Through eight chapters that expound on Lenderman's (and others') 2004 IXMA Manifesto (International Experiential Marketing Association), the Creative Director of GMR Marketing provides scores of examples of XM's revolutionary approaches to marketing, many of which are employed by big name companies from Proctor and Gamble to Disney to leading car companies. Instead of the car company logo hanging over the concert stage, how about having new models outside where consumers can get in and breathe in that new car smell? While the book's train of argument wanders as it goes from one campaign to the next, the XM approach is fervently presented as the absolute antidote for dispassionate consumers. Companies looking for new and sophisticated ways to grow and connect their brand with consumers will find this book helpful, as several of its ideas can be adapted and implemented with little capital outlay.