
Why moments-based marketing is here to stay
Long gone are the days when ad agencies could throw out several campaign creatives a year and see what sticks.
Right now, personalisation, trustworthiness and positive experiences are what customers crave most. This is only possible when brands focus on building a consistent message over time. Hence the rise of always-on marketing.
So once the right tech stack (including AI, of course) and customer journeys are set up correctly, your lead generation and nurturing can run along quite nicely. But while it’s ticking along, you’re missing out on opportunities to excite and delight customers. Just like those neat, one-off campaigns used to do. Enter moments-based marketing.
How does moments-based marketing work?
Moments-based marketing works by taking the insights gathered from always-on customer journeys and using them to create unique, impactful brand-human interactions. This can be as small as a personalised email delivered at the right time, or a set of social media content built around a relevant cultural event.
Historically, campaigns would leverage big public events to sell products e.g. a Royal Wedding or FA Cup final. Moments-based marketing only focuses on occasions that chime with the specific target audience. By using data to identify the trends or behaviours that are likely to engage this group and leveraging them as effectively as possible, marketers can improve their ROI.
Why is it a popular approach?
By making data-backed decisions on what moments to focus on, marketing efforts and investment are directed into touchpoints where the closest customer-brand connections can be made. For customers, this shows a business actually cares. For businesses, it helps maximise their budget.
It shows relevance
By connecting to events or cultural moments in a timely fashion, brands show they’re relevant, responsive and interested in the same topics as customers. In particular, the ability to respond to public moments in real-time can boost engagement and kickstart conversations that increase your brand’s visibility.
This can showcase your business as being agile, actively involved in the community and help you break through the noise to get to your target audience. By reacting to these moments authentically, brands can also exhibit their real personality while building trust and credibility with customers and enhancing their perception.
It builds relationships
Repeatedly making your brand visible at important touchpoints shows you have a genuine understanding of a customers’ needs. Meeting those desires in a timely fashion and with an authentic approach helps build a genuine connection between the brand and its target audience.
Offering a real opinion, quality expertise or standout creativity enhances the sense of connection even further. Over time, this creates a two-way communication which can inspire emotions, build trust and enhance customer loyalty. However, it’s important that every touchpoint and interaction is thought out and done for a reason, as overdoing it could have a negative impact.
It provides data
By having the right tech in place, you can get a complete set of data on brand-audience touchpoints. This allows marketing teams to see which interactions are the most effective, helping them to target their efforts into the right moments. With constant analysis and refinement, they can finetune their strategy and maximise return on investment.
This doesn’t just make sure prospects and customers are getting exactly what they need, but can be done with budgets of any size. Rather than running long-term campaigns which can have large upfront costs and be difficult to monitor, responding to specific moments in a creative, unique way doesn’t involve huge spend and has easily trackable performance.
Examples of MBM
The moments you enhance for your customers can be minimal or monumental, the key is to take full advantage of them to get your audience engaged. Here are how some brands have done it.
McDonald’s McRib
McDonald’s created their own series of ‘oops’ moments to promote the return of their McRib menu item. ‘Glitchy’ notifications from the app that read ‘McRib_Test.notification_16.10.24 [TEST]’, cryptic OOH adverts and ‘broken’ emails triggered a wildfire of social media speculation. This meant both warm and cold prospects became engaged.
This built up to a short, bold ad which loudly announced "The McRib is back.” This was a climax to all the suggestive moments which leveraged the burger’s notoriety. As Andrew Long and James Millers, executive creative directors at Leo Burnett UK, said, “By understanding how the brand lives in the real world, we have been able to build hype in a playful and culturally relevant way, which fans have loved.”
Spotify Wrapped
After 10 years of building, Spotify Wrapped has become a cultural moment in itself. Delivering personalised stats to users at the end of every year, it creates a sense of nostalgia and reflection while encouraging social media sharing and real-life conversations. Generating FOMO amongst audiences, it’s also a culmination of the brand’s personalised approach towards music choices.
To celebrate the fans as much as the artists on the platform, the Wrapped moment is accompanied by global events and interactive, localised out-of-home experiences. This tailored creative reflects the person-focused values of the brand while attracting the attention of audiences both on and off the app.
KitKat Skydive
To take advantage of Felix’s Baumgartner record-breaking skydive, KitKat sent their signature biscuit to space. Despite the overall event being sponsored by Red Bull, this activation took advantage of weather-related delays to the dive. Encouraging Felix and his team to ‘take a break’, the KitKat ascended 22 miles from Cambridgeshire with a camera tracking its progress.
Using the #BreakFromGravity, this spontaneous creative (the video was made in 24 hours) took advantage of a cultural moment in a way that was authentic to the brand. Attracting more than 6.5 million views on Facebook, it brought KitKat’s sense of fun to life. It also sparked an online ‘brand banter’ trend which included joint activations with Oreo, Google and Apple and attracted thousands of followers.
How can you implement MBM?
To take full advantage of the right moments, marketers need to have the right tech stack in place. Automation, data and AI can help leverage key touchpoints. From finding times in the customer journey when engagement is high to creating timely, personalised content and generating immersive experiences, technology makes brand-human moments possible at scale.
However, to make genuine connections with your audience, it’s equally important to have the right creative colleagues on-hand. They’re your key to generating ideas which will effectively engage your target customers with your brand. From promoting your values to building excitement and having fun conversations, without their input, you won’t create memorable moments.
As experts in both branding and digital marketing, we can help you create a moments-based marketing strategy that really chimes with your audience. To find out more about how we could make your interactions special, call us on 01926 754038 or drop us an email at hello@designmc.org
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Looking to realign, refresh or redevelop your brand or business marketing strategy? Send us an email at hello@designmc.org or, give us a call direct on 01926 754038 for an informal chat.