Game Changers:
Delivering Customers:
Agency Collaboration:
Key Performance Indicators:
Trade shows have always been prime opportunities to find and qualify prospects. Over the years the challenge has remained the same: How do you make a lasting connection with these people — one that will translate into a purchase? Now, thanks to an unexpected convergence of at least two phenomena, show attendees are ready to explore your services from one or more giant flat screens. In the process, they become more deeply involved in your brand and offerings.
The first phenomenon is the most obvious: The flat screen television. Large monitors are becoming ubiquitous in homes, airports and other public spaces. Innovations such as the Times Square HD LED billboards by Clear Channel are training consumers to see public digital displays as more than dumb displays. They are a way to receive valuable information, including audio and photos beamed via Bluetooth to consumer cell phones.
The Wii Phenomenon
The second phenomenon is the Wii gaming system from Nintendo, whose appeal has reached well beyond the gaming community. This way of interacting with a digital monitor uses a hand-held wireless stick controller called the Wiimote. Homes, schools and even nursing homes are using this interface to play common — as well as exotic — games (you can bowl or golf one minute and run from Donkey Kong the next).
In the process, the Wii is giving people permission to play with and explore what’s on a flat screen — all without a keyboard or mouse.
Due to these two trends and undoubtedly many others, the ground is fertile for the first mass-marketed “multi-touch” screen.
It arrived last month, introduced by Microsoft. MS Surface is a technology that lets consumers explore content with a sweep of a finger, and even loads this content into digital cameras or music players.
The Zune Connection
Not surprisingly, Microsoft is emphasizing the ability to load devices, such as their Zune, with content. Our VP of interactive services, Jeff Larche, speculated when it was released, that the Zune might someday enhance tradeshows by allowing exhibitors to beam podcast-like ads, or guided tours of their wares, to booth visitors. That would require a considerable jump in the Zune’s popularity, however, which makes this application unlikely in the near future.
The Surface also makes this capability nearly moot, because there are
so many rewards beyond the ability to transfer files. They are rewards
that come from the human touch.
The Surface relies on technology first introduced last year by Jefferson Han. The movie to the right plays a demonstration.
Screens That Glow and Pulse
Nelson Schmidt has created interactive kiosks for many
of our clients. But when a kiosk is not necessary, other “screens” can
be similarly effective at drawing attention and dramatizing
your offerings. Consider the kiosk a client created to promote a beverage
company and sell its products. The technology is created by CeeLite, and
consists of paper-thin membrane that – when charged with a small
electrical current – glows
and pulses. The company won the distinction of winning Time Magazine’s
Top 100 Best Inventions.
This and other new surfaces promise to help products generate attention and deepen the sort of involvement that leads to a sale. We encourage you to contact Nelson Schmidt about how we can turn these innovations into a marketing reality for your business.
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