The Story

Does it shock you to know that there are only an estimated 1,600 pandas left in the world? Maybe it does. But chances are, you’re like many, who naturally can’t comprehend how dire the situation really is.

To engage people in the hopes of compelling them to take action, check out what the French did to turn the number into a tangible reality. (actually, the organization was WWF, but the panda invasion occurred in Paris. If your Italian is good, you can read more about it at Bloguerrilla.)

Rather than draw attention to the cause by creating a full-length animated Disney movie (see Kung Fu Panda) that kids go ga ga over, they installed an art installation in which the exact number of all the pandas left in the world fit in a small town square.

The statement “There are only 1,600 pandas in the world” may not sound compelling, but compare that to actually seeing 1,600 pandas, fitting in a square and that might change your mind. Turns out, 1,600 ain’t a lot.

The moral of this story: Don’t just make a statement about your organization and its cause, your industry or consumer issues with words. Use experiential marketing and literally “make” your statements with raw materials, so that audiences can not only see the important information you’re trying to convey, but also touch, smell, taste and hear them. Experiential tactics will definitely generate more word of mouth for your cause than traditional marketing.

What if we showed how little Americans save on average each year? Or worse yet, what kids save? Or the amount of people who don’t know what an IRA is? In order to tell, we must show.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 at 10:22 am and is filed under Experiential Marketing, Experiential Brands, Multisensory Marketing and 5 Senses Branding, Viral Marketing, Word of mouth marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.