In my 21 years as the owner of an experiential agency, I don’t think a client brief has ever come past my desk that hasn’t in one way or another listed ‘brand awareness’ as the key objective.

And I get it, visibility is important. When every market is so cluttered, brands need to be seen to be chosen. That’s marketing 101. But the attention economy is burnt out. Consumers’ attention is being ripped in multiple directions – not just to other brands but to the rapids of the news cycle while juggling daily life.

So what good is awareness when your customer has a million things coming at them every day? For me, the question is: why do brands chase being seen, when being remembered is what really matters?

There has been a push towards experiences because we know the impact they can have. But impact is not a given. Plenty of activations may garner awareness but drive little real change. The ones that do leave people with an impression – not just a like or a share. An experience that stops you in your tracks stays with you. Because it taps into your memory. And if a brand can encode a feeling into customers’ memories after an interaction, that is a powerful economy to be trading........

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