"Why attend EDPA ACCESS2019?" by Stephen Ross, VP / Executive Creative Director, Access TCA

Stephen Ross
VP / Executive Creative Director
Access TCA

Disclaimer: I am directing this to the “Ds” in EDPA. Yes, you. “D” as in designers. My tribe. The people who face the same challenges I do. Every. Single. Day.

What challenges, you ask?  Well, let’s take the usual ones like budgets. Undisclosed budgets. Insufficient budgets. Unclear budgets. (That budget includes WHAT?) Shifting budgets, usually shifting downward. Or timelines. Impossible deadlines. How about RFPs that come from procurement?  Do we respond to procurement—or do we craft our responses for marketers? How can we let procurement people know that our products are not commodities? Then there’s the challenge of the exhibit managers who want to impress their bosses by report how many scanned bodies visited the exhibit as opposed to reporting what type of experience those visitors had?

But more than these issues, what I need to learn from you, my peers, at ACCESS2019 are solutions to the new challenges we face: the expectations of our clients. And those expectations are changing dramatically.

In a podcast on MarTech Advisor, Amy Barone, Chief Strategy Officer of Splash had this to say:

The concept of experiential marketing is no longer limited to consumer events. It’s entered the business world in a big way. Attendees of business events are demanding more than a drab hotel ballroom and a rubber chicken dinner. People expect business events to be thoughtful and creative in their experience design, and when companies fall short of this expectation, they’ve missed an opportunity in the customer journey. We’re essentially seeing a “consumerization” of business events; the demands have changed…. we’re seeing the industry think about an “experience” as something more than what happens during the event. The attendee experience includes the websites they engage with, the email communications they receive, the social media posts they interact with. Innovative brands are thinking about an experience more comprehensively today, taking advantage of every touchpoint and connection opportunity.

She lists three key reasons why providing an experience is so critical. To paraphrase her words:

1.       Our clients, corporate exhibitors, know that their competitors are doing it--and they expect an experiential solution from us, not just a built environment.  

2.       Customers are increasingly being taught to expect an experience. Experiential marketing communicates innovation. Brands who ignore it run the risk of appearing behind the times.  

3.       Maybe the most important:  it works! People remember experiences. They remember the way a meaningful experience made them feel. Experiences help people identify more closely with a brand and create a deeper relationship.

Sharing best practices remains the optimal way for all of us to meet these new client expectations. My company delivers experiences to healthcare clients. I would love to hear about and adopt some of the initiatives that work well in less regulated industries. There are so many engagement techniques available to designers today, but how can we tell which will work best? Hit or miss isn’t an option. Sharing results, both positive and negative, helps us all.

Beyond the experiential challenge, let’s talk about the fact that most of us have four generations working in our design studios. Plus, in order to attract top talent, our teams include remote members. How do YOU meet the challenge that comes with diversity? I can tell you what works for me, but I’d like to know what works for you.

So please come to ACCESS2019. The agenda features a complete track for designers, and we need your voice to be heard.