As traditional, digital, and experiential  campaigns are being integrated under an umbrella marketing strategy, the hashtag has become an important cross-channel aggregate tool. In fact, 57% of nationally-run Super Bowl ads incorporated a hashtag to extend the life of the ad past its 30 or 60 second spot and connect with consumers digitally. You can find hashtags on virtually all giant social media sites, allowing for both brands and consumers to track topics in real time. It is a way for consumers to chime in and also a way for marketers to listen.

Crafting a golden hashtag is a delicate balance of creative genius and strategic mastermind. Okay, maybe not that complex, but a few guidelines should be taken in consideration before plastering #BadIdea on every traditional and digital marketing channel you’ve got.

Determine #Function.
Decide how you will be using the hashtag. Is it purely a listening tool? Is it a consumer content curating tool? What channels will it be promoting? How will your brand or company use this information? Take the time in the planning stages to consider all functional aspects to avoid uncertainty down the road.

Be #Relevant.
A hashtag loses its effectiveness if it is too obscure and your consumers are unable to associate it back to the brand. Remember, this is an opportunity to connect with consumers, not to confuse them. Don’t bewilder the customer by changing it mid-campaign or jumping on a trending topic bandwagon if it doesn’t align with your brand.

Stay #Consistent.
Like any other important component of your campaign, be sure that the hashtag is consistent with the campaign strategy and objective. Once you pick a hashtag for a campaign, stick with it.

Do #Research.
Investigate. See if the hashtag has been used previously or is associated with something you don’t want related to your brand. Try to think of the worse case scenario of how it can be used or misinterpreted. Sometimes, you may have to think like a teenager and be sure that the hashtag is void of any double meanings or unfortunate letter combinations.

Get #Specific.
A wishy-washy, generic hashtag is not beneficial when tracking through a campaign. Pick something that  speaks to your brand, but also isn’t so broad that messages are getting lost in a sea of posts. Make it unique to your campaign.

By following these simple guidelines, you can successfully integrate a hashtag into your campaign to amplify your message and interact with consumers.

Brands work incessantly in establishing emotional connections with consumers and in particular, leverage the power of the five senses. Whether it is a color, audio, or visual cue, we have all experienced brand association in every day life. Think about the McDonald golden arches. What is the first thing that immediately comes to mind? Or when someone mentions Red Robin, do you feel compelled to finish the jingle?

Marketers are now looking into the power of scent marketing in creating an integrated brand identity. It is the only sense that goes directly to the emotional and memory centers of our brains (Scent Marketing Digest).By successfully creating a connection between brand and scent, marketers can tap into these sensory powerhouses, creating deeper emotional relationships and building stronger brand loyalty.

For example, imagine walking into your hotel room and catching a waft of a pleasant, yet distinct, aroma. You have stayed at this hotel previously and have always had a positive experience. Even though this is your first time staying at this particular location, you feel a sense of familiarity and comfort. Your mind has associated the distinct scent with good memories and places you at ease. Why would you choose to stay at an unfamiliar hotel over this one?

By its nature, experiential marketing provides sensory brand experiences, making incorporation of scent marketing only natural. Experiential marketing allows for brands to produce unique experiences to reinforce association with a particular scent. A holistic brand activation can tie brand associations for all senses together to create an impactful brand statement and further develop lasting relationships between consumers and brands. Staying top-of-mind with consumers is a valuable position, and scent marketing offers an additional way to interact with consumers.

While 3D printing may not be a new technology per se, it has recently made quite an impact in different industries with a multitude of applications. It has been used in producing medical equipment, automobile parts, and even food items. That’s right. You could, in theory, be printing out your dinner in some years time. As this technology continues to be further developed, industry leaders are tinkering with its diverse functionality to create innovative uses for 3D printing, including marketers.

Marketers are beginning to take hold of 3D printing. To promote its new mini bottles, Coca Cola printed 3D copies of consumers, like action figures. Nokia provided consumers with the opportunity to print out customized covers to promote its Lumia 820. While currently the big brands are capitalizing on this technology piece, consumers should not be surprised to see 3D production integrated in campaigns more often as the cost of production decreases and 3D printers are more accessible. 3D printing especially opens the floodgates of possibilities for experiential campaigns.

3D printing offers customization and on-site production. The consumer can design one-of-a-kind premiums that enhance the brand experience and create personalized interactions. What if a major car brand had an activation that let consumers customized their dream car and have a model printed for them on the spot? Or a shoe company prints sandals with branded messaging on the soles on the beach in Santa Monica? The possibilities are truly endless for crazy ideas to take form. Not only does 3D printing capture the consumers’ attention with its novelty, but it also adds a unique touch point to a brand experience.

The downside? The printing process does take quite some time, limiting the number of consumers who could directly interact with the technology. There are no doubts, though, that this will also see mass improvements.

Oreo’s brilliant response to the 2013 Super Bowl blackout sparked a new obsession over real-time marketing. Real-time marketing is when a brand puts something out, typically via social media channels, on the fly during or response to a particular event with the goal to create buzz and generate a conversation bit to further engage with consumers. Some have had some success, like Old Spice’s viral YouTube campaign, while others have faced widespread backlash.

Recently, Coca Cola took real-time marketing to a new level by integrating live tweets into a television ad to encourage people to enjoy meals together. Not only did social media following increase, but also people wanted to actually watch the ad to see if their tweet would be featured. Coca Cola was able to have its messaging be noticed without being lost in the advertising clutter because it gave its consumers a reason to interact with the brand.  The cool factor of having your tweet displayed alongside an ad was really only a bonus incentive; instead, the thought of reconnecting and engaging with human interaction had a much more profound impact.

This hot trend of featuring real-time messaging in traditional and digital media channels has also been incorporated in experiential campaigns with unlimited possibilities of integration including RFID, interactive digital walls, or street projections. Here at Beyond Traditional, we identified the benefits of capturing a larger audience by featuring live updates from an activation a few years back. As part of our campaign to promote Yahoo!’s sponsorship at New York Internet Week, the Yahoo! Studios Sweets Treats Truck featured instantaneous Facebook photo uploads of participants proudly displaying their delectable treat at the activation and connected the activation to the digital world. Followers of Yahoo! Studios social media channels viewed photos of the brand experience as it was happening, expanding the event footprint to the digital realm and resulting in over tens of thousands impressions.

Integration can range in complexity and still encourage consumer participation that matches your campaign objectives.  One of the biggest advantages of incorporating real-time marketing into your experiential marketing plan is that by allowing for consumers not present at the activation to involve themselves and witness what is happening, you increase your campaign impact and reach. Even more importantly, you engage in developing deeper relationships with your customer base.

Marketing campaigns have employed augmented reality technology into interactive campaigns to create unparalleled brand experiences. Augmented reality works by modifying the users’ sensory world with sounds or images, rather than replacing the real world with a simulated one as with virtual reality. The technology complements experiential marketing campaigns because of its ability to immerse users into an experience.

Augmented reality is currently one of the hottest technologies being integrated into interactive campaigns. It is changing marketers’ ability to manipulate users’ perceptions and experiences in incredible ways.

BMW executed a brilliant campaign that provided New Yorkers with a future glimpse of the city’s streets. This brilliant use of augmented reality made the future appear tangible as cars passing by a window display were transformed on a giant screen to be BMW i concept cars.

National Geographic allowed passers-by to interact with the National Geographic world by bringing wild and out-of-this-world experiences to life. People could walk alongside astronauts, play with dinosaurs, summon a storm, and pet a jaguar. National Geographic doesn’t have a reputation for being the most “hip” or technologically advanced brand; however, this experience challenges peoples to rethink previous notions about National Geographic and creates enthusiasm for the topics it covers.

Not all augmented reality campaigns have to be large, public stunts. The prevalence of smart phones makes it easier to bring the technology directly to the consumers’ hands. Starbucks relaunched its Cup Magic app that allowed coffee drinkers to place the holiday cups in phone’s vision and create a video to send to your loved one Valentine’s Day.

Want to try on a certain nail color prior to purchasing? Maybelline encouraged targeted magazine readers to download an app that allowed them to do exactly that. Users were able to “try” out different featured colors on their own nails.

You don’t have to have to create a giant, mind-blowing campaign to have the same effect; instead, focus  on developing a smart strategy that results in achieving your objectives. Believe us, we know how hard it may be to resist some of those technology temptations, but we promise you will achieve the maximum results with a targeted campaign. Plus, the wow factor of augmented reality possibilities will get people talking.