Understanding people’s desire so you can intersect it.
Understanding people’s influence so you can leverage it.
Consumers are far more sophisticated now and they are looking for something they can relate to. Recently, a few marketers have begun to realize that they will lose the consumer’s attention if they continue attempts to “shout” over competing brands. Today’s consumers are savvier than ever. They can see right through yesterday’s marketing keywords such as “new” and “improved,” and they are searching for meaningful brand connections.
In this economy, it’s about toning down the “noise” in today’s crowded retail space and standing for value in the consumer’s mind. It’s about understanding that the complete package with a sensory experience, will contribute to a brand identity that stands out in a crowded marketplace.
Value isn’t just about price. In fact, battling competitors in a price war to achieve the lowest price is the road to eroding brand value with consumers. Other brand assets should be leveraged to create value. For example packaging that is so well-designed, consumers want to interact with the brand it represents over and over again. Rather than containing mundane products they need to use, consumer packaging can deliver something so extraordinary, it adds enjoyment and pleasure—thus a value-added perception–to everyday items.
Is your company packaging experience?
Rethinking package design can lead to an all-important second moment of truth (SMOT) with consumers. Adding a new aesthetic to functionality can accomplish that.
-This creamer package embodies function, pleasure and style. Consumers say they often are performing another task simultaneously while preparing coffee, but many creamer packages make it difficult for them to multi-task. Product Ventures collaborated with WhiteWave on the research and created a more European-like, ergonomic new bottle with flip-top cap design, while also retaining the brand’s message of continued pleasurable and enjoyable brand experience, making consumers feel pampered during the coffee making ritual.
Effective design communication can “trigger” a bundle of emotions and positive attitudes that increase the likelihood of consumer purchases. Some examples:
-New product from a SONIC and Microsoft collaboration.
Computer mice are typically packaged in a clear shell following the contour of the product like a second skin, allowing user not only to visually inspect the product from multiple angles, but also to check if the ergonomics of a particular mouse shape works for them. There are many advantages making a product accessible to our five senses. It is part of human nature not only to look at objects of interest, but also to hear, touch, smell, and eventually to taste them.
To experience something untouchable on the other hand leaves room for our imagination; it triggers curiosity and desire. Out of reach, it can elevate the value perception and emphasizes on the emotional and inspirational benefits of a product. SONIC developed a package that intentionally separates the merchandise from the outside world. Unlike any other product in this category, the mouse is placed sideways highlighting the innovative folding mechanism and beautiful product profile. Positioned as a lifestyle product and catered to a hip and fashion conscious target audience the mouse is featured completely intangibly in a clear-folded plastic box to convey the premium nature of the product.
-This Shiseido bottle may look like a beauty product or a sophisticated skin cosmetic, but a closer look at the inside proves you wrong.
Those are hexagonal pills! The bottle refers to water and earth, with the green and blue colors. The underlying concept behind this new brand of supplementary health tablets from the Japanese cosmetics company is the belief that from good health and well being flows true beauty. The product is made using grasses found growing on high cliff-tops by the sea in eastern Japan. The designer refrains from plastering the design with obvious health-evoking imagery and instead attempts to subtly point to the water, temperatures and environment.
Identify Touch-Points and Emotional-Triggers. It’s tempting to jump right into its aesthetics. What should first be considered, however, is how you can cultivate the creation of moments of engagement between the consumer and the brand, and the emotions and associations these moments foster.
With the shift in consumer and market behavior that will drive packaging trends, what can we expect to see in 2010 and beyond?
-Multiple-Solutions Design:
Companies are turning to design to address the economic reality as well as new consumer sensibilities. Innovative packaging is one means of combating the high cost of resources and delivering products more efficiently. (For example Walmart’s redesigned milk container has reduced shipping labor by 50 percent and water usage by 60 to 70 percent. The new packaging enables Walmart to stock 224 containers in a space that used to hold 80!)
Too much category packaging looks similar, so how about investing in structural packaging? Structural packaging is a standout; new innovations and unique package structures become easy brand identifiers over time, and strong differentiators on the retail shelf. A structurally distinguished package also can refer back to the brand in a decisive manner.
-Lotus Splendour Lancome’s extraordinary launch this February. The lotus head packaging splits open to reveal three petals containing lip and eye products and a mini mirror, each leaf hinges & clicks back neatly and seamlessly into the weighted base by using hidden magnetic closures.
-Estuche Grand Class, best carton award/confectionery.
-Heightened Point of Difference:
Eye-popping new graphics and visuals also might be considered. Some of the world’s most visible and celebrated brands benefit from new graphic architecture. Remember Pepsi-Cola’s pop art bottles last year? And Coca-Cola’s this year? Established brands can become tired, and nothing generates new excitement for products like engaging, daring new packaging that plays into today’s cultural values.
Employ bold design to showcase valuable differentiation and communicate a proactive message to the marketplace. Now is the time to take a deep breath, be brave and unleash hi-visible design with a clear point of difference.
The trend is toward less cluttered but more compelling graphics and clear copy.
-Ultra-stylish ‘Mockingbird’ beer bottles. They are the kind of bottles you want to be seen drinking from and not pouring the brew into a glass. Gorgeous, pearl-clad women holding birds, legs, and female silhouettes adorn the bottles. Under the cap of each are fun little quotes like, “Birds of a feather rock together” and “it’s good to be a little bit crazy.”
-Cheetos goes big time. Building on its track record as the most mischievous and playful snack brand in the world - not to mention a rich history of cheesiness - Frito-Lay’s Cheetos brand just announced one of the BIGGEST innovations to ever come out of the snack food industry - Giant Cheetos snacks.
Green With A Twist:
Approach sustainability with a healthy dose of perspective. Many companies are asking if sustainability will lose relevance in the current economic climate. Research says that it is more important than ever before. With all things being equal – price, efficacy, quality – a green benefit can be the tiebreaker. Consumers reveal that consciousness may also be inspired by a sense of hope for the future, and a desire to do and to feel good.
Most Americans don’t understand companies’ green claims. Even though consumer desire is increasing to live more sustainably, they are confused and looking to companies to provide a laser-focused direction on how their products and services will help them do that.
The food and beverage category is central to perceptions of sustainability. Consumers view the category as salient to all zones of sustainability and make direct connections between food and the earth.
Consumers are also looking for personal benefits in green products. Think about green where design, lifestyle and packaging meet.
-Pangea Organics, glueless carton packaging innovation.
-New eco-friendly mascara from Physician’s Formula.
-Trek Wine Karafe, reusable aluminum bottle.
-Treepac, a new design concept for solving the problem of single use shipping and mailing packages as a reusable container intended to replace cardboard boxes.
-Xooma X20, water enhancement product in packets, with BPA-Free reusable water bottles.
Being green is becoming a key factor in the way consumers view companies and each other. Even consumers who aren’t green or still confused, are getting pressure from their children, parents, friends and peers at work…green is a huge power.
There is a need for a company to be legitimate with its green claims. Consumers are asking for green, but the reality is that even with a lot of misinformation, these very connected consumers will call you out on false claims.
