(from IAEE) Organizations such as Coca-Cola, The U.S. Army, Hershey's Chocolate, Charmin and countless others have used experiential marketing tactics to bring consumers closer to their brands. From museum-like exhibits to portable toilets in New York's Times Square, immersive experiences are designed to attract media attention, enhance customer engagement and drive sales. While experiential marketing in the B2C channel has been around for some time, experiential marketing in the B2B arena is more recent. As the ultimate B2B environment, trade shows have something to learn from this emerging marketing discipline.

In a 2009 survey conducted by Exhibit Surveys for Jack Morton, a global brand marketing agency, experiential marketing is de?ned as, "experiences that enable people to interact with a brand, product or service face-to-face or one-on-one, resulting in authentic connections that drive sales and increase brand image and awareness. The people engaged by these experiences may include consumers, business customers or partners, employees, channel in?uencers or other key stakeholders." The survey included responses from 406 marketers.

The Jack Morton study revealed some interesting statistics regarding the growth of experiential marketing.

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How are exhibitors at the ASTD 2010 International Conference & Exposition preparing to use experiential marketing?