Ultimate Brand Experience--Blue Man Group

I saw the Blue Man Group perform live for the first time earlier this year. I’ve been following them for years and have admired their work ever since I learned about them. The humor, creativity, and inventiveness of the organization is unsurpassed and if you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend it!

What the Blue Man Group does really well is they are masters of experience. Going to see a theatrical show or even going to the movies it’s about you sitting in the audience watching and enjoying. Yes there is music, visuals, and some form of action, but it’s an isolated experience meaning that it’s you personally watching and having no interaction with the rest of the audience—unless you want to upset someone around you!

But going to a Blue Man show is just captivating and indescribable. Yes there is the personal experience, but there is also the audience experience and audience teamwork. I’ve been to many shows where someone from the audience is brought up on stage. Usually, that is about that one person that we all get to laugh with (or at), but at a Blue Man show, they succeed at making everyone in the audience feel like they are that one person. You aren’t watching her wondering what she is going to do, you’re watching her and thinking “what am I going to have to do next”? When they bring the next person up on stage, the same thing happens—you watch him and wonder “what am I going to have to do next?”

Towards the end of the show, the audience becomes the show. For the show I was at, it was super huge balls that changed colors and bounced around the audience. You wanted to touch them, but you could watch the audience working together to ensure that everyone around them also got to touch them. The Blue Man Show is just as much about them performing as it is the audience’s experience. They set the tone, they define what is going to happen, but in the end they turn it over to the audience letting them have the ultimate brand experience that will never be forgotten!

Social media has enabled both customers and brands to have a shared voice and created an environment for them to interact on a public stage (like the stage of the Blue Man Group). This balance creates an opportunity for brands and customers to address their own wants and needs. It enables you to gauge what your audiences are saying about you and to participate in the conversation. Do you have a captivating brand experience for your brand? Are you using social media as a tool for creating or enhancing that experience? What is your in-person or over the phone experience like?