Essence Music Festival
In 2015, Essence tasked Zehnder with handling social media engagement and brand activation for the 2015 Essence Festival in New Orleans. The client was relying on our agency to make the event more successful than ever through unique, high-quality social media content captured on the ground and deployed in real time.
Scheduled content makes up much of the social media world -- because it’s easy, predictable, and planned. Real-time content, on the other hand, is a much “higher risk” endeavor that many brands shy away from. Zehnder’s brand activation team boasts decades of experience in event marketing and real-time online marketing. Essence was able to trust us with capturing the right content at the right time, refining it quickly, and publishing it with messaging that aligned with their overall marketing goals. Our efficient, effective approach secured millions of impressions for the client in only four days.
We enhanced Essence’s content by making it truly unique — that is, sharing stories and perspectives that only the Essence brand had access to. We scheduled a number of celebrity Twitter interviews and backstage appointments to ensure access to some of the festival’s top performers and most share-worthy moments. This helped Essence content stand out among other social media posts.
Zehnder’s on-the-ground team was supported by staff in our office who worked quickly to edit, promote, and publish raw images and copy. Our in-office team also responded to comments and messages and monitored performance. This approach allowed us to deploy high-quality content quickly, and make informed strategy decisions in minutes.
