How To Use Packaging To Create a Compelling Brand Experience

by Startacus Admin

You’ll be hard-pressed to find a greater love than that of the entrepreneur and their product. That love is what makes the day worth starting, but it can be a blinding if your focus stops before its box.

There’s a common trap for entrepreneurs to look at their product by itself and believe that this is all the presentation it needs. Once a customer tries your product, they’ll love it and that’s all you need.

However, packaging for a product often is the customer’s first true experience with that product, and packaging can make it wonderful or terrible. A terrible experience can lead to returns and weak sales, while exciting experiences can help turn customers into part of your marketing and grow both their value and your channels.

Packaging Is Your Product

To capitalize on the customer’s overall experience, you need to make your packaging reflect your brand identity and keep it relevant to your packaging.

Think of your favorite beer or soft drink. The liquid is what you’re craving, but the glass or the plastic packaging drive that first decision to try it. High-end liquors will choose glass container with a specific design, high-quality foil logos and a myriad of gold leaf or etching on the bottle.

However, they also incorporate these elements on the bags and boxes that sit behind their bottles or rest on customer shelves. That start creating that air of luxury before you’re able to see your bottle.

Your phone likely did the same thing. Most come in clean packages with bold lines that show you the phone in a snug presentation right when you open the box. All the papers, headphones, and cords are placed underneath, in their own section, while featuring your phone in a place of prominence. You’re greeted with what you care about and the greeting sets your expectations for a clean, engaging phone experience.

Here are a few reasons to consider adopting premium packaging and thoughts on what you might want to include.

Customers Want to See Your Causes

Millennials have become the largest group of buyers in the U.S. and they’re moving into more product categories, effectively reshaping the way our economy works. These buyers identify strongly with consumer brands and want these brands to reflect their lifestyle. For many that includes eco-friendly living, one of the easiest things for your packaging to convey.

Per an A.T. Kearney and The NPD Group study, Millennials care about three big sustainability practices:

• Product itself is sustainable (47%)
• Product is made and packaged in a sustainable way (32%)
• Company comes off as socially responsible (21%)

Using recycled materials or low-impact packaging and reducing the volume of your package are easy ways to introduce sustainability to your product and your messaging. Not sure how to express this? Try printing your commitment to sustainability directly on the box or a branded sticker. Put it on the front page of your inserts, or add it directly to your existing packaging. That way, you’ve showcased your commitment without using any additional material (which could be viewed as waste) to build your brand reputation.

Sharing and Increasing Sales

Packaging that reinforces your brand and brand identity will help increase the likelihood of users searching for your goods. An enjoyable experience opening your package also can help you become part of the unboxing craze that’s prominent on YouTube.

Increased aesthetics will help increase the likelihood that your product shows up online for an unboxer’s audience. Strong brand recognition will also cause more people to search for your product, often leading to these unboxing videos as well. That means compelling, branded packaging can drive product awareness and excitement through two avenues.

If your package is compelling and invites the user to open it, then you’re tapping into that excitement and desire that people find innate, and many want to share online. And this custom packaging can be applied to your products in either your distribution center or from specialty fulfillment partners who have the equipment to create custom labels, stickers, and more.

Studies from Dotcom Distribution and many others also show that roughly that 40% of customers who are on the fence will make a purchase if the packaging is compelling. Roughly the same number will make a second purchase from your company if their order comes in either premium packaging or giftbox-like packaging.

And the News You’ll Love

Your packaging doesn’t have to cost an arm and a leg to have a big impact on your customers. The overall experience matters more than the materials, and that includes some of the elements we looked at above, like showing environmental commitments.

Premium packaging doesn’t necessarily mean expensive packaging unless you’re a luxury brand. It’s a way to share your brand story and show customers that you care about their experience. Amazon dominates the market with envelopes and bland boxes, so you’re giving yourself a chance to stand out against the dominant player who is also delivering to your customers’ doors.

Your relationship with your customer doesn’t end when their product is shipped. It follows the product through the entire delivery process, the doorstep, and the countertop when that customer digs into the box.

Work hard to impress and share your brand at each of these touchpoints and you’ll give yourself the best position to increase customer lifetime value thanks to reorders, gifts for friends, and much more.

Content written by guest contributor Geoff Whiting

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Published on: 14th November 2016