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Business

Overcoming advertising amnesia: How to emotionally engage the overstimulated

Kiryl Chykeyuk, Founder and CEO at HYPERVSN

We as consumers are inundated with advertising, and often so much so that most of it washes over us. Much like the ad-blockers found in our internet browsers, our brains eventually filter out the noise from our conscious minds. And it’s a lot of noise. The average person sees between 4,000 and 10,000 advertising messages in a single day. Even the most innovative and super-engaging ad concepts can quickly fade into forgetfulness, even if there was a loud initial buzz around the campaign.

Much like retail spaces playing host to potential consumers, expos and business-focused events are incorporating more screens and unique elements all around, with the aim of grabbing the attention of attendees moving through packed halls. Consequently, our brain’s filtering mechanism is in overdrive in these spaces. So how can businesses engage overloaded target audiences? The answer lies in new immersive mediums that can bypass our brain’s information firewall and enter our consciousness.

It’s seemingly all been done before

We’re not just inundated by too many adverts; we’ve become hugely accustomed to the way they are presented to us. Even 2D digital signage was once innovative compared to traditional methods such as TV, radio and cinema ads. Now, we often ignore content that is not relevant to our interests or needs. Some consumers may even actively perceive them as outdated or boring. For event organisers, who may have potentially thousands of people passing through the doors, it’s a lost opportunity to engage attendees and achieve an ROI on their significant advertising outlay.

In addition, advertising of a more traditional nature fails to allow for direct interaction or feedback from consumers. This passive level of engagement means that brands are unable to build relationships, particularly as personalised and immersive experiences become the new expectation. If there’s no opportunity for businesses to initially engage, then they can’t create the emotional response that stays with their audiences long after their interaction.

Bypassing the defences

New advertising deployments must take a different path to bypass the brain’s staunch defences against the mundane. Phygital experiences, made possible by holographic technology, have the ability to leave an indelible mark on consumer consciousness and create a lasting emotional response.

With 3D holograms, advertising campaigns can be presented in fine detail and complex shapes without any distortion or pixelation. Because of this, they can create a sense of depth and presence, making users feel like they are interacting with real objects or environments. This can help to foster deeper connections with attendees and enable campaigns to pop against the plethora of advertisements being shown at a venue.

Engagement at the next level

Two-way interaction is key to fostering engagement between business and user. Hologram-based control panels can be utilised to allow attendees to interact with technology using gestures, voice commands or even eye movements. A key benefit of these panels is the capability to customise and adapt them based on different contexts and needs. They could be implanted alongside virtual reality applications, and attendees simply need to use their hands to fully manipulate holographic objects and environments.

By being more intuitive and natural than traditional interfaces, hologram-based control reduces the cognitive load for users and instead opens up the opportunity for engagement. The technology can also be layered on top of physical aspects to captivate the intended audience, such as physical touchpads to then allow attendees to change or manipulate holographic imagery.

By mixing holographic deployments with other emerging technologies, businesses can really build powerful and lasting connections with end users. Virtual avatars can inform attendees about available services and products, and even interact with them in different languages. People can even step inside the story or theme at an event by live beaming themselves as a digital avatar, bringing them even closer to the action. Each newly-immersed attendee provides the opportunity for improved advertising metrics, new transactions and an improved return on investment.

Accessing the long-term memory of attendees

The evolution of advertising in the face of overwhelming consumer exposure and mental filtering is a challenge for organisations, but also an opportunity for innovation. As traditional methods lose impact amidst the noise of daily ads, holographic technology offers experiences that captivate and create deep emotional connections with attendees. Alongside emerging technologies such as virtual reality and avatars, users can find themselves immersed in stories and themes in relation to products and services.

The future of event advertising lies in creating memorable and emotional experiences that go beyond mere visibility. This way, businesses can navigate around the forgotten noise and into the sanctity of long-term memory.

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Business

How data is paving the path to net zero

Karl Breeze, CEO at Matrix Booking

The world is facing an existential threat: climate change.

As this threat looms larger than ever before, the race to achieve net zero is on. And this is not simply a race that any tortoise can win either. Time is not on our side.

Public and private sector organisations across the globe are now feeling the pressure to act in reducing their carbon footprints and better contribute to the  goal of net zero by 2050. According to research that was published at the World Economic Forum in Davos, more than a quarter (26%) of UK CEOs feel they are moderately or extremely exposed to the threat of climate change over the next 12 months.[i]

Yet, despite the urgent need for businesses to reduce emissions and move towards a more sustainable future, there are many asking how to achieve this ambitious target. The answer lies in the power of data.

The simple notion of leveraging data-driven solutions is fast becoming a critical tool in paving the way forward. Specifically, through resource management data, businesses can gain a deeper understanding of their emissions and identify areas for improvement. With it being harder for organisations to effectively manage what space they need – due to a surge in remote working – data has become the key to taking targeted steps in reducing their carbon footprint and implementing more sustainable practices.

The clock, however, is ticking and the race to net zero is one where businesses are starting to fall behind. It’s time to pick up the pace with the help of data.

Navigating the obstacles

Without accurate data, businesses across all sectors may not even have a clear picture of their environmental impact, making it impossible to identify areas for improvement. Not to mention, adapting to the changes of the working world  has presented a plethora of challenges, too.

Between an uncollaborative approach thus far, increasing costs and business leaders trying to account for where and how people work, those dealing with an organisation’s resources are being pushed to their limits  to maintain efficiency, let alone achieve net zero. Since the pandemic, underutilised space and energy price shocks have been driving real estate executives to reset their strategies by bringing a greater focus on space optimisation and reducing energy expenditure. To support these initiatives, firms are investing in technology to drive efforts and achieve ROI.[ii]

But the biggest challenge to even acquiring accurate data is funding. Implementing energy-efficient technology or data collection software, or even investing in renewable energy sources can require significant upfront costs. This may be a barrier for many, particularly in the public sector where budgets are restricted. However, you can’t manage what you don’t measure. Data provides a clearer insight into combatting these challenges and can lead to a long-term ROI. More importantly, it  supports an organisation on their journey to net zero.

Net zero to hero

As one of the most powerful tools in the fight against climate change, leveraging the right data can allow businesses to gain valuable insights into their energy usage patterns, identify areas for improvement and track progress over time. One element for organisations across every sector to consider is how employees now work.

The shift in how we work has led to  wasted resources and unnecessary carbon emissions in other areas, specifically office spaces. Therefore, utilising the right management data can allow firms to once more fully understand their physical resources. Data can reveal certain areas of an office that can be consistently over or underutilised, indicating an opportunity to adjust the layout or occupancy allowance to save energy and improve efficiency from a business perspective.

Furthermore, saving money on reduced office space and equipment can allow for greater investment into net zero initiatives, such as green leasing. Green leases serve as a means for decarbonising real estate and opens a more collaborative effort between landlords and tenants, all in support of net zero.[iii]

Whilst reducing the size of office spaces can enable companies to cut down on their carbon footprint, there is a catch. As more people work from home, the burden of emissions is being shifted to their households instead. The individual behaviours of staff, from energy use and travel to digital footprints and waste management, fluctuate wildly and is harder to measure and control, let alone enforce by the government. Therefore, it’s crucial to instil a company culture of sustainability by setting policies and providing support to help workers reduce their environmental impact while working from home.[iv]

The path less travelled

The term net zero is not something that should lead to eyerolls and sighs – it’s a term that should inspire change. Change towards a more efficient and cost-effective business model. Rather than considering net zero as a burden, business leaders should think of it as an opportunity to improve how they operate, decrease long-term costs and increase efficiency.

Despite uncertain short-term market prospects, many UK companies do plan to increase investment to reduce their carbon footprints. Almost half of business leaders (49%) surveyed by the British Property Federation plan to accelerate the delivery of their net zero programmes over the next 12 months.[v]

Now more than ever, data can be used to inform and drive business decisions to capitalise on climate action. However, achieving this will require a full-scale review of an organisation’s internal strategy, targeting precisely where they can reduce emissions and eliminate waste. With the application of data management systems, companies can leverage insights that not only align with their business objectives but also their net zero objectives, enabling them to better understand their environmental impact and accurately forecast reduction scenarios.

With mounting pressure from governments across the world as well as growing awareness amongst the general public, the race to net zero is one that business leaders need to pick up the pace on  before it’s too late.


[i] Green Retail World,PwC CEO survey: Businesses feel significantly exposed by climate change

[ii] Ben Readman, Verdantix, 2022

[iii] JLL, Green Leasing 2.0: Bridging the owner-occupier divide to deliver shared ESG value.

[iv] Harvard Business Review, Is remote work actually better for the environment?

[v] i-FM,Property looks to accelerate decarbonisation

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Business

Successfully dealing with the unintended consequences of change

by Daniel Norman, Change Management Consultant at Symatrix

Most people dislike change. We are drawn to stability and established routines and feel unsettled when anything happens to disrupt the ‘status quo’. It’s bad enough when the local supermarket moves the bread section – but when the company we work for introduces a new digital system that completely changes how we work, it feels like ‘the sky is falling in’.

When change happens within businesses, there may initially be some resistance from employees: whether it be in the form of avoiding new systems, skipping training, clinging to old methods, or even quitting altogether. Change in business is a constant, however, and it is usually driven by a desire for improvement, and typically over time, becomes the new normal.

Good change management is all about smoothing this process of transition and that means engaging with people and helping them to seamlessly switch to a new model or ways of working.  Change management is not just concerned with implementing new systems or processes; it is just as much about listening intently to colleagues, customers, and stakeholders.

It’s working with people to get things right, building a deep understanding of the challenges we and our colleagues face, and shaping the vision for a future that resonates with people. Change is most successful when everyone feels they have a part to play in moving things forward. And that’s true of all change initiatives, large and small.

Finding a way forward

When it comes to managing change, it’s important to recognise that everyone will have their own journey; they’ll work through things at their own pace, and that’s more sustainable than pretending we’ll all arrive at the same point at the same time.

 It’s also important to focus on creating a supportive environment, or the right conditions for people to adapt, with as little friction as possible. The goal is to establish conditions that minimise friction and foster a collective sense of purpose. This philosophy is crucial in creating a environment conducive to individual and organisational growth.

Getting the planning process right

When planning for change, it’s essential to consider both the intended and unintended consequences. Just as technological advancements like social media have transformed communication but also introduced challenges such as misinformation and mental health concerns, organisational changes can have extensive, unforeseen impacts. A thorough exploration of current operational practices, beyond process maps or managerial assertions, is therefore, always a vital feature of any effective change management approach.

For that reason, it can often be a mistake to pull out those process maps the team updated 12 months ago or rely on the word of line managers that will tell you ‘this is how we operate’ without taking into consideration the work-arounds or simplifications that employees have developed over time.

Teams will naturally evolve, and patterns of work; ways of doing things that aren’t written down, will always be there. A good change manager must always be cognisant of that. Even small changes, like when a key person in the team changes roles, can have a big impact.

To manage change well, it’s important to talk to the people who will be most affected by it. This helps change managers to plan and effectively execute the change journey. By ignoring these key considerations, organisations risk their change strategy stalling from the outset and the opportunity for operational efficiencies may therefore never be fully realised.

Throughout the process, it is crucial to continuously monitor and measure the impact of change on all key stakeholders. One effective way of doing that is by embracing the principle of change curves: a popular model organisations can use to understand the different stages people and the organisation go through when a change occurs.

An effective strategy involves mapping stakeholders against this curve, whether as individuals or groups, during project check-ins. This approach can help project leaders gauge the current position of every team member on the curve, the impact of the project’s upcoming phase on them, or their colleagues, and additional support measures that could be implemented. Such an assessment facilitates a more tailored and effective change management strategy, ensuring stakeholders are adequately supported throughout the transition.

Not everything will run like clockwork, of course, no matter the change management approach that is put in place. Challenges, setbacks, and opportunities for improvement are inherent to any process, but proactive anticipation and planning for potential worst-case scenarios and unintended consequences significantly enhance our ability to support our colleagues and teams effectively. This strategic foresight is crucial in managing transitions smoothly and realising the intended benefits of initiatives.

A positive route ahead

Change, especially in business, are inevitable and often aimed at fostering improvement and growth. However, the journey through change is deeply personal and varies from one individual to another. By acknowledging this, creating a supportive environment, and engaging with all stakeholders, organisations can navigate the complexities of change with minimal resistance and maximum efficiency.

Effective change management, therefore, is not just about the technical implementation of new systems but about genuinely listening to and working with people to adapt and thrive in new circumstances. It’s about understanding the nuanced ways teams operate, the unofficial shortcuts and workarounds they’ve developed, and considering the broader implications of change beyond immediate operational efficiencies. Through a thoughtful approach that anticipates challenges and values stakeholder input, organisations can not only manage change but turn it into a catalyst for positive transformation and growth.

It is clear then that while people may inherently dislike change, with the right conditions, support, and leadership, the transition can become a journey of collective progress and innovation. Change, managed well, can transform the initial discomfort into an opportunity for development, making the once feared ‘sky falling in’ scenario a launchpad for reaching new heights.

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