The SXSW Austin Experience: Celebrities, Parties and CX Lessons

The Gist

• Embrace influencer collaborations. SXSW Austin experience highlights the power of influencers in creating brand affinity and customer lifetime value. Brands should identify and partner with influencers who resonate with their target audience to humanize their brand and deepen customer engagement.
• Enhance sensory experiences. The success of activations like Porsche’s “Full Service” at SXSW underlines the importance of engaging all five senses to create memorable and impactful customer experiences.
• Encourage social sharing. Creating share-worthy experiences is crucial for word-of-mouth marketing in the digital age. SXSW Austin experience demonstrates that when customers are inspired to share their experiences on social media, it amplifies brand visibility and attracts new customers through a form of digital endorsement.

Austin Texas forever changed my life. Let me explain about my SXSW Austin experience.

How I Got to Know Austin

My first ever trip to Austin Texas was for a bachelor party in 2017 (I know, stereotypical). One of my good friends was getting married and at the time all of us were living in Massachusetts and decided that we should head “south by southwest” to the capital city of Texas for a weekend of cheap beer, laughs and fun times.

A Profound Effect

As we arrived and settled into our Airbnb — we couldn’t control our excitement. The entire weekend was filled with bouncing around between music venues, meeting new people and taking a trip to the lake for a boat day. We all knew that Austin was fun — but what I didn’t know was the profound effect it would have on me.

A Place of Inspiration

As we left and returned back to the Northeast and settled back into our lives — we still spoke of the stories from that weekend, how the city felt electric — filled with people from all over who just seemed as happy as could be. The feeling the city provided stuck with me — a yearning inside of me as a relatable feeling that can only be described as a nostalgic, serotonin filled jar of inspiration — just waiting to be opened again.

A Look Inward, and a Decision

Fast forward three years and a whole lot of looking inward at my own personal and professional growth goals — I made the decision that I wanted to move to a new part of the country — and as you may hypothesize, I picked Austin.

Why?

It’s the feeling, the energy, the inspiration this city has. Everyone who is here, is here to do something great. All have goals and inspirations that are to do things that are beyond themselves, make the world better, feel inspired — grow. This city changed my life.

So it’s fitting that every year in March, the entire world descends upon the city for the SXSW Austin experience to do the same. Actors, filmmakers, musicians, creatives of every stripe. All embark on the journey to this place to “feel” the inspiration they so desire — and all leave with a sense of excitement of what could be.

The SXSW Austin Experience: Celebrity Encounters

The number of celebrities that attend the show each year appears to be increasing. During the 2023 SXSW event I was walking down the street when I noticed Paul Giamatti walking around trying to find a place to eat. I stopped and said “Hi Paul, big fan of your work — try the place on the corner, it has amazing crudo and cocktails.” We chatted for a few minutes, snapped a picture and went on our way.

This year — with stars like Jake Gyllenhaal, Ryan Gosling, Post Malone and others in town to promote their movies — the star meter uptick was significant. However, it’s not just the premieres — influencers and celebrities almost always have brands of their own. With that, many of them are out at local music venues or bars promoting their brand and simply just having a good time.

What makes this so special is that almost everyone you brush shoulders with is open and enthusiastic to have a few words with you. You can FEEL the energy they are getting from this city, this event — and brands love that. When an influencer or celebrity is tied to a brand — it helps that brand curate anthropomorphism amongst its consumers. This is critical to creating customer lifetime value and brand affinity.

Related Article: Weird Is Way Better: Why SXSW and Austin Are the Epicenter of Customer-Centric Inspiration

Spontaneous Serotonin

As a local, my favorite part of not having a badge is taking my e-bike out around town — and seeking out what brand activations, parties or events are going on that are open to the public. And maybe to your surprise — there are actually a TON of things that locals can attend. From Porsche’s “Full Service” brand event to the Tide activation house — all of these activities have one thing in common. They are spontaneous, and they get the serotonin cylinders firing.

Most things that go on during this event you hear about at the last moment, and in that fashion it creates another level of excitement — mixed up with the power of the “unknown.” You never know what you will see, who you will meet — and what each day of exploring will look like — but you will know one thing, it’ll be a ton of fun.

Related Article: Should Marketers Still Care About SXSW Interactive?

Pay It Forward

To be honest — my favorite part of SXSW is my ability to pay it forward. I, like many of the visitors who come to this inspiring city for the event, have a goal. We all actually have a set of common goals — to feel inspired, find new ideas and to think differently about whatever it is that fills up our “passion cup.”

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Each year for SXSW I always get the opportunity to meet new people and hear what they do and why they are here — my goal is to always leave that conversation by being a representation of what this city has meant to me, and to help them on their own journey to find whatever it is they are seeking. Paying it forward is my way of recreating the experience I had when I first visited the city in 2017. This place is so special because of the people who choose to live here — and it’s our Austinian duty to pass that inspiration and feeling along to visitors so that they can leave with memories of that time, that conversation, that interaction — all of which may have been the spark they needed to realize their own full potential.

3 Lessons for Creating Customer Lifetime Value and Brand Affinity

With all of that being said, what really makes this event so special is that mostly everyone you brush shoulders with is open and enthusiastic to have a few words with you. You can FEEL the energy they are getting from this city, this event — and brands love that. When an influencer or celebrity is tied to a brand, it helps that brand curate anthropomorphism amongst its consumers. This is critical to creating customer lifetime value and brand affinity.

Here are three ways that your brand can tap into these feelings and leverage similar approach to build brand affinity and exceptional customer experience

Embrace the Influencer Wave

There has been a lot of talk over the years around influencers and brand partnerships. Do they work? Is it worth it? The answers to some of these questions may be answered by events like SXSW, where almost every brand activation that was going on around the city had some brand influencer (celebrity, YouTuber, TikToker) associated with it.

As a brand, you must know your audience and what they care about. And these days, many consumers rely on influencers as a source of information, inspiration and connection. By embracing influencers as part of your branding and go to market strategy, you’ll help elevate the anthropomorphic possibilities that surround the connection between brand and consumer. This will provide the human-like characteristics needed to keep customers engage for the long haul. But, influencers do not need to be celebrities. (More about that in a second).

Tantalize All of the Senses

Last year I did a piece on why it was so important for brands to evoke all five senses when curating exceptional customer experiences. This approach was something that was quite universal this year at SXSW.

A great example of this was the aforementioned Porsche “Full Service” brand activation. As you entered into their pop up, your eyes were drawn to vibrant colors, your ears were alive with music and sounds of the cars engines. And even a live performance from the hip hop artist Common (See above influencer reference). They had a full-service bar with drinks and snacks. You were able to sit in the various vehicles on display and touch the interior designs. They even had little Porsche car air fresheners that you could take home with you after you left.

The point is this: All of these five senses were orchestrated to perfection. If you’re looking for ways to extend and elevate the experience your customers have, look to work in opportunities where all of your customers’ senses can be evoked through your products, your experiences and anywhere your customers interact with your brand.

Inspire Social Sharing

The final, and maybe most obvious, lesson learned from this event surrounds the idea of creating an experience so fun, so different, so exceptional that your customers don’t have any other choice but to share it with the world.

Most of the brand engagements at SXSW have photo opportunities. For example, the Paramount TV network pop up allowed visitors to take photos on different movie sets through a kiosk. The kiosk then texted you the photos that you in turn could share on all social media platforms.

As a brand, there is never any marketing more powerful than that of positive “word of mouth.” Social media is today’s solution to word of mouth marketing. When a consumer decides to share something attached to a brand, they, in a sense, become a mini influencer of the products you are selling.

The secret sauce here is creating experiences that inspire your customers to want to share with their network because that shows their network of friends that they believe and love for what your brand stands. This social word of mouth will do wonders for creating new customers and also inspiring them to return again and again.

Final Thoughts: Finding Purpose in Austin

Now, I know what you may be thinking — “Doesn’t it get old every year?”

While I can understand that question, my reply is “No, it doesn’t — because every year is something new, something different, something weird — and that’s just the way I like it.” The unknown adventure of what I’ll see year after year is what keeps this conference so entertaining and engaging. It’s what keeps attendees from all over the globe coming back, submitting their movies, their music, their ideas — for that one chance to be able to have the stage, they need to find the spark that will ignite the fire of their life purpose. That’s what this city is about, that’s what this event is about.

One the best examples of this is the career of the great Willie Nelson. In 1972, he moved to the capital city — unhappy with his career and essentially feeling he was finished with music.

However, much to his surprise — once he arrived here, the people of this city welcomed his style of music and gave his career a reboot. The city, the people, the vibe — all were welcoming to who he was and his art. If this had never happened — some of his best music would likely never have been written or performed.

That’s what the city and the SXSW Austin experience does, that’s the inspiration you can find here. And sometimes, you just need a “Bloody Mary Morning” before you get “On the Road Again.”

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