Yesterday, we posted to our Facebook page a fantastic article on how the Grateful Dead’s unconventional promotional strategies can apply to direct marketing. Yes, those Grateful Dead. Whether you’re a fan of their music or not, it’s impossible to deny the Dead’s unique approach to their art.

In a follow-up piece, Deliver Magazine offers seven tips to apply to direct mail campaigns, but many of these apply outside of the direct mail realm. They can be used across an integrated marketing campaign and even be used to change the core of a company.

One lesson to be learned from the Grateful Dead is that a business should create an experience for its customer. To truly do this, a company and all of its employees must focus on the experience in all levels, not just in marketing. The best customer experiences are created from authenticity. If everything a company does is generated by an authentic commitment to the experience, it becomes much easier to convert leads to clients and clients to fans.

The core competency of a business is what generates revenue, but creating an experience is how it builds fans who will be repeat customers and brand evangelists. What company doesn’t want thousands of fans who will happily pay for their products again and again?

In addition to authenticity and creating an experience, a business can give a tremendous boost to its brand by going beyond the usual marketing tactics. Yes, “outside the box” thinking. The Grateful Dead did things which were unheard of in the music business at the time and found incredible success. They didn’t do it simply to be contrarian; they did it to create a better experience for their fans. They thought about what fans would want, rather than what industry wisdom dictated.

Business owners, CEOs and CMOs, take a look at your marketing from the perspective of your leads and customers. Forget about what you’re currently doing, forget about what marketing veterans say and forget about what your competitors are doing, because the people you’re marketing to already don’t care about that. Figure out what they want and give it to them, even if it seems as crazy as letting people record your concerts. Give customers a great experience and they will reward you in the best way they can: by giving you their business.