DE-YAN Becomes First Company to Earn MASB Certification for Experiential ROI

New MASB certification for DE-YAN's Experiential Revenue Impact Calculator (ERIC) marks an industry-first: a standardized, peer-reviewed framework that lets brands measure the business value of live experiences with the same rigor as digital and traditional media

NEW YORK, May 13, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- DE-YAN, a global brand experience studio, today announced that its Experiential Revenue Impact Calculator (ERIC) has been certified by the Marketing Accountability Standards Board (MASB) and added to the MASB Marketing Metric Catalog. MASB is the same body that sets measurement standards for marketing and brand evaluation and valuation.

DE-YAN is the first company to earn this marketing and advertising standard designation.

The certification is the result of an independent study, commissioned by DE-YAN and conducted in collaboration with market intelligence firm Avasta, Inc., that set out to quantify what the experiential marketing industry has long believed but rarely been able to prove: that well-executed live brand experiences create measurable, lasting commercial value. The findings exceeded the researchers' own internal benchmarks.

"Too many brands evaluate their events based on vibes or press coverage. We have long believed in the impact of experiences toward the bottom line, but to date, have not been able to prove it. I am proud to report that ERIC changes things. We can now predict and quantify the true revenue value of every experience we deliver, before we build it, and after it runs."

— Stephen Martell, Chief Innovation Officer, DE-YAN

Evaluated against the MASB's Marketing Metric Accountability Protocol (MMAP), a rigorous review framework that assesses metrics on ten characteristics including relevance, predictive validity, objectivity, calibration, reliability, sensitivity, simplicity, causality, transparency, and quality assurance. The protocol's conclusion: ERIC provides a pragmatic framework for calculating both total and marginal return on investment from experiential marketing, accounting for direct purchases, digital amplification, word-of-mouth, extended lifetime value, and event costs.

"MASB is pleased to confer metric certification on the DE-YAN Experiential Revenue Impact Calculator, which brings much-needed rigor and transparency to financial attribution in experiential marketing," said Frank Findley, Executive Director of MASB. "Our work in sponsorship accountability has consistently identified measuring financial return as a key area for improvement, and ERIC's analytic approach represents a meaningful step forward in helping marketers quantify and validate experiential impact."

For an industry that has historically evaluated events on press coverage and post-event anecdotes, the certification is a structural shift and a landmark moment. Brands can now model the projected revenue impact of an activation before it runs, and appraise actual return after by using a methodology that holds up to the same financial scrutiny applied to any other marketing channel.

The study produced findings that reframe how experiential fits into the broader marketing mix. Among them: 89% of attendees said the event was the main reason they purchased, either during or after. The halo effect on other channels is just as striking, high-quality live experiences improve the performance of every marketing channel by an average of 47%, in some cases flipping negative-return placements into positive ones. In one example from the study, a -14% ROI on an Instagram Priority Placement turned into a 24% positive return when paired with a live brand experience. The halo effect, in other words, extends well beyond the audience in the room.

The Path That Led Here

DE-YAN's investment in measurement began not with a thesis, but with a result. When the studio was hired to create a high profile experience for a luxury retail brand, it was briefed as a brand moment, not a sales driver. But the data showed something different: a measurable, significant lift in sales directly attributable to the experience. The finding reoriented how DE-YAN thought about its work, and what it owed its clients.

That early signal led to Hyperion, DE-YAN's first proprietary real-time measurement platform, which captures behavioral data across activations: where attendees go, how long they stay, what they engage with, and what they abandon. Rather than reconstructing audience behavior after the fact, Hyperion gives DE-YAN and its clients live intelligence they can act on.

Deployed across projects including the NBA 2K League All-Star activation and Louis Vuitton Beauty, Hyperion has consistently turned instinct into evidence. At the NBA 2K activation in 2025, which was staged at a convention center adjacent to, rather than inside, the All-Star venue, Hyperion recorded an average dwell time of 42 minutes, lines stretching an hour and a half at peak, with a 78% completion rate through a five-stage experience. At Louis Vuitton Beauty, real-time video engagement data enabled mid-activation creative pivots that improved performance on the fly. The studio has many similar case studies showing this impact, including recent work for Puma that has continued to advance DE-YAN's data-informed approach across brand and culture contexts.

ERIC is the next step: built from the Avasta study, certified by MASB, and available to any marketer who wants to apply the same financial rigor to experiential investment that they apply to digital or programmatic spend.

From Cost Center to Profit Center

DE-YAN has long argued that the industry's measurement problem is not just a data problem, it's a positioning problem. When brands cannot prove the return on an activation, experiential defaults to a discretionary spend, become the first line item cut when budgets tighten, and the last to be given room to grow. ERIC is designed to change this.

With ERIC now in the MASB Marketing Metric Catalog, CMOs and marketing leaders have a credentialed, peer-reviewed framework to bring experiential into budget conversations with finance on the same terms as digital, out-of-home, or broadcast. The certification gives experiential what it has never had: a standardized basis for financial attribution that holds up to CFO scrutiny.

The broader argument DE-YAN is making goes further. A well-executed live experience doesn't just deliver its own return, it amplifies every other channel in the mix. When consumers who engage with a brand experience, or encounter one through earned media and word-of-mouth, become measurably more receptive to the brand's digital, social, and broadcast marketing, experiential stops functioning like a tactic and starts functioning like a multiplier. That is the shift DE-YAN is building toward: a future where brand experience is recognized as the most valuable form of media, and where connections replace clicks as the primary currency of brand growth.

About DE-YAN

DE-YAN is a global brand experience studio shaping the next era of human connection. With teams across the US, EU, Brazil, and Canada, DE-YAN brings together strategy, design, creative technology, and production to create experiences that move people and move culture. For over a decade, the studio has set the benchmark for how ambitious brands connect with their customers and drive measurable growth. Through proprietary tools and creative frameworks, including Hyperion, its real-time behavioral measurement platform, and ERIC, its MASB-certified ROI calculator, DE-YAN is building the measurement infrastructure and creative standards that define the next generation of brand experience. In an industry obsessed with automation and efficiency, DE-YAN believes the future belongs to brands that create something real. For more information, visit de-yan.com.

About MASB

The Marketing Accountability Standards Board (MASB) is an independent, private-sector body whose mission is to establish and advance marketing measurement and accountability standards across the industry. MASB's Marketing Metric Certification program reviews metrics, algorithms, and software using its Marketing Metric Accountability Protocol (MMAP). Certified metrics are added to the MASB Marketing Metric Catalog, the industry's authoritative reference for validated marketing measurement. For more information, visit themasb.org.

SOURCE DE-YAN