San Jose went and turned a familiar NHL nickname into a spectacle that makes the game-day experience unmistakably its own.

My Edmonton Oilers visit San Jose this afternoon, and will have their hands full with or without Sharks superstar Macklin Celebrini on hand.

But imagine looking down at your skates and seeing a few great whites circling UNDER the ice.

The Sharks have recently added a creepy underwater illusion to their pregame show at SAP Center:

Animated sharks swim through rippling water projected onto the ice as the teams enter.

The rink seems like it’s an enormous, iced-over aquarium.

We all know it’s a projection, but it still gives me the willies.

“Shark Tank” has long been the arena’s nickname.

This illusion makes it feel eerily, wonderfully literal.

The animation uses the ice as its screen, with ripples and swimming movement creating the impression of depth as the “sharks” become bigger and clearer as they seem to approach ice level.

It joins a presentation that already included lasers and the (non-scary) giant shark-head entrance.

What I admire is how naturally the idea belongs to this team. A rink fulla circling sharks gives the nickname a physical presence and the fans something worth sharing with their friends.

The hockey starts at puck drop, but the experience customers paid for is already well underway.

That connects with the question behind I Need That: what makes an experience worth choosing? Here, the team is adding a moment you can anticipate, talk about and associate ONLY with bein’ in San Jose.

For product marketers, a familiar name or customer nickname can be a surprisingly useful creative brief.

Before inventing another dismembered message, look for ways to let customers experience the meaning you’ve already got.

(Preferably without feeding my Oilers to it.)

If you’d like help creating and marketing products people feel compelled to buy, the product marketing consultants at Graphos Product can help.