8 Effective Event Marketing Strategies

Many organizations evaluate the success of their event based on two key metrics: The financial aspect includes the money collected while the quantitative aspect touching on event success focuses on people who attended the event. These two are closely linked, and choosing the right event marketing strategy will address both issues.

Event marketing is a vital area of focus for any organizer because it entails the entire procedure of publicizing the event, creating goodwill and sustaining good relations with the attendees.

Of course, there is a lot of advice that is available on how to market an event, however, this article will provide what we believe are the best marketing tips for event management companies, to help take your marketing to the next level.

What is Event Marketing?

Event marketing can be defined as the promotional activities that a firm deploys to market its goods and services, or brand via events either in-person or online. It encompasses diverse forms of events, be they social or corporate, ranging from product releases, end-of-year parties, classes, demos, and many others, at either, online or physical events.

The Importance of Event Marketing for Businesses & Non-Profits 

Event marketing is one of the best options to create awareness of your products and boost interaction among your existing and potential clients. Event marketing can help you to: 

1. Generate sales and fundraising dollars

Fundraisers are, undoubtedly, the most typical and encompass a wide variety of events and activities aimed at collecting money. Walkathons, charity dinners, telethons, etc. 

2. Grow your email list

Promotion through events is effective in making people develop a conscience about your business. As people signed up for the event or provided their name and email on the sign-in sheet, one knows that they agreed to know more and consented to receive the information. 

3. Engage individual customers as a way of building a rapport with them

Friend-makers do not invest in the funds. It’s about visibility, networking, entertainment and keeping folks interested. Examples of friendly promotional events include mixers, lectures, sessions and giveaways. 

4. Build brand awareness

Other industries benefit from hosting events for their small businesses. Think about it: when people register for an event or when people write their name and email on the sign-in list, then it means that they are interested in what you are offering. That means, you know to whom you have to advertise on emails and social media and can get direct feedback from customers. 

When being engaged in a small business or organization, it is very crucial to be creative when advertising the products and services being offered.

8 Event Management Marketing Strategies

Event management companies conceptualise and execute all types of Business-to-Business (B2B) and Business-to-Consumer (B2C) events and several of them would be engaged in marketing the event so that there is maximum turnout. Below are eight of the best ideas that any corporate event management company can employ when planning and marketing events to ensure there is enough demand and that clients receive the best experience.

1. Always have the metrics in mind when planning

Event marketing should always be strategic and should serve your business’s purposes. When planning your event, be sure to have certain goals that require your attention in mind. For instance, if the aim of the event is media coverage ensure that journalists are invited and press kits are provided. For B2B, if the aim is to seek partnerships, make sure to have a chance to network and invite potential partners, coming up with speeches to capitalize on this moment.

2. Developing target market personas

Knowing your target market is something crucial when it comes to marketing. Create target markets—real characters that mirror different types of attendees that you expect at your event. Demographics such as age, occupation, and motivation should be taken, alongside what they anticipate from your event. Marketing to each persona is more effective because the strategies used are specific to the persona.

3. Prioritize inbound marketing

Inbound marketing on the other hand is about getting people to come to you with a focus on adding value. While it may be tempting to make a post directly hawking the event, the best strategy is to create content related to topics of interest to your audience, which will lead them to the event. Be a good friend to the audience that has participated in the event by offering them incentives like early bird privileges or good service that could make them post on social media about your event.

4. Optimize & enhance attendee engagement map

This concept begins when the attendee attends no other event and ends when the attendee is done with the event. Identify all the crucial steps—starting from how potential attendees come across your event and ending with ways that you sustain the interest after the event is over. Engage the audience before the event with teasers, storytelling valuable content, materials, surveys or other networking opportunities.

5. Generate excitement with email marketing

Email marketing is a genius way of reaching out to attendees before the event. As opposed to social networks, emails provide a personal and selective, private character. Set up automated emails for everyone who registers, including:

• Welcome confirmation
• Event specifications and history
• Pre-preparation tips and useful information
• Industry-related content

A continuous engagement helps create buzz around the event and retain the attendees’ awareness making their experience memorable even before they arrive at the event.

6. Leverage networking at industry events 

Leveraging means seeking opportunities to network with industry players in various events targeted to your industry.

One good marketing technique that event organizers can adopt is to attend other events in the same industry. Tell attendees who you are and what you do, people may not know about your event and networking with them will make them aware. It also helps in creating awareness and credibility in the market.

7. Designated space for attendees

Loyalty incentives are attractive to your event and are available for purchase. Organize an area in the virtual or face-to-face event through which participants can mingle and get to additional content. It makes the event experience not just for the day but continues it, which grows the bonds of relation creating a sense of belonging and hence more attendance.

8. Gather post-event feedback

Marketing can be defined as the process of creating, communicating, delivering and exchanging offerings that have value for customers in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders for improved consumer response and organizational performance in the marketplace. It is important to request feedback after an event to know what measures proved to be effective and which ones need enhancements.

It not only extends the interaction but is also quite beneficial to gain input for improvement for the next events. Also pointing out that feedback results in changes helps prove that you are devoted to improving the experience, and strengthening your brand’s authority.