Event Marketing: What It Is, Strategies, Ideas & Examples

Event marketing consists of all the activities of creating, planning and managing corporate events in collaboration with the other means of communication used by the company, in order to reach its target audience.

It is a very effective strategy that every company uses, in fact, events are able to benefit guests and sponsors.

The objective of event marketing is to promote, through events, a brand, a product or a service, leaving customers with a unique experience, giving added value that leaves its mark more than other marketing investments.

Compared to classic advertising , event marketing is able to attract many more target people and involve them in a unique and sharing moment, to make the message you want to convey more effective.

Types of event marketing

Among the types of event marketing, we find those that are linked to the acronym MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences, Exhibitions): conference activities, incentive systems , organization of corporate travel.

The definition of event, however, nowadays is also defined in reference to other areas of communication that the company offers, in fact other types of event marketing can be identified:

• Trade fairs: large organized events that take into consideration a specific sector or type of product. Trade shows give companies the opportunity to showcase their products and services;
• Seminars : organized events that focus on training and take into consideration a small number of people. Discussions, conferences and networking opportunities take place in the seminars ;
• Conferences: events organized for customers, with prize competitions and sponsorships.

Pop-up stores, also called temporary shops, can be defined as event marketing. They are spaces used mainly by e-commerce for the temporary sale of products in a specific environment.

Who is suitable for promotion through event marketing?

Event marketing is most often used by companies that meet the following criteria:

• Stable profit. It is irrational to invest money in an event when the company cannot pay the loan or the work of contractors. If an expensive event brings new losses, it will be even more difficult to get out of the crisis.
• Recognized brand. It is easier for well-known companies to attract guests and participants. A market newcomer usually needs large budgets for this.
• Marketing budget. Events require financial investments. However, some events do not bring immediate profit, since they do not directly sell anything. This must be taken into account when planning.
• Readiness for dialogue. Management and brand representatives know how to communicate with clients and partners, listen to opinions, answer questions, calmly respond to comments and take them into account in further work.

In general , events are a great way to pump up your brand and increase sales in the long term. Therefore, newcomers to the market often use event marketing to increase awareness. According to the Event Marketing 2018 Benchmarks and Trends report , 80% of marketers believe that events are critical to business success.

The advantages of event marketing

Event marketing is an excellent strategy that helps companies succeed and brings several advantages:

• Generate leads and sales: events for the launch of a product, promotional tours, musical, sporting and cultural events are carried out, which are aimed at increasing the popularity of a brand and a product;
• Customers are more involved: thanks to event marketing, it is possible to involve many current or potential customers during events;
• Builds better brand awareness: Hosting or attending events is an effective way for businesses to grow their brand;
• Encourage product education : the event also includes an “educational” component for participants: it doesn't just focus on a brand or product, but on other features not related to the commercial aspect.

The modern customer wants much more than a simple brochure to make purchasing decisions, so event marketing was created to build relationships between customer and company and build loyalty in order to return to purchase its products.

Event Marketing Tools

Let's look at the most popular types of events in event marketing.

Conferences

These are large business events where business representatives discuss current topics in their industry. The program includes expert presentations and reports by speakers, workshops, and networking . Conferences are suitable for promoting B2B and B2C companies .

Festivals

They are organized for a target audience - for example, a music festival for those who sing and like to listen to music, or a beer festival for those who drink a foamy drink. Often, event marketing tools are limited only by the marketer’s imagination. But at the same time, it does not use standard indicators to evaluate effectiveness, because it is very difficult and sometimes impossible to calculate the conversion from a thematic event.

Seminars and master classes

These are educational events for a limited number of participants. Their main goal is training and retraining. They involve expert speeches, discussions, presentations, and communication in question-and-answer format.

VIP events

Events for especially important persons associated with the company: influential shareholders, sponsors, ambassadors , honorary clients. They are organized to maintain VIP loyalty to the brand, strengthen relationships with them and continue further cooperation.

Forums for industry leaders

These are events to discuss global issues related to the economy, social sphere and other socially significant topics. They involve well-known, reputable companies that occupy leading positions in the market. They exchange opinions, share experiences, discuss current problems.

Presentations

At such events, the company presents new products to clients, potential buyers and partners. The main goal of such an event is to interest the audience, clearly demonstrate the benefits of the product and increase sales.

Exhibitions

These are events to showcase and sell products from one or more industry brands. They allow you to attract customers, increase profits, and find partners for cooperation. One of the key promotion channels for B2B companies.

Lotteries

This event has a gaming element so it can be used for a wide target audience. For example, you can create your own lottery and advertise it to all clients and customers to attract participants.

Recreational activities

Festivals, concerts, holidays and parties make the brand more recognizable and create an emotional connection with the audience. Events come in different themes and sizes - from a small closed corporate event for employees to a large music festival designed for hundreds of thousands of guests.

Online events

In 2020, after the start of the pandemic, the popularity of online events increased. Conferences, presentations, concerts and many other events can be held in the virtual space if the company does not have the opportunity or desire to organize an offline event.

Launching an online event is easier, faster and cheaper. There is no need to spend money on renting a site and equipment, furniture and catering. And you also have no geographical restrictions - speakers and guests can connect to the event from anywhere in the world. This allows you to increase your coverage.

Online events are very popular in the educational environment. They are a key tool for selling information products.

How to organize an event and evaluate its effectiveness

Any event, even a small one, requires preparation. To organize an event, follow the algorithm:

1. Set goals. Determine why your company needs this event. What results will it bring: will attract leads , improve brand awareness, talk about a new product.
2. Select a format. Start from your tasks and your niche. A presentation is suitable for selling a new product; a concert or a children's party is suitable for strengthening audience loyalty.
3. Make an estimate. Think carefully about what the organization needs. Include all expenses in the estimate: from renting premises to purchasing disposable tableware.
4. Schedule tasks. Break the work into stages. Determine when advertising flyers must be ready, a host must be booked, or catering must be ordered. If a team is working on a project, identify those responsible for each item. Don’t forget to think through your interaction with the audience after the event in advance: prepare letters, posts on social networks, and send out diplomas/certificates, if any.
5. Announce in advance. Tell us about the event. Use your own email and social media subscriber base, contextual and targeted advertising. This will help expand the audience of the event.
6. Host an event. Don't forget to take pictures and video. The content will be useful for social networks and reports on the website.
7. Collect and process feedback to understand whether participants enjoyed the event and how to improve it in the future.

After the event, it is necessary to evaluate its effectiveness. This will help you understand whether the event paid off, whether you managed to achieve your goals, find errors and correct them in the future. Most often, marketers evaluate the following criteria:

Attendance. It can be difficult to determine at mass offline events, but for webinars it is one of the key metrics. Be sure to evaluate the parameter in terms of the number of registered users. This will help you understand whether mailings and bots with reminders worked well.

Cost-benefit ratio . If one of your goals was to generate income, calculate how much money you spent and how much you earned.

Mentions on the Internet. Check whether users often wrote about the event on social networks, the media and thematic groups. This can be done manually or using special programs. Thematic hashtags for the event make this task easier - come up with and launch them in advance.

Leads . Look how many new clients the event brought. To do this, you can give event participants special promotional codes or discount coupons with a time limit.

Summarize the event taking into account the metrics, discuss the result with the team. This way you will understand whether you need events and how to make them effective and profitable for your company.

How to promote an event

To gather as many guests as possible, you need to take care of promoting the event. Start talking about the event in advance, at least a couple of weeks in advance. Engage your audience, use different channels at the same time.

Own website

Event websites are needed to inform users, register participants and sell tickets. Most often, this is a standard landing page with a contact collection form and the ability to buy online.

Create a resource in advance and publish useful information about the event: introduce speakers, organizers and participants, describe the event program, indicate the date, time and location of the event, add calls to action .

Social networks and instant messengers

Social networks have different tools for promotion: separate public event pages, advertising, seeding in other communities and placements with bloggers. With their help, companies distribute information to the widest possible audience.

On social networks, it is convenient to motivate users to post UGC content. Invite participants to post photos with the event hashtag and create a cool photo zone. You will receive good coverage, photos of guests and feedback.

Messengers use partner placements in popular Telegram channels for promotion, and also implement chatbots . The bot will write an announcement of the event, send a link for registration, and remind you of the start of the event. This tool is often used for webinars.

Email newsletters

Create a chain of emails that will guide the user through the sales funnel . Invite subscribers to take part in the event, tell them about the benefits, and send a reminder about the event.

Also, ask your colleagues, friends and partners to tell you about your event in their newsletters: on a commercial basis, by barter or for free. 😊

Stages Of Organizing An Event

The effectiveness of event marketing depends on the correct organization of events. An entrepreneur has three options:

• contact an event agency that organizes a turnkey event;
• create a staff unit in the marketing department that will be responsible only for the event direction;
• resolve organizational issues independently.

If the latter path is chosen, the progress of the work should be planned correctly.

Setting Goals And Defining Objectives

Organization begins with setting a goal and defining the objectives that the event must solve. Depending on this, the format of the event is determined - an exhibition, the opening of a new outlet, a competition, and others.

To make it easier to evaluate the event at the next stages, you need to set a measurable goal. For example, not just attract new clients, but increase the client base by 15%.

Determining The Target Audience

Once goals and objectives are defined, you need to focus on the desired target audience. It is important to choose the target audience segment for which the event will be designed. Then representatives of the segment need to be invited directly, for example, by sending an email or calling the customer base. If the goal is to expand the circle of clients, then you will need to attract new people to the event. The same advertising channels should be used as for promoting the product. For example, create and promote a group on social networks, launch targeted or contextual advertising.

At this stage it is important to plan the number of guests. It depends on the theme of the event, the format of the event and the technical equipment of the site.

Choosing A Theme And Script

The topic and format of the event should correspond to the interests of the target audience and leave the company the opportunity to promote its product. You can study the experience of competitors if they have already organized holidays for a similar target audience. Also, the type of holiday depends on the company’s budget. If it is not possible to organize a large-scale festival, you can hold a small celebration:

• Master Class;
• seminar for clients;
• client day dedicated to a specific product or brand.

Promotion

In order for enough people to come to the event, you need to notify them about it. Notification methods depend on the preferences of the target audience. But the announcement period is universal: you can start an advertising campaign 1–3 months in advance if the event is large and requires preparation on the part of visitors, or 2–3 weeks in advance if it is local and small. It is important to remind visitors about it 1–2 days before the start of the event via a call or email.

Summarizing

After the event is over, it is important to take stock and evaluate whether the goal was achieved. Since the goal was set as measurable, it will be easy for the company to evaluate quantitative results, for example, the number of guests relative to the planned one, the budget spent, the number of applications received.

It is important to evaluate the qualitative results. To do this, you need to get feedback from visitors. Here's what you can ask:

• Was the holiday interesting and useful?
• What can organizers do next time to make visitors more satisfied?

It's important to remember that event marketing is about long-term results. Therefore, even if there was no increase in sales immediately after the event, it may occur in the future.

Effective Event Marketing Strategies and Ideas You Should Try

Now that you have defined and researched your target audience, we will discuss what effective event marketing strategies and ideas you should try at your next event.

1. Share a press release with the media

Event Marketing Phase: Primary event launch phase, but also pre-registration and throughout the day-to-day phase.

This one is pretty self explanatory. By sharing your formal press release with the media, you can expand your reach to spread the word to your target attendees. Additionally, a formal press release will be important in securing your sponsors and could help gain the attention of influencers, who in turn could help promote your event.

If the main goal of your event is to build brand awareness and build relationships with businesses and influencers, then this event marketing strategy is a “must” .

2. Early Bird Records

Event Marketing Phase: Event Launch Phase Selling early bird tickets at a lower price is a very popular event marketing tactic, simply because it is still very effective in two ways:

• You're building a sense of urgency : “get it before it's gone,” which is very effective in attracting conversions. Selling early bird tickets can also help with event cash flow.
• People will talk about it, and that's why it's very effective to make noise and expand your reach.

The idea of early bird registrations is quite simple: you will increase the ticket price closer to the event, and you can create several stages or phases depending on the timeline and purposes of the event.

Another reason early bird discounts are so popular is that you can easily link them to other event marketing strategies, for example by mentioning the lead-up to the early bird discount expiration in your press release or email newsletter. . It is very versatile and cost-effective, it is a must!

3. Effective pre-event promotions

Very often people focus on the launch of the event and the sale of tickets, but the pre-event registration phase is also very important.

You can create a pre-event page (e.g. on Facebook or your own website), which can be very effective in generating early interest. You can use the page to capture leads that you can contact again once the event is officially launched, and you can also run contests and giveaways to help build event awareness.

A good pre-event page can also help with the SEO performance of your event site. So, this should be an important consideration if you plan to build a website/blog in the long term.

4. Social media marketing

Event Marketing Phase: All Again, this one is pretty obvious: in the age of social media, it only makes sense to promote your event on the social media platforms where your target audience is most prevalent.

Social media marketing is useful in all phases of event marketing: to make noise and boost the launch of your event, to attract your target audience and ultimately to build community.

An important approach in social media event marketing is creating an event hashtag. The hashtag should be unique enough that it doesn't get lost in all the noise, but at the same time it should be familiar enough that your target audience can find it easily.

5. Content Marketing

Event Marketing Phase: All Writing on your own site, as well as guest posting on blogs and sites relevant to your niche, can be a great way to establish your thought leadership, which can actually help attract more people to your event. to register.

The most important principle here is not only to use your content to promote your event, but also to try to provide value to your target audience and establish your credibility. You should also use SEO strategies to boost your content to attract more people to consume this content.

6. Paid channels

Event marketing phase: mainly day-to-day marketing It's no secret: we can't always rely on free and organic marketing if we really want to optimize our reach and conversions. You will probably need to invest some money in paid advertising options: social media ads, Google Ads, retargeting ads, sponsored posts, influencer marketing, among others.

When investing in these paid channels, it is crucial to understand these roles in comparison to organic options:

Organic channels are very inexpensive, even free, but you will probably need to spend a significant amount of time before you get the desired results. Paid channels, on the other hand, can guarantee short-term results as long as you have the money, but they can get really expensive if you're not careful. It's important to focus on your overall event marketing strategy to find the balance between the two.

7. Email Marketing

Marketing phase of the event: mainly day-to-day marketing, but also all phases.

Email is still a fairly effective marketing channel and is especially powerful in event marketing.

You can send an “email blast” to potential attendees who have registered their interests on the pre-event page, and you can also send periodic emails to promote early bird stages and also generate more traffic to your content.