When putting so much time and energy into planning your event, you want to make sure that you do the promotion right. To generate the highest amount of registrants, you need a mix of email, social, public relations, and other types of paid promotions to get the biggest bang for your buck. By communicating with your audience early and often leading up to the event, you will have a better turnout as your event will be top of mind for your attendees. Just like lead nurturing, successful event promotion will consist of a series of touches that may include press releases, emails, direct mail, and call downs. Remember to take into consideration what sort of event you are hosting when determining the promotional tactics that will draw in prospects or customers. Promotions for webinars and online events will often rely on emails, while those for offline events may take a multi-touch approach.
Direct Mail
Online marketing efforts aren’t the only way to drive event engagement. In fact, using multiple marketing tactics can drive huge results. Direct mail is one tactic often overlooked by marketers for events. While conversion rates can be low if not done right, with planning, timely follow-up, and creative packaging, a direct mail piece can bridge the gap between online and offline engagement, and drive high response rates. You can use many different tools for your direct mail efforts, with different features that could be of use to your team. For example, by adding direct mail applications to your marketing software and CRM system, you can send out a direct mail piece and track it from the moment the vendor creates the package all the way to the moment it hits the prospect’s desk. Are you on a budget? Opt for applications or vendors that can send the direct mail pieces without any tracking. This keeps the cost low, but you can still be track the pieces if you include a Personalized URL (Purl)
Finding the right number and times for email promotions for an event has a great deal to do with the type of event you are promoting. For a larger trade show, you should send a series of promotional emails starting roughly a month before the actual event, and spaced a week or a little more apart. This allows people to plan accordingly. The same principles apply to online events (e.g., webinars and virtual conferences), but on a smaller, less intense scale. When people don’t physically have to attend an event, they are more likely to forget about it. For online events, it’s best to begin promotions 2-3 weeks beforehand so your event is fresh in the minds of your attendees. Many marketers worry of underpromotion. Does this sound familiar? “Our reg numbers are too low! We won’t hit our numbers! Send a blast today, and the day after tomorrow, and Saturday, the day before, and the morning of…” This sort of behavior leads to deadly over-promotion. Once someone receives an email a few times with the exact same offer and there’s no click, any more promotions will only frustrate your audience lead to un-subscribes.
Plan Template Event: Revenue Rockstar Tour Event Description: Marketo hosted roadshow tour Promotional Timeline: • Announcement: Multi-city email invite + big-bang press release • 2 weeks prior: Individual city invite • 1 week prior: Individual city invite v2 • 2 days prior: Limited space invite • 2 days prior: Automated voicemail confirmation (prospects only) • 1 day prior: Reminder email
Banner and display
– These types of ads appear on a website and can be effective at driving new names to register for and attend your event. You can either place your ads on sites that you think your target audiences frequent, or you can sign up for a retargeting campaign where your ads are targeted based on your audience’s internet preferences.
Search engine marketing
– People search for the events that they want to attend. Make sure you put ads on Google, Yahoo, and Bing to maximize your exposure. When someone searches for an event or a webinar having to do with your expertise, catch their attention with search ads.
Sponsored newsletter and emails
– By using sponsored emails, you have access to a target audience that might not otherwise be reached.
Guerilla marketing
– This is a form of marketing that tries to generate brand awareness at a low cost by using atypical methods like graffiti, flash mobs, and poster campaigning.
TV & radio advertising
– You can use radio or TV to deliver a scripted message to attract new clients. Just keep in mind that this form of advertising is less targeted.
Outdoor advertising
– This is advertising that appears when someone is in transit, or at an activity outside of their home or office, in order to drive awareness or encourage a specific call-to-action. Billboards are a prime example of this, as are ads targeted to commuters on buses or in subways. These ads are also less targeted so they are best for brand awareness.
Print advertising
– From flyers to newspapers and magazine ads, print advertising includes all advertising found in printed media. Put an ad for your event in an industry-specific magazine or print fliers to give out at smaller networking events.
Social Media
Being active on social networks before, during, and after your event is the bread and butter of your event social strategy. Since events are in real time, attendees often use social networks to get updates and to engage with other participants in a live environment. During an event, social networks offer a unique opportunity to interact directly with your audience and have them share your message.
PR
Press Release: While it’s unlikely your event will be picked up by national press, its still worthwhile issuing a press release and getting it sent out through free distribution channels.
If you write it with key search terms in mind, then anyone with Google Alerts set up for those terms will see your release, and you may get some local or niche press pick-up.
If you are looking for wider press coverage, then you need to avoid talking about your event in a formulaic way, where you focus only on the date, location, price etc.
You can’t focus on features or even benefits – that’s sales copy and not a news story. Instead you need to focus on one of two unique angles.
The first: why your event is completely novel, strange, a landmark first, quirky etc. Think about whether commuters would chuckle about it or be curious about it if they read it on page 5 of their paper on the way to work. Chances are if they would, a journalist may also pick up on it.
The second: dive into the human element. Are you (or anyone involved in the event) an interesting story? Have you overcome adversity and challenges? Is there a weird or funny story attached to how and why you’ve come to organise this event? Telling the human story is a universal strategy of mainstream press, so play to that if you can.