Over the past decade events have become increasingly popular as people chase “experiences” over “purchases”. This may come as little surprise given that research demonstrates that spending money on experiences over possessions can lead to greater happiness. While this is encouraging and shows signs of a growing market, it also means there is far more competition than previously, and event organisers need to pay close attention to their event marketing strategies.
Event Marketing Strategies – Component Breakdown
Event marketing strategies should start with a clear goal in mind. For example, are you trying to sell a certain number of tickets, attract a particular level of sponsorship or some other goal? Once you have this clearly defined, you can start to articulate a strategy to achieve it.
Event marketing strategies typically include things such as:
- Content Marketing – Articles and blog posts can be a great way to generate interest in the run-up to your event. This could include content on your own site, but also guest posts on other relevant sites that your target audience might read.
- Social Media – Event marketing strategies have certainly shifted over the past few years and social media has become increasingly important. Not only can you engage the relevant target demographic for your event, but social media also gives them a platform to discuss and share the event with each other.
- Paid Ads – Paid adverts, either via platforms like Google AdWords or banner ads on other sites, can be a great way to generate immediate interest in your event and drive traffic back to your own site.
- Platform listings – As events have become more popular a whole network has grown up of sites advertising different events. This includes event discovery sites like Eventbrite, but there may also be more niches sites relating to your specific industry or area of focus.
- Email – If you already have a large customer base, depending on their contact preferences, you may be able to easily reach them via email as one of your event marketing strategies. Alternatively, if you’re just starting out, you may be able to use an incentive to collect people’s email addresses through your site so that you can contact them in the future.
- Partnerships – Partnering with other brands and organisations with a similar target audience can be a great way to market events. If you are not directly competing with them, working together to promote the event, or leveraging the audience of another brand can be mutually beneficial to both companies.
Event Marketing – AsOne Style
At AsOne we’ve been helping business from a vast range of industries to market their products and services for over a decade. Whether you are looking to host an event to promote an existing aspect of your business, or you want to market a one-off event, we can help you to select the best event marketing strategies to ensure you achieve your goals.
For more information on how AsOne can help craft event marketing strategies to meet your specific needs, don’t hesitate to get in touch and speak to one of our expert marketers. For companies based in the North East, we are proud to be affiliated with the NEBSF funding scheme, which entitles qualifying businesses to up to 40% off the cost of their first project.
