Posted by sofia.rodrigues on December 8, 2020
Have you ever attended a football match, live concert or any major live sporting event? Silly question, I suppose. Maybe you’ve even been lucky enough to attend one of the competitions at the Olympics? Remember what it felt like to be part of that crowd?
I’m sure you’d agree that the sheer number of people all cheering in unison, singing along to popular chants and supporting their favourite teams together creates a magical, unique atmosphere.
The spirit of an event, be it a sports match, a film premiere, or a live concert, is created by the audience. The more people take part, the higher the excitement and energy levels.
The same is true for B2B events. The more attendees you attract, the more conversations and chatter you generate, and the more successful your event will be.
So how do you capture as many attendees as you possibly can?
The simple answer is, by marketing your event in a smart manner that creates intrigue and generates interest even amongst casual attendees. Event promotion depends on your budget and the scale of event you are planning. If you have big sponsors backing you, you can afford to splurge on large, fancy billboards and glitzy advertisements. But even if your marketing budget is limited, there are a plethora of cool event promotion ideas you can use to reach as many people as possible. Read on to discover them!
13. Optimise your event registration website
Your event website is the single most powerful tool you can use to promote your event. By opting for an interesting event website template that captures the vibe of your function, you immediately grab the attention of users. A well-optimised event website not only provides users with the necessary information, but also act as a hub for registrations and payments. Here are the different ways in which you can optimise your event website:
a). Usability testing:
Web visitors form an impression of your website in as little as five seconds. It is important that the design and look of your website immediately spark the interest of visitors. Use tools like Usability Hub’s Five Second Test to better understand users’ experiences when navigating your website.
b). Heat mapping:
Heat maps are colour-coded to provide a visual representation of user activity on your website. Information about how much time visitors spend on your website, which features are most interesting to them, and even how far they scroll down the page is available at your fingertips!
c). A/B testing:
Through A/B testing, you can contrast two different versions of the same webpage to compare audience engagement. While A/B testing usually requires a certain level of technical skill, you can use tools like Optimizely to experiment with different design features, headlines, and call to actions.
d). Web analytics:
Do you use Google Analytics to keep track of visitors on your website? Trick question: your answer should be ‘Yes, of course’! Analytics have become the most important tool to gage the effectiveness of your website and analyse how many visitors might turn into paying attendees.
12. Offer Early Bird discounts
We all love discounts. A sure-fire way of getting more people to register for your event is to provide exclusive ‘early bird’ offers. Set a clear deadline for the early bird pricing or only put a limited number of tickets on offer – scarcity marketing will create a solid buzz around your event, while tempting attendees with a discount they can’t refuse.
11. Leverage social media
Given their massive audience outreach, Social media channels like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn have proved to be popular mediums for event promotion.
In the UK, Facebook has an active user base of over 30 million people, with around 80% of people in the 23-37 age bracket being frequent users. Here is how you can use Facebook to attract people to your event:
- Create a Facebook page centred around your event and share it in different groups. If your budget allows, go for paid promotion as well. This will generate quick returns for a small investment.
- Cross-promote the event with an event marketing partner who has considerable influence in generating buzz and increasing registrations.
- Use Facebook Live Video to stream your event promotion activities.
Twitter is another widely-used medium in the events industry. There are many ways through which you can promote your event on Twitter:
- Create a catchy hashtag for your event and find creative ways to get it trending. You could even devise a competition, encouraging registrants to retweet and include the event hashtag for the chance to win a prize!
- Create an influencer list and target them through smartly crafted @mentions.
- Host a Twitter chat, share live broadcasts.
Event organisers are also leveraging LinkedIn as an effective promotional tool to entice more attendees to their events. Given its huge professional user base, LinkedIn can help attract the right audience to your event. You can:
- Write an informative article that has share value.
- Post a short video highlighting all the exciting things about your event.
- Join different groups and promote your event.
Read the full article with more cool ideas here.
AUTHOR
Felicia Asiedu
An experienced CIM qualified marketing professional, Felicia is the European Marketing Manager at Cvent and has nearly 15 years’ sales and marketing experience in fast-moving technology businesses. She's responsible for the strategic direction of the marketing team in Europe, including expansion planning, campaign execution, demand generation and event management.
Before joining Cvent, Felicia held multiple marketing and business development positions with technology providers including Rackspace, Telecity Group (now Equinix), Infinity Data Centres and Merrill Corporation (now Datasite). Having had a healthy appetite for events for many years, she also has experience in planning and hosting both corporate and private events as well as speaking at both live and virtual events.
