Being an event promoter, you must learn to sell yourself first for selling an event. That is a valuable tip you must always stick to!
Powerful events are an important success factor for any business. In fact, 31% of marketers have a consensus that events are a better marketing strategy for business success than other forms of marketing.
The need for business events resultantly stresses the need for competent event promoting organizations that can effectively turn events into a success.
An event without promotion is rendered useless if the targeted audience fails to show up!
All established brands/ companies place the fate of their events in the hands of these event planners who use every possible marketing avenue to create hype and buzz about the event in advance.
Whether an event will turn into success or not, totally depends on the skill of the event planner assigned to the duty.
Companies and firms would only want to pay you if they think you are capable enough of carrying out the job effectively.
But how do they gauge your skill with your passion? It is not redundant to say that sometimes marketers need marketing too!
The more you advertise yourself, the more popular you are!
However, here are a few tips for staying relevant in the market that will be helpful for all the event promoters out there and also for those who are aspiring to be!
#1. Voluntarily work with event promoting companies
The frequency of events is significantly increasing as the statistics suggest that between 2017 to 2018 the number of companies organizing 20 or more events per year increased by 17%.
This highlights your never-ending demand in the market, but you need to have some experience to be able to commence your career professionally.
All well-established and multinational companies hire people who have some prior experience in a particular area.
You will rarely see them hiring inexperienced and amateur people as they can’t afford to jeopardize the image they’ve built over the years.
If your long-term goal is to be associated with a known event promotion company or you aim to establish an organization of your own, start off with voluntarily associating yourself with other event promoting organizations.
The experience will surely equip you with expertise that will prove to be helpful in establishing yourself as an independent event marketer eventually.
If you wish to get paid, you can find a temporary job in an event promoting company or get an internship to enhance your skill.
#2. Free work
Learn the ins and outs of your craft by actively participating in your area of interest i.e. event promotion.
Extend a helping hand with the ongoing tasks in your niche just to gain hands-on experience.
Establishing a reputable name for yourself is never an easy job to do.
You need to work your fingers to the bone to achieve the place where you aspire to be.
Initially, you will have to do a lot of struggle to gradually make your way up to success.
This may even require you to render your services for free for a while!
Yes, you read it right!
Well I know nobody wants to work for free but you have to trust me with this one.
The free work you do can be a great opportunity to promote events with minimum risk. Once you work for someone else or start your own event promoting business, the accountability naturally increases.
The slightest mistake can bring forth unwanted circumstances for you.
When you’re doing free event planning, make sure you pay attention to every detail so you can refrain from committing blunders ahead!
#3. Keep your fee minimal initially
If you’ve just stepped into the business I would suggest you not to charge an exorbitant fee as there is no customer trust developed in you yet and people will be reluctant to take the risk.
Keep your charges moderate and negotiable. Once you manage to establish a strong foothold in the market and people begin to trust you, you can gradually increase your charges.
In the business world, this strategy is referred to as penetration pricing i.e. you scale up your prices gradually once you’ve managed to penetrate the market!
Also, try giving the consultation free, which could make you naturally more approachable for the people.
#4. Be Responsible
The demand for event promoters never dies as 68% of B2B marketers agree that live events give the most advantages in terms of business competition.
This point can be proved by taking Apple’s example into consideration and how its annual products launching event is a huge success.
There is no denying that event promotion is a job that poses immeasurable stress on the nerves given the degree of responsibility that falls on an event marketer’s shoulders.
Always make sure that everything is in the right place because your answerability is the highest in the scenario.
You have to be extremely careful and diligent with the given task at hand!
Take care of all the aspects and arrangements to eliminate the slightest chances of mistakes.
Make sure to have things done before time!
Always strive to provide your clients with the best you can. Provide them with experience by making their event so successful that they turn into your long-term happy clients.
You can certainly achieve that by being consistent in the good quality that you provide.
Revolver Productions, an event management company based in New York, offers event marketing and planning services.
Big-named companies like Yves Saint Laurent, Google, Forbes, and Giorgio Armani have been their clients for a reason!
#5. Networking with people
Networking with people can be a great source of introducing yourself into new circles.
There are networking events for a reason! Don’t forget to carry brochures, posters, and business cards with you and spread the news of your event briefly.
Try attending events that fall within the scope of your business. Meet new people and build acquaintances that can help you with the business in the future.
Make sure to be very forthcoming and friendly.
You need to socialize well to be able to inform people of your skill.
The contacts you make can certainly be of great help in bringing you business. Once you manage to be on the word of the mouth, the rest follows itself!
#6. Attend seminars and courses
There is no limit to learning no matter how cosmopolitan and adept you become. Whether you are an established or aspiring event promoter, be always open to learning and improving your craft.
You can take courses, online or otherwise, for learning new techniques applicable in your field. The greater the exposure, the more the learning!
Moreover, seminars can be a great source for acquiring knowledge.
These are the events where attendees are educated about a particular subject.
Event management related seminars might give you an insight into how practically and ethically enhanced client service can be implemented in an efficient manner.
Whenever you come across such a seminar, get yourself registered right away for improving your skill better!
#7. Learn to sell yourself
You have to learn the art of selling yourself.
The first thing you should always consider is to look presentable as it has a huge impact. According to the statistics, 41% of businesses are more willing to promote or hire better-dressed people.
Smile more and try maintaining a pleasant demeanor and be someone who is constantly willing to improve themselves.
And if you’re lucky enough to have a gift of the gab, convincingly promote yourself to the people with the power of your words!
Whether you run a private business or work in an event promoting organization, you need to sell yourself to your respective clients or employers.
#8. Beep up your online advertising
The global digital video ad revenue is expected to grow from 23.06 billion U.S. dollars in 2017 to 52.76 billion in 2023, underscoring the importance of digital advertisement!
As far as online promotion is concerned, first and foremost, you need to leverage social media capabilities. Start off with creating official pages for your company on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
Take well-lit photos that appropriately capture the ambiance and demonstrate what people can anticipate at your event.
Photographs are all that is going to attract your potential customer through social media so make sure to have them on point!
You may also create interesting video content about an upcoming event to attract people significantly.
Keep posting the events you promote along with the upcoming events while keeping the audience engaged.
That way more and more people will come to know about you!
Moreover, you can make use of the Facebook ads-advertising your business, to target a wider spectrum of audience.
Be active and keep the social media sites updated with all your details mentioned there. You never know who could find your work well and approach you online!
Join different groups on social media for keeping abreast of what is happening new within your industry!
Furthermore, don’t discount the power of Google ads that can play a great role in bringing you more business. You simply need to pay for getting your website on the top of google generated results.
This will surely help as people are more likely to tap links that appear on the top!
#9. SMS Marketing
Like I said earlier, it is not wrong to say that event promoters need to promote themselves too!
Hence, you must be utilizing all avenues of marketing for yourself at the same time!
The texting campaign never fails to generate results given its exceptionally good opening rate of SMS that stands at 98%.
If I may say, it is undoubtedly one of the most convenient and effective methods of marketing. Moreover, it is important to choose the right provider for that as well. Express text can provide you a seamless experience in this regard.
Send out texts to your potential clients letting them know about the services you offer and also if there is an event coming up.
Anybody interested will contact you back right away.
People will never come to you unless they know your existence as an event promoter and for that very purpose you need to adopt the right marketing strategies for yourself also.
#10. Send ticket reminders to your customers
Create a sense of urgency by sending reminders to the customers for grabbing tickets before they are all sold out.
Sending reminders will serve to ring a bell for the customers who were willing to purchase the ticket but were procrastinating all this time!
Send texts or emails so they don’t miss out on the event.
#11. Use influencer market
The highest level of “influencer marketing” is the paid brand ambassador.
Hunt for influential people with a huge fan base online such as celebrities, subject-matter experts, popular bloggers, YouTube stars.
You can pay them to create strategic and timely posts to generate hype about your event.
#12. Donating tickets can be a good idea
Of course, ticket sales are crucial for achieving your event goals, however, ticket donations can help you reach another level.
This will also allow you to build relationships with other organizations effectively.
The losses of the direct sales can be compensated, through loyalty and promotion, so keep a few tickets aside and offer them deliberately as gifts!
#13. Use Print Media
You can sell the event by getting an ad published in the newspapers or famous magazines.
Also, get vinyl banners printed and get them placed in high traffic areas.
Don’t forget to invest in pull up banner stands which can be used inside to promote your event and can be displayed at the venue for a considerable time before the event, to achieve maximum engagement.
Conclusion
Event promotion is not a child’s play. It requires a great amount of hard work for turning any event into a success.
Remember that you are selling yourself with every event promotion you undertake, so this is not a job for the coward.
It requires taking constant risks and application of useful marketing strategies!
Moreover, make sure to learn about what’s new out there so you can develop your event promotion plan keeping in line with the modern-day demands!