7 Event Marketing Ideas Used by Professionals
by Micaela Navarro, 15 December 2022Updated 12 September 2024Event marketing is a technique to promote events to a highly relevant audience. If you are hosting an industry event soon, you have a great opportunity to meet some decision-makers and attract investors. A good event can also build brand awareness and encourage sales.
However, when brands go about planning an event, only a few have inspiration. Attendees are often drowning in overused concepts, reliving events they have attended before. So how do you create an event that no one wants to miss?
Seven Amazing Event Marketing Ideas You’ll Love
Event marketing works for small businesses and big brands alike. Instead of employing the same concepts over and over again, it’s time to get creative. In this event marketing guide, we will show you some of the best ideas to help your event soar.
- Define Your Event
First in our list of event marketing ideas is the conceptualization phase, where you need to define your event’s positioning and unique value proposition. Determine what makes your event worth attending — similar to how one needs to evaluate what makes their company stand out for successful lead generation.
You must create a positioning statement that communicates your event’s selling point. For instance, if you are hosting an Instagram marketing event, you might try something like, “The only place where you can learn about _____ marketing.”
Similarly, you’ll need a value proposition that can appear as a catchy tagline. Consider following this template: “This event will help you master your _____ skills by helping you _____ and stay up to date with _____ .”
- Brand Your Event
Branding your event is about creating a unique brand voice, designing visuals that reflect your company’s values and style, and composing a consistent look and feel for prospective attendees. Research shows that consistency can significantly increase event revenue.
But what separates a good event from a must-attend event? Some say it’s the speakers, others think it’s the event location or entertainment options. But the reality is, it’s the hype around it. So you must focus on branding and create a memorable name, color scheme, messaging, and imagery. Branded swag boxes dazzle attendees before or after registration and deliver a signature experience around your event.
- The QR Code Approach
QR codes are a modern way to attract people to specific digital channels. Users can simply scan these codes with their phones to open the event’s website, view more details on a specific landing page, preview videos, see time and location, and link to other resources. They can even link the event details to their digital calendars with a single tap.
To set this up, you’ll need a dynamic QR code generator. And fortunately, setting things up is straightforward. You can directly increase attendee engagement with a QR code on your flyers, event tickets, and at the event entry.
One of thebest event activation ideas is to ask your attendees to ask and clear their doubts or even share their reviews and feedback by scanning the QR code, which can be helpful for future events.
- Promote Mini-events as Teasers to the Main Event
If you are planning a big event and need to build a massive attendee list, mini-event teasers are one of the best strategies for event promotion. An evergreen webinar series hosted weekly or bi-weekly is a great way to build your audience and discuss topics related to the main event.
You can invite other guests from the industry and spread the word about your main event, discuss related topics or do anything that would attract people to RSVP to the main thing.
- Consider Online Events
People love attending online events – they are one click away and are easy to plan. Attendees will save time on travel and don’t have to worry about out-of-office arrangements. Plus, most of them feel more comfortable commenting and asking questions as they feel closer to the speakers.
Going virtual with your event is a good way to save money, as you would escape the costly venues and massive budgets to get staff on-site.
Many event organizers, however, think that online events take a long time to plan. In reality, it is as simple as setting up a conference call with a reliable provider and sending out the details to all attendees who signed up for it.
- Use Social Networks to Boost Engagement
Social media is your best friend for event promotion. You have probably witnessed how channels like Instagram, Snapchat, and LinkedIn help with event promotion. With Instagram Stories, you can promote your future presence during an event. In addition, by using different social media scheduling tools, (e.g., tools like Agorapulse), you can more effectively post and engage your audience.
For instance, you can show the agenda and set up, post videos of your teams preparing, and have some of the staff introduce themselves. Stories can also be sponsored if you want to reach a larger or more specific audience.
Sponsored ads also work well for promoting your event in a specific location or to a specific group of people based on their interests and/or demographics. If you're using social media for these ads, it can also provide valuable insights for social media reporting purposes.
If you lack professional photos, don’t think twice about hiring a conference photographer. The photos will be better looking, retouched, and professional, so you can attract visitors by posting regularly on your profile. Sure, even average Mac or PC users may know how to edit photos. Yet, if you need further edits with a reliable tool, consider using this photo editor.
Integrating SEO tactics into your social media strategy can also help amplify your event's visibility online. This involves employing a keyword research tool to identify trending keywords that resonate with your target audience. When these keywords are woven naturally into your Instagram Stories, posts, and sponsored ads, your content's reach and discoverability on social media platforms and search engines significantly improve.
- Create an Event-Specific Website
Having a landing page on your website to promote your event is nice. Having a Facebook event page is also nice. But having an entire website dedicated to your event shows how professional you are while building brand authority for your organization.
A specific event website also allows attendees and potential attendees to get all of their questions answered. You can build pages such as “Event Schedule” or “Event Gallery” (if you have previous event photos) as well as a “FAQ” page where you will get all of their questions answered. As you explore various event marketing ideas, it's essential to optimize your digital presence as well.
One way to do this is by making sure your website is in top shape. If you're a macOS user and struggling with a startup disk that's running out of space, you can learn how to clean up your disk and free up valuable storage by following the steps outlined "here." This helpful guide provides detailed instructions on how to efficiently clear disk space on macOS, ensuring your computer runs smoothly throughout event planning.
Your website can really get people excited about your event. And if you think creating a website is too difficult, think again. Platforms like Squarespace and Wix have pre-made event templates that can help you get going in no time. However, if your goal is to further customise your site to stand out from the crowd, considering premium Squarespace templates could be your next step.
Summary
As you can see, good event marketing is all about letting people know that you are hosting a great event and showing them how much it would mean to you if they joined in. There are so many great event promotion ideas out there that can help you create a buzz and entice people to join in. The most important thing is to think outside the box and go all-in with your event marketing strategy!
Get access to the event industry's inside scoop