You’re probably always looking for more effective ways to generate leads, right? We get it – lead generation is a never-ending goal. But have you considered event marketing? Hosting or attending events positions you in front of your target audience and gets conversations flowing.
In this article, we’ll explore how to make events work harder for you through strategic partnerships, capturing contact info, and post-event follow up that turns interested attendees into solid leads. With some planning, creativity, and follow-through, events offer face-time that digital tactics can’t match. You’ll discover tips for identifying the right events, creating engaging activities at your booth, and leveraging your presence to ultimately gain more leads.
What is Event Marketing and Why Use it for Lead Generation?
- Face-to-face interaction. Events allow you to have meaningful conversations with prospects, answer their questions in person, and build personal connections. This type of two-way engagement is much more impactful than other lead gen tactics like email marketing or social media ads.
- Capture customer data. At events, you have the opportunity to collect contact information from interested prospects through lead capture forms, business card collection, and badge scanning. You can then add these leads to your database and nurture them with targeted content and follow-up communications.
- Demonstrate expertise. Events give you a platform to showcase your knowledge and establish your brand as an industry leader. You can give presentations, host workshops or panels, and engage with attendees. This expertise and thought leadership will make a strong impression on potential buyers.
- Build brand awareness. Participating in industry events, especially as a sponsor or exhibitor, increases visibility and gets your brand in front of many potential customers at once. Use promotional items, signage, social media, and pre-event marketing to maximize brand exposure.
- Generate buzz. The excitement and energy of events can create hype around your company and products. Engage attendees by offering giveaways, hosting games or contests, debuting new offerings, or making special announcements. The buzz from the event may lead to media coverage, social media mentions, and word-of-mouth marketing.
Event marketing should be an important part of your lead generation strategy. When done well, events provide opportunities for meaningful connections, data collection, expertise sharing, brand building, and buzz creation—all of which drive high-quality leads and sales. The key is to plan your event marketing approach, create engaging experiences, and follow up to turn new leads into happy customers.
Types of Events for Lead Generation
In-person trade shows and conferences are popular events for lead generation. At these events, attendees can see products in action, talk to knowledgeable staff, and network with like-minded professionals. Set up an eye-catching booth, offer special promotions or free trials, and capture contact details from interested visitors. Follow up quickly while the experience is still fresh in their minds.
Webinars are virtual events that allow you to connect with many potential customers at once. Hosting a webinar on an industry topic positions your company as a thought leader. Include a strong call-to-action at the end of the webinar to generate leads, such as offering a free resource in exchange for contact information. Record the webinar so people can view it on-demand.
Product demonstrations showcase how your offering solves key customer pain points. Invite target customers to an in-person or live-streamed demo. Seeing your product in action is highly compelling. Capture details from attendees and send follow-up emails with special offers to generate high-quality leads.
Field marketing involves meeting potential customers on their own turf. Set up a booth at related industry events, conferences, and trade shows that your target customers attend. This allows you to start conversations, demonstrate your product, and collect contact information from interested professionals in a low-pressure setting. Follow up quickly to express your interest in helping them solve key challenges.
Hybrid events blend in-person and virtual elements. For example, host a live trade show booth with streaming video coverage. This allows people to experience the event both onsite and online. Capture leads from both audiences through promotions, giveaways, and your call-to-action. A mobile event app can also enrich the experience for onsite and virtual attendees by providing schedules, live streaming, social sharing, and lead capture forms.
Mix and match these event types based on your audience, budget, and company goals. With the right strategy and follow-up in place, events can be highly successful for generating quality leads and driving new business opportunities.
Planning a Successful Event Marketing Strategy
Set clear goals and objectives
What do you want to achieve from your event marketing efforts? Do you want to generate new leads, build brand awareness, or launch a new product? Setting specific and measurable goals will help guide your strategy and determine key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure success.
Develop a comprehensive budget
How much can you afford to invest in your event marketing campaign? Create a budget that covers costs for things like venue rental, catering, promotional materials, entertainment, transportation, and staffing. Your budget will shape many strategic decisions, so plan thoroughly.
Create an actionable event marketing plan
With your goals and budget in place, develop a comprehensive event marketing plan. This includes things like:
Selecting the right event(s) to attend or sponsor based on your target audience.
Determining the experience you want to create, e.g. educational sessions, networking opportunities, entertainment, giveaways, etc.
Choosing promotional strategies to maximize attendance like social media marketing, email campaigns, media sponsorships, etc.
Developing resources for lead capture like contact forms, business card drops, social media contests, etc.
Training your team on lead follow-up to turn attendees into customers.
Track and Analyze the Results
The only way to improve your event marketing over time is to measure its effectiveness. Track key metrics like attendance, social media engagement, lead generation, sales conversion, ROI, and customer satisfaction. Analyze what’s working and not working to optimize your future event marketing strategy.
With careful planning and analysis, your team can execute an event marketing strategy that generates a high volume of quality leads and ultimately drives more sales for your business. The key is setting clear goals, developing a realistic budget, creating an actionable marketing plan, and continuously optimizing based on results.
Promoting Your Event for Maximum Lead Generation
To generate the most leads from your event, start promoting it early and often. Use all the marketing channels at your disposal to spread the word.
Email Marketing
Send a series of emails to your contact lists announcing the event details. Start promoting 2-3 months in advance, then send reminder emails closer to the event date. Offer a special discount or incentive for people who register early. You can also send follow-up emails after the event to those who attended, thanking them for coming and sharing any materials or next steps discussed.
Social Media
Post event details on all your social media profiles like LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. Create an event page and invite people to attend. Start posting 6-8 weeks before the event and continue up until the day of. Share blog posts, videos, images, and teasers to build excitement. Engage with those interested by replying to their posts and comments. Livestream parts of the event or post photos and videos in real time to encourage those not attending to sign up for the next one.
Website
Feature your event prominently on your company website. Add an event page with all the necessary details like date, time, location, agenda, speakers, pricing, etc. Place a link to the registration page so people can easily sign up. Blog about the event topics and reasons why people should attend. Update the page regularly as new information becomes available.
Media Outreach
Pitch your event to industry publications, media, influencers, and bloggers. Offer complimentary passes in exchange for coverage and promotion to their audiences. Ask if they want to do any interviews with speakers or organizers. Their promotion and media coverage will significantly raise awareness and drive more leads.
When promoting an event, the key is to use multiple marketing channels to reach as many potential attendees as possible. An integrated and consistent campaign across email, social media, your website, and media outreach will generate the maximum number of leads for your event. The earlier and more often you promote, the greater the turnout and success!
Measuring Event Success: Tracking Leads and ROI
Successfully generating leads through events requires diligent tracking of key metrics. By closely monitoring lead volume and quality, you can calculate your return on investment (ROI) and ensure your event marketing efforts are paying off.
The number one way to measure an event’s success is by counting the leads generated. Make it easy for attendees to provide their contact information by having lead capture forms readily available. You can also gamify the lead collection process by offering a prize drawing or other incentive for people who provide their information.
Track leads generated not only during the event but also in the days and weeks after. Some leads may visit your website or reach out via phone or email once the event is over. Be prepared to capture information from all of these lead sources.
Analyze the leads to determine which are “marketing qualified leads” (MQLs) that are potentially a good fit as future customers. Look at factors like job titles, company names, and interests expressed. The higher the percentage of MQLs, the more successful your event was in attracting your target audience.
Finally, calculate your cost per lead (CPL) by dividing your total event marketing costs by the number of MQLs generated. A lower CPL indicates a higher ROI and more bang for your buck. If CPL is higher than your target, reevaluate your event strategy and make changes to improve performance for next time.
To maximize your event ROI:
- Promote your event ahead of time to boost attendance
- Offer valuable content and experiences that resonate with your audience
- Make it easy for people to provide contact details and opt-in to communications
- Follow up quickly with all leads while interest and enthusiasm are high
- Track key metrics like lead volume, quality, and cost per lead to optimize future events
By diligently tracking leads and calculating ROI, you can ensure your events are accomplishing their goal of generating new opportunities to propel your business forward. Make improvements where needed and build on your successes for even better results at your next event.
In Summary
Event marketing offers a powerful way to generate more leads and nurture relationships when done right. With some thoughtful planning around your goals, budget, audience, logistics, content, follow-up, and measurement, hosting or sponsoring events provides a path to directly engage with your target customers.
Take the time to create memorable live experiences that attendees want to be a part of. Events let you connect the dots between all your marketing activities and accelerate sales opportunities. Of course, you’ll want to track and optimize based on what’s working for your business. But if you make that investment of time and resources into well-executed events, you’ll see the leads and sales start to stack up.