When it comes to running a successful event, we consider many things such as careful planning, effective promotion, and excellent execution. Right?
But alongside the must-dos, there are also some mistakes to avoid, for the event to go on smoothly. Sometimes even a tiny error can cause big problems for your entire organization.
To help you make the most of your events, we’ve put together this ultimate guide where we take you through the most common event marketing mistakes that you should avoid in 2024.
This comprehensive guide will also help you understand:
- Ways in which Airmeet can help you prevent those mistakes
- An overview of the benefits you can enjoy by investing in event marketing
- Different types of events you can consider and
- Tried-and-tested strategies for event promotions.
“Events are the ultimate marketing tool, allowing brands to create memorable experiences that resonate with their audience and leave a lasting impression.” – Tony Robbins
What is Event Marketing?
Event marketing is a strategic approach that businesses use to market their product, services, or brand through a live event. As per this report, 65% of attendees say live events help them understand products or services better.
Event marketing usually involves planning, promoting, and advertising events to connect with specific audiences, boost brand awareness, and generate leads or boost sales.
Depending on the size of a company, the industry you belong to, your budget, and your goals, you can invest in different types of events – from small-scale gatherings like seminars or workshops to large-scale conferences like trade shows, or product launches.
It can take place either online or in person, depending on the format you choose and the objectives of the event.
In 2021, the global exhibition market reached a value of US$13.87 billion and is expected to grow to US$36.31 billion by 2026.
Avoid These 20 Common Mistakes in Event Marketing
A detailed breakdown of 20 event marketing mistakes is given below:
1 – Ignoring Audience Research: Not understanding your audience and their needs is one of the biggest mistakes event marketers can make and can cause your event marketing campaigns to fail. Without understanding your potential customers’ demographics, interests, and exact requirements, your marketing efforts are unlikely to attract them.
2 – Lack of Clear Objectives: You may lack focus and direction if you do not have clear event goals. It will become challenging to make informed decisions regarding the event’s structure, content, and marketing strategy. This lack of clarity will result in an ineffective event experience for both organizers and prospective attendees.
3 – Poor Budget Planning: If you do not figure out the appropriate event marketing cost, you may end up spending extra money. Poor budget planning can lead to overruns and financial strain, causing you to lose more than you gain from your efforts.
4 – Neglecting Multiple Digital Channels: Neglecting digital marketing channels such as social media, email marketing, and online advertising can limit your reach and impact.
Plus, you will miss opportunities to engage with your target audience. You won’t be able to reach your target if you use a single channel for an event.
5 – Overlooking SEO Optimization: If you overlook SEO optimization, your event website or landing page may struggle to reach relevant audiences, compromising the quality and quantity of registrations and putting your event at risk.
It is important to optimize your website, landing pages, and event content with relevant keywords, in today’s digital world.
6 – Communication Gap: Not communicating well with other departments can lead to silos within the organization and affect your event marketing goals. Also, you will lose cross-promotional and collaboration opportunities which can limit your reach.
Make sure to include sales and customer success teams while promoting events, so they can spread the word to the relevant audiences that they engage with.
7 – Ineffective Content Strategy: If your content strategy is not effective, you may struggle to engage your audience and gain leads or conversion. Ultimately you will fail to meet your marketing objectives. Crafting clever content around your events can help you communicate more than just what your event landing page has to offer.
Publish blog posts about upcoming events to help the audience understand the nuances of what to expect. Create post-event content to communicate the takeaways, the success stories, and the overall impact of your event. Leverage the power of social media to get the message across.
8 – Ignoring Data Analytics: Failing to track and analyze marketing KPIs can make it difficult to measure the success of your event marketing campaigns. You will miss out on valuable insights into audience behavior, campaign performance, and areas for improvement.
9 – Poor Event Branding: Poor branding can lead to a lack of awareness and credibility with your target audience. Your business can face difficulties in standing out in the competitive marketplace. Additionally, it will hinder your ability to attract and retain customers for the long term.
Having a consistent brand story across all touchpoints is crucial to event marketing’s success.
10 – Ignoring Mobile Optimization: If your website is not mobile-friendly or event registration forms are not accessible on mobile devices, it will annoy prospects who are trying to register for the event through their phone or tablet. This simple mistake could prompt you to lose potential attendees due to poor user experience.
11 – Absence of Influencer Partnerships: Without relevant influencer collaboration, your event might fall short of reaching new audiences. In the age of social media, influencers have a certain credibility that you can tap into by collaborating wisely.
Including influencers as part of your event promotions helps you reach a wider audience, beyond your current network, bringing in new business opportunities.
12 – Skipping Social Proof: Skipping social proof like testimonials, client reviews, and endorsements from past attendees or thought leaders can lead to a lack of credibility.
Without social proof, potential attendees may question the legitimacy and quality of your event. This could make them vary your event and lower your participation rates.
13 – Poor Email Marketing Strategy: Sending generic or spammy emails can damage your reputation and lead to low open and click-through rates.
To maximize the effectiveness of your email marketing campaigns, personalize your messages, segment your email list, and provide valuable content and offers that resonate with your subscribers.
14 – Underestimating the Video Content: Video content has become increasingly popular and effective in event marketing, yet many organizers overlook its potential.
Incorporating video content into your marketing strategy can help capture attention, convey your message more effectively, and engage your audience on a deeper level.
15 – Missing Local Marketing Opportunities: Local marketing initiatives play a crucial role in establishing connections with potential attendees in your target market. They also help in generating excitement for your event within the local community.
Without targeting local audiences through community partnerships, regional media, and local marketing, your event may struggle to gain visibility.
16 – Ignoring Potential Technical Issues: Technical issues can hinder your events in a way that nothing else can. This includes sound system failures, internet connectivity issues, projector or screen connectivity problems, and such.
These technical glitches can disrupt the flow of the event, causing frustration and dissatisfaction among attendees.
17 – Unclear Brand Message: An unclear brand message can make it challenging for your brand to establish a strong and memorable presence in the market. Not only does it make your brand look unprofessional, but it can also lead to confusion among your target audience. |
18 – Manpower Shortage: If you do not have sufficient staff in your event marketing team, the workload and stress that comes with common event planning and executing marketing campaigns may compromise the result.
With limited manpower, your efforts may not come to fruition and can cause chaos before, during, and after the event. Make sure you are adequately staffed to handle all of the planning and execution of the event.
19 – Not Prioritizing Post-Event Follow-up: If you do not follow up with leads and attendees after the event, you may fail to convert leads into customers. Neglecting post-event follow-up with new clients not only undermines the ROI of your event but also limits your ability to build long-term relationships with customers.
20 – Incorrect Call to Action: If your web pages do not effectively prompt a strong call to action (CTA) button, such as registering for the event, purchasing tickets, or downloading materials, you may experience low conversion rates. Make sure your call-to-action buttons lead to the relevant pages. Test everything multiple times beforehand, to ensure a seamless digital journey for prospects.
5 Ways Airmeet Can Help You Transform Your Event Marketing Initiatives
The following are five ways in which Airmeet can assist you in avoiding event marketing mistakes, so you can deliver successful events that convert:
- Customizable Branding: Using Airmeet’s customizable branding options, you can effectively represent your company’s brand via the visual elements including uploading logos, banners, and background images that align with the brand’s colors, fonts, and style.
These options will assist you in creating a cohesive and immersive experience for your attendees. With Airmeet you can deliver consistent and professional event branding, minimizing the mistake of poor event branding.
- Data Analytics and Insights: Airmeet provides a comprehensive analytics and insights dashboard into event performance. It gives you access to key metrics such as attendance rates, session duration, poll responses, and interaction levels. Airmeet also gives you detailed post-event analytics, including attendee feedback surveys and session ratings.
With these analytics, you can track the effectiveness of your event marketing efforts, identify areas for improvement, and make data-driven decisions for future events.
View the details of this point here
- Technical Support: Airmeet provides technical support and backup plans for seamless event execution. With features like automated backups and 24/7 customer support, you minimize the chances of technical difficulties or disruptions.
By leveraging Airmeet’s robust support system and emergency planning functions, you can quickly address any unexpected challenges that may arise during their event.
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- Post-Event Engagement: After an event is hosted on Airmeet, you can continue engaging with attendees through various tools and functions. You get access to features such as networking lounges and on-demand content access.
A Networking lounge is where attendees can connect with each other, exchange contact information, and further discuss topics of interest. Plus, you get an option to record your event for attendees to review and access important information or content they may have missed.
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- Advertising an Event Through Email: Airmeet provides a user-friendly email editor with features like adding text, images, GIFs, buttons, and more. It allows you to make a targeted email list with dynamic content like attendee names, event details, and registration links, allowing you to create branded and visually appealing emails for your event promotion.
Along with this, you get detailed analytics regarding open rates, click-through rates, and other metrics, helping you refine your email marketing strategies.
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Key Benefits of Event Marketing
Event marketing is a highly effective way for businesses of all sizes to achieve a variety of marketing goals. It plays a major role in the success of any business. Let us see some of the key benefits of event marketing:
- Increases Brand Awareness: The biggest benefit of event marketing is that it allows you to showcase your product or services to a targeted audience in real-time. It naturally boosts the visibility of your brand in the market.
At the same time, event marketing lets you directly engage and interact with your prospects, raise awareness of your brand, make strong connections, and build credibility in your industry.
By showcasing your brand’s values, personality, and unique offerings, event marketing will not only cultivate your company’s image but can also help your brand shine in a highly competitive market.
- Generates New Leads: One of the key benefits of event marketing is that it lets you generate new and quality leads. It allows you to connect with potential customers through face-to-face interactions.
Thus, event marketing helps attract ideal prospects, convert them into valuable leads for further follow-up, and eventually close more deals.
- Strengthens Customer Relationships: Event marketing not only generates fresh leads but also builds strong relationships with existing customers.
When you invite customers to your event and engage with them at a show or fair, their relationship with you deepens and helps them stay the same.
- Educates Your Target Audience: Events are a great way to educate your target audience about your products or services. Through live interactions and hands-on experiences, attendees learn more about the features and benefits of your products or services.
Event marketing makes it easier for you to educate your potential customers about how your product or services can solve their problems or meet their needs.
- Provides Networking Opportunities: Events provide a platform for networking and building relationships with industry peers, partners, vendors, influencers, and potential collaborators. It allows you to expand your professional network and explore new partnership opportunities.
- Boosts Sales: Event marketing naturally boosts sales through promotions and exclusive offers. Approximately 80% of marketers in the United States use events to increase sales.
The event allows you to offer special discounts and deals on products or services, enabling attendees to take advantage of limited-time offers. Along with this, you can upsell or cross-sell your additional products or services to existing customers.
A successful and memorable event helps in word-of-mouth marketing too, which significantly impacts sales. Satisfied attendees are more likely to share their experiences with friends, family, and colleagues, leading to increased brand awareness, credibility, and ultimately, sales.
- Builds Community: Event marketing brings people with similar interests together in one place, providing them with an opportunity to meet, communicate, and connect. It also helps build a friendly community around your brand, where people support each other and stay connected for a long time.
The goal of any event is to turn strangers into friends and friends into customers.” – Patricia Fripp, Speaker and Author
Different Types of Events Occur in Event Marketing
In event marketing, various types of events are utilized to promote a brand, product, or service. Some common types of event marketing include:
- Trade Shows:
Trade shows also known as trade fairs, or exhibitions, are events where companies from a particular industry gather to showcase their latest products and services to potential customers, partners, and investors.
At trade shows, companies usually set up displays, demos, and promotional materials to attract visitors and generate new leads. Trade shows provide audiences with a personalized and immersive experience. This allows them to interact with products, ask questions about them, and provide feedback at the same time.
- Conferences:
Conferences are large-scale events that bring together professionals, experts, and stakeholders from a specific field to share knowledge, insights, and ideas.
Conferences are typically organized by academic institutions, professional organizations, or private companies to discuss the latest trends and developments. They are held in-person or virtually.
Such conferences typically include presentations, panel discussions, keynote speeches, slide shows, and workshops.
- Product Launches:
Product launch events are exclusive occasions where companies present new products or services to the market. It includes various marketing activities such as press releases, social media teasers, advertising campaigns, and live events.
Product launch events can take place in-person, online, or a combination of both. These events have the potential to enhance brand visibility, create excitement, grow customer reach, and increase sales.
- Award Events:
An award event is a ceremony where an individual, a group of people, or organizations are recognized and awarded trophies, medals, or certificates for their achievements.
Award ceremonies come in various sizes, from small local ceremonies to large national or international ceremonies, and are intended to celebrate success and achievements.
- Live Streaming Events:
Live streaming events involve online broadcasting of real-time video content, allowing viewers to watch and engage with the event as it takes place.
These events are broadcast over the internet, enabling remote audiences to attend meetings, concerts, seminars, and other live performances anywhere in the globe.
Live streaming events often incorporate features such as live chat, and audience polling to keep viewers interested and connected with the show in real-time.
- Networking Events:
Networking events are gatherings where professionals connect, build relationships, and explore collaboration opportunities with other industry leaders.
Networking events occur in various forms, including mixers, happy hours, virtual coffee, breakfast meetings, and Speed networking. It plays a key role in expanding your networks and establishing meaningful connections with others that lead to new business opportunities.
- Charity Events:
Charity events are known as fundraising events that aim to raise awareness and funds for nonprofit organizations. The primary goal of charity events is to engage with donors, sponsors, volunteers, and the community to address social, environmental, and humanitarian issues.
These events provide opportunities for people, businesses, and local communities to come together in support of a common cause and make a positive impact on society.
- Webinars:
A webinar is a virtual seminar or lecture that is conducted online using webinar software. Typically in a webinar, the host interacts with a virtual audience using slides, videos, and other multimedia content.
Webinars are commonly used for educational purposes, such as training sessions and workshops as well as for marketing and sales purposes, such as product demos and lead generation.
- Hybrid Events:
Hybrid events combine elements of both in-person and virtual experiences, allowing attendees to participate either physically or remotely. Such events offer more flexibility and accessibility to a wider audience.
Hybrid events usually incorporate interactive features such as chat rooms, Q&A sessions, and virtual networking opportunities to foster engagement and collaboration among both in-person and virtual attendees.
What are the Effective Strategies For Promoting An Event?
Consider the following strategies to promote your event successfully:
- Define Event Goal: First, identify the primary purpose of hosting an event. It could be generating leads, increasing brand awareness, driving sales, fostering networking opportunities, or launching a new product. Ensure your goals are specific, achievable, and have a proper deadline.
- Understand Your Audience: After defining the event goal, understand your target audience, their needs, interests, and preferences. Conduct thorough research to get more information about your target market.
Analyze the target audience of competitors or similar events in your industry to gain insights into their demographics, and behaviors.
- Create an Event Website: Create a user-friendly website or landing page to promote your event effectively. Make sure it has all the important details about the event such as event date, time, location, agenda, speakers, and registration details.
Additionally, you can include social proof (testimonials, quotes), and videos of past events to increase the credibility of the event. - Leverage Multi-promotion Channels: Don’t rely on just one channel. Use multiple promotional channels such as social media, email marketing, content marketing, and paid advertising.
Leveraging various marketing platforms will allow you to promote your event to a larger audience and boost its visibility. Along with this, you can invest in offline marketing such as print media, direct mail, event sponsorships, and physical promotions. - Build Relationships with Partners: Build strong relationships with potential partners such as other businesses, organizations, or influencers. Reach out to them with a personalized message and highlight the mutual benefits of collaboration. These can be increased exposure, access to new audiences, opportunities for cross-promotion, etc.
Developing deep connections with partners will help build trust, credibility, and loyalty, leading to more successful event promotions and long-term partnerships. - Promote User-Generated Content: Encourage your audiences to express their thoughts and excitement about the event through social media posts, photos, and videos. First, create an event-specific hashtag then encourage attendees to use it in their social media posts. This will help more people know about your event.
- Create a Buzz: Offer early-bird discounts to encourage early registration and generate excitement among desired audiences. Tap into the concept of “Fear Of Missing Out” (FOMO) among your audience. Highlight the importance of the event and the cost of missing it.
- Measure ROI: Track relevant metrics and KPIs before, during, and after the event. Measuring and analyzing metrics like attendee engagement, ticket sales, leads generated, social media reach, and post-event surveys can be highly informative.
Calculate the overall costs of arranging and promoting the event, including venue rental, catering, marketing materials, and employee wages.
Whether you are planning an online or an in-person event, implementing these strategies will help you create a successful and memorable event.
Conclusion
Understanding and avoiding common event marketing mistakes are essential for event organizers and marketers to maximize their success and growth in 2024. Organizations can improve the impact and ROI of their event marketing by avoiding these mistakes and using effective strategies.
Ultimately, businesses that are not afraid of learning from their mistakes and continually improving their professional development and event marketing strategies tend to succeed in the long-run.
FAQ
The cost of event marketing can vary depending on various factors such as the type of event, the size of the event, venue rental, promotional materials, and staffing. According to a Clutch report, the average cost of an event marketing agency ranges between $100 to $149 per hour.
Hosting events enables organizations to address common challenges such as low brand awareness, poor audience engagement, lower sales or revenue, and difficulty in generating leads or conversions.
In the future, event marketing will use more digital methods, like virtual and hybrid events, to reach people worldwide. This way, events become more personalized, interactive, and immersive.
Also, AI will likely play a prominent role in event marketing. Its ability to analyze data, personalize content, and automate tasks can enhance targeting, engagement, and overall effectiveness of marketing your event campaigns.
Event marketing is highly impactful as it creates the immersive experience that is needed to engage audiences. It also helps increase brand awareness and develop meaningful connections with customers.
Through face-to-face interactions and memorable product and service presentations, event marketing helps increase strong brand identity, trust, customer loyalty, and overall business growth.
You can measure the success of your event marketing efforts by tracking key performance indicators such as attendance numbers, lead generation, attendee engagement, and post-event feedback.
Additionally, analyzing metrics such as sales conversions, brand awareness, and return on investment (ROI) can provide detailed insights into the effectiveness of your event marketing strategies.
