Technology has come a long way in mainstreaming remote working. Yet, despite all of these advances, it is still important to meet with people in person at events and conferences. As important relationships are best maintained in this way, events should be part of your marketing mix. The challenge is that it can often be difficult to quantify or justify the Return on Investment (ROI). And, picking the right events to attend can sometimes be difficult. Combining PR with your event strategy is a great way to boost event return on investment. This approach will increase overall marketing effectiveness and drive greater engagement with your audience.
Read this article to see how the role of PR and marketing is now merging, “The Future of Public Relations.”
The Role of PR at an Event
Given the large investment of attending an event, anything that can be done to help ROI is a good thing! The costs can be substantial. Examples include sponsorship fees, booth design, graphics, and labor set-up fees (paying union wages). Then, you need to travel to get there. This can include airfare and lodging costs. Add to this the collateral or swag given away, and the total cost is significant! Anything you can do to amplify the benefits and reap future dividends will go a long way to justifying attendance.
Here is where a focus on engaging with the media and analysts can really help with your selection process. If the event under consideration has sponsors, check to see if any are from the media. Smaller events might have a low entrance fee, but only one exclusive media sponsor – which is good and bad. Good, in that you likely will have a chance to speak with them. But bad, in that no other publications will be present. In this case, it might be a good idea to go with a different choice where multiple journalists are present. This approach gives you a greater potential for wider coverage. This is your first step to boost event return on investment.
The same holds true for industry analysts. Participating in events well attended by your customers is a great way to connect them with influencers, such as an industry analyst. Take advantage of the fact that everyone has traveled to the event and find a time to put these people together to have a conversation about an industry challenge, and perhaps a follow-up for a customer success story.
Here are three additional suggestions on how to best boost event return on investment by incorporating public relations as part of your event strategy:
1. Be All In – Make an Announcement from the Event
An overall theme to the most successful event attendance strategy – and one that will get you to maximize your ROI – is to choose quality over quantity. For the same budget, it is better to attend 3 events and be “all in” vs. attending 6 with a meager investment at each show. By being all in I am suggesting you should consider being a sponsor, having a booth, getting a speaking slot, making an announcement, and hosting a dinner for customers.
This investment requires having the right team on-site, including sales representatives – it will do your sales pipeline no good to only have marketing staff in the booth and engaging with customers!
Plan your PR announcement pipeline so you can coincide some sort of Press Release, be it a new support program, product launch, or new strategic direction to coincide with your event attendance. Consider hosting a press conference to promote this announcement at your booth. This activity will translate into “buzz” on the show floor, which will generate better awareness and get your internal team excited about working their shift and representing the company.
It is easy to fall into the trap of thinking. Better awareness will be achieved by simply covering more shows, right? This is especially the case if you are a startup or a smaller company. Taking the time to be all in will give you significantly more awareness, buzz, and engagement by customers, prospects, employees, and the media.
2. Plan and Engage with the Media Before the Event
Once you have picked the right event and news to announce, the next step is to drive interest. Ideally, this is done BEFORE you get there. Reach out to the journalists and analysts in your space to see who will be attending. Organize a dinner or lunch event. Call for a press conference. Do whatever it takes to get a commitment from them to meet with your executives. Offering 1:1s with subject matter experts or meeting with a customer is another strategy.
The more planning you can do in advance of your event, the better engagement you will capture at the show. This will be noticeable by all in attendance, including the competition, helping to further boost event return on investment.
3. Be a Speaker, Presenter or Panelist & Promote It
Part of why people attend events is to learn more about an industry, the players, and the future direction. Technology life cycles continue to compress in length, which makes it very difficult to stay current.
Any opportunity you have to speak at an event – even if that means paying a fee as part of a sponsorship package – is time, resources and money well spent. It may be extra work and require an additional employee to travel, but the payoff can be big if you pick a good topic that it is well attended.
By taking a disciplined, multi-faceted approach to your event strategy, it is possible to deliver impressive results including new sales, opportunities, and media coverage. Driving attendance with pre-show announcements and outreach, with offers for interviews, can demonstrate thought leadership and build engagement with the media. Promoting this activity both before and after the event will add further awareness to your brand. This type of holistic approach is the best way to boost event return on investment. These benefits extend well beyond the time you are at the event, substantially amplifying the ROI of your event marketing strategy.
Gordon Benzie is a marketing and communications professional with 20+ years of experience working for startups, large enterprises, and private clients.
