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Planning a sales conference or a launch party and want people to attend? A marketing event needs to be a fun and productive experience for all involved, which could mean adding some extra incentives to get people to come along. Here are a few tricks that could encourage people to attend your event.
Set a date early
The earlier you set a date, the earlier you can start advertising your event. Leave it too late and people may already have plans. How you market it is up to you – it could be a case of calling people up or it could a case emailing people. Meanwhile, if it’s a public event, you may be able to start advertising on social media and handing out flyers.
Choose a unique venue in a good location
A good venue in a good location will encourage guests to come. Don’t just pick a dull conference room – think of somewhere creative like a historic building or a pub or even a marquee outdoors somewhere. Many hotels have conference areas and that could allow guests to stay overnight if they have to travel a long distance. Restaurants meanwhile may offer the incentive of food. Make sure that the location isn’t too rural as this could affect accessibility by public transport. There should also be nearby parking for those coming by car, which could be something to seriously consider if you’re hosting your conference in a city centre. Supplying maps to everyone you invite could be beneficial.
Supply food and drink
Hiring a catering service to offer food and drink could further encourage guests to come along. This could be anything from canapes to a full sit-down meal. You may have invited guests with bad experiences of conferences – providing food and drink is a small extra that shows your event isn’t just going to be another dull talk.
Mix business and leisure
When it comes to getting people to part with huge amounts of money, a standard marketing event might not be enough to convince people to come along. This is where you may need to mix business and leisure. This could involve buying stadium seats at your local sports venue, playing a game of golf, hiring entertainers or renting out a boat and taking a tour. The fact that you’ve gone to the effort of giving them an experience might persuade them to pay more attention when it comes to the business side of the event and potentially buy into your product.
Make your event educational
Contrastingly, you could advertise your event as a chance to learn something. If you’re a social media marketing company, you could teach people attending some social media marketing secrets to use on their own businesses – you can then promote your own services. People may find you more credible and trustworthy if you pass on some of your knowledge. You could even make your seminar interactive by throwing in quizzes and hand-on practical learning. Just make sure that your event is still advertised as a marketing event – if your event is advertised as purely educational and you start throwing in promotional stuff, people may get irritated.
Offer event discounts to anyone attending
Another way to get people to attend your event could be to offer anyone who attends a discount of your services. Knowing that they could save money from going to your event could help to persuade guests to come along. You could give out vouchers at your event or offer a freebie for coming along. Make sure that any promotion you offer doesn’t cause you to run the event on a loss – the aim is still make money out of the event by generating new customers.
Invite a special guest along
Inviting special guests along can be beneficial at launch parties. This could involve a local mayor, a politician, celebrity or a journalist. The chance to meet this persona and potentially discuss networking opportunities could sway guests into attending your event. First, you will need to secure this special guest of course, which could be the difficult part. Don’t start advertising that this guest will be attending until you’re sure that they can come, otherwise guests could be disappointed if they show up and your special guests is nowhere to be seen.
