Experiential Marketing Tactics
Now that you know the basics of what goes into setting up your own experiential marketing event, you need to learn about specific tactics that will let you be successful. There are a few experiential marketing tactics that you can employ to boost your overall strategy.
Social Media Engagement
Social media is one of the most essential parts to making your experiential event successful. By allowing the brand to reach the consumer before, during and after an event, it’s a key platform to stay in constant contact with a prospect.
Here’s how:
1. Use the Best Platform
Where does your audience live online? Each social media platform serves a specific audience, so make sure that you’re advertising on the best one for your needs.
2. Build Engaging Content
Users won’t care about your post if they don’t find it interesting. Ask questions, post polls or quizzes, or put up videos to better engage your audience.
3. Create Consistent Messaging
Your messaging is directly related to your event goals. Make sure your exhibit aligns with what you’re saying in advertisements, social posts, brochures, etc.
4. Encourage Sharing
Encourage sharing so that you reach new networks. Create a hashtag, set up a photo booth, offer prizes for posts so your attendees will share it with their own circles and other attendees.
Bring Your Brand Ambassadors
Brand ambassadors bring something unique to your event. They serve as the liaison between consumer and brand, allowing a meaningful conversation to transpire. Guests want to find out how brands will affect their lives for the better. Brand ambassadors can start the conversation, offering salespeople an opportunity to close the deal.
1. Identify Your Goals
Whether you’re trying to develop brand awareness or increase the amount of leads, your goals will determine your team members.
2. Understand Event Requirements
What do you need your brand ambassadors to do? Will they be conducting product demonstrations, talking to attendees about a specific UVP, or posting on social media? Choose those with experience that best matches your event requirements.
3. Getting Help to Find the Right People
From tech experts to sales people and influencers, there are a number of different people you can employ as brand ambassador. Determine who will create the biggest impact for this particular event.
4. Offer Incentives
With an incentive, people will be much more likely to become ambassadors. You can offer free products or services, or even payment, to create interest.
Live Streaming
With new social media platforms and features growing in popularity, people can engage in your event whether they’re physically there or not (and with minimal cost to you). Keep your audience updated by using live video feeds to help your network stay connected with your brand.
There are a number of ways to engage your audience with live streaming:
1. Perform Live Product Demos
Live product demos are a boon to any event marketing strategy. Live streaming gives you the perfect platform to showcase your products in use.
2. Host Live Q&A Sessions
People have questions, and social media provides a great venue for any person to inquire about a brand’s offerings. Hosting live Q&A sessions will make people more comfortable with your product overall.
3. Go Behind-the-Scenes
People love to experience behind-the-scenes of any event. Show what it’s like to set-up, teardown and interact with the team that’s behind the booth/stand.
4. Repurpose Live Video Content
Live video will give you plenty of ideas for repurposing content. Take a live Q&A session, for example, and repurpose it into a FAQ page on your website, or even turn it into an extended video explanation.
1. Pre-Promotion
Pre-promote your event on social media, search ads and by traditional means — whatever will best reach your audience. Search ads let you target certain keywords/queries where traditional ads help reach a broader audience and raise brand awareness. Generate excitement, improve attendance rates and amplify your message. A pre-event campaign will set the expectation that the event is dynamic and can create the fear of missing out.
2. Registration Page
Now give your attentive audience somewhere to register. Whether it’s a registration page on your own website or through a third-party app, a registration process offers assurance and helps set expectations about who will be attending, so you can plan accordingly.
3. Create a Social Event
Today, people keep their social life organized through platforms like Facebook and Twitter. Create a social event so you can invite people and keep them informed about event happenings.
4. Offer a Main Attraction
The main attraction is normally what gets people in the door. Your main attraction could be a guest speaker, special performance, celebrity appearance or grand prize drawing.
5. Request Post-Event Action
Once the event is over, keep in touch with all prospects through follow-up requests. Continue to offer incentives, discounts or content that will appeal to your newfound connections. This drives customer engagement and encourages brand retention.