What is Event Marketing?



Event marketing is a strategy marketers use to promote their brand, product, or service with an in-person or real-time engagement. Events can be online or offline, and companies can participate as hosts, co-hosts, participants or sponsors. Whether online or in-person, event marketing is the ultimate way to connect with your audience, showcase your brand, and drive results.

Event marketing is a great strategy that can help:

Build brand awareness
Increase customer engagement
Generate leads
Educate prospects and customers
Upsell customers
If done right, events can be one of your most impactful marketing channels.

With their Valentine’s Day Live Video event, Dunkin’ Donuts built brand awareness, increased engagement, and educated their customers when they showed viewers how they create new products. The live event ended with the exciting creation of a gigantic donut-themed wedding cake.

This digita; event had a total of 43,000 viewers, that’s 43,000 people engaged in watching doughnutsbeing made and gaining interest in Dunkin’s brand and product:
Branding and awareness
One of the biggest reasons companies participate in, or host, a marketing event is to establish and build their brand. With the increasingly fierce competition in almost every industry, being able to differentiate yourself is crucial.

You may choose to participate in specific marketing events to associate with the host’s brand, to gain access to a highly targeted audience, or show off your brand’s personality.

Let’s take a look at some different events and why a brand would choose to participate
Dreamforce: you want to penetrate the Salesforce ecosystem. You’re trying to sell to their target market and customers.
The Super Bowl: you want your brand name to reach a broad audience and associate with some of the biggest names in advertising.
Fashion Week: you’re a lifestyle brand that wants to establish yourself in the luxury category.
When selecting which event you want to participate in, or the type of event you’d like to host, first think about who your customer is and what kind of event they’re likely to attend. That’s where you’ll want to focus your resources.

Another way companies build brand awareness at events is by connecting with attending members of the press e. If done right, they can establish relationships with influential journalists or bloggers in their industry, get press coverage and position themselves as thought leaders.

Customer engagement
Events help humanize your company and create a more authentic connection with consumers. By immersing your customers in a unique and memorable experience, they’re more likely to have an emotional tie to your brand and will be more inclined to share their experience with friends, businesses, and potential clients.

By creating a meaningful interaction between your brand and your customers, you have a higher likelihood of increasing client retention and creating brand loyalists in the process.

Lean Cuisine managed to engage customers through their #WeighThis event by creating an experience for their customers. They made it easy for customers to share their personal stories on what they have accomplished, or ‘what they want to be weighed on’. instead of their physical weight:
Lead generation
Conferences and industry events are a powerful way to engage with your target audience, gain a more in-depth understanding of their pain points, and facilitate their decision-making process.
To facilitate the event marketing purchasing process, you’ll need a plan in place to capture qualified leads’ information to follow up after the event. Ways to engage with prospects and collect their information include: