Event Marketing Strategies to Drive B2B Media Brand Growth by Helen Coetzee, on 26/02/2019 MPG recently hosted a round-table event for some of the most senior and experienced marketing leaders in multi-platform B2B media brands. The discussion focused on how a successful portfolio of events, that are well marketed, can and should support strategic brand development. Discussion participants were all senior marketers who oversee marketing functions that support a number of revenue streams – including subscriptions, memberships and advertising, as well as event sponsor, exhibitor and delegate revenue. Chaired by marketing guru Ashley Friedlein (Founder of Econsultancy and most recently founder of the new professional networking app Guild), this elite gathering uncovered the key challenges and opportunities in how events are marketed, taking into consideration the role events play in growing a multi-platform B2B media brand: Event marketing investment trends Overall, investment in the marketing of events is increasing – both in terms of people and direct spend, as the successful marketing of events is more resource intensive than other types of product marketing. As marketing investment increases, heads of marketing are expected to provide more granular marketing budgets and better measurement of the return-on-investment of various marketing initiatives. Subscriptions marketing generally requires less investment than events, relying mostly on SEO and other forms of inbound marketing – usually delivered by digital agencies. The high quality of this web traffic in turn supports events and overall brand growth. As the return-on-investment on email marketing, PPC and social media becomes more transparent, event marketers are investing more confidently in digital marketing. However, direct mail and telesales continue to earn their place in the event marketing funnel and spend mix – used for the nurturing and closing of prospects already engaged via digital channels. Direct mail is still an important part of the marketing mix for events – especially when highly targeted and creatively deployed to achieve cut through. By matching sales data to marketing data, a return-on-investment can be ‘assumed’ (if not completely accurately measured). A well-executed direct mail campaign, showcasing an excellent event, has a positive ‘halo effect’ for the whole brand. LinkedIn has become the important social channel for most events and continues to grow in importance. Building LinkedIn groups are no longer a focus, while targeted sponsored posts are becoming more effective and efficient in driving web traffic, leads and bookings. Data, technology and the much-prized single customer view The discussion on data and technology centered on the need for, and benefits of, a single customer view – particularly for multi-platform brands. Senior decision-makers seek visibility of how customers are engaging with the full range of events and subscriptions products. For many B2B media brands, only a small proportion (approx. 10%) of subscribers become event delegates and vice versa, which is concerning when brands are seeking deeper engagement with their customers. Some B2B media brands have achieved the tech stack and data flows that give them the much sought-after single customer view. This has allowed marketers, sales people and those in product development to gain real-time information about how an individual customer, or defined group of customers, is engaging with and consuming content, products, marketing and sales. This should enable co-ordinated, relevant and personalised delivery of communications and content to each individual via all touch-points with a brand. In many cases, the single customer view is still elusive, with many organisations grappling with costly and lengthy tech and data projects. However, there was consensus that a single customer view is needed – even if it is not necessarily as straight-forward to deliver as tech vendors have promised, or as essential to effective marketing and decision-making as the ‘hype’ around a single customer view insists it is. Event marketing skills and team structures There are two commonly used marketing team structures in B2B multi-platform media businesses: A brand-led structure – where all products within a brand’s portfolio (subscriptions, events etc.) are marketed by the same team, usually led by a ‘brand manager’ A product-led structure – where distinct marketing teams exist to promote different product types, i.e. the subscriptions marketing team is separate from the event marketing team. The brand-led structure is usually deployed when an organisation is aiming to be more customer-centric. However, this approach has distinct operational disadvantages as event marketing tends to dominate the marketing team’s time and focus due to the high volume of activity and the hard deadlines associated with events. The group agreed that either structure can work, as long as marketing teams are well resourced and managed, and the required marketing skill sets are in place. The greatest challenge faced in event marketing is the lack of specialist marketing skills required to get the most out of digital channels and data. Most event marketers in situ and newly hired tend to be generalists who struggle with the technical and analytical aspects of ‘data and digital’. Generalist marketers are usually good at strategy, planning, messaging, project management and stakeholder engagement. They tend not to focus on mastering data and digital-focused skills due to a lack of time or interest. Round-table participants tabled a number of possible solutions to this dilemma: Hiring dedicated data and digital specialists into an event marketing team Upskilling and refocusing willing generalist marketers to become more adept at digital marketing and data-related work Working with external partners, usually agencies, to provide the expert delivery of ‘data and digital’ marketing elements. Overall, participants face very similar challenges in ensuring all aspects of marketing a multi-platform B2B media brand are resourced and optimised with the right people, systems and processes. Strategic investment in event marketing is essential for success and growth. Marketing leaders are being held more accountable for the return on this investment, which is important if marketing wishes to move up the organisational value chain. We look forward to being part of this next chapter in event marketing’s journey! Round-Table Discussion Chair: Ashley Friedlein CEO & Founder, Guild; Founder & President, Econsultancy Round-Table Discussion Participants: Jemma James Pageant Media Paul Gilbertson LSX Leaders Gareth Pike Faversham House Jonathan Perry PEI Media Sophie Eke Incisive Media Yetunde Akinwale Last Word Nik Dinning Retail Week & World Reail Congress Continue Reading Topics: Community marketingEvent marketingMarketing strategyMarketing technologyProject management
7 Strategic Predictions for 2019: Conference & Exhibition Marketing by Helen Coetzee, on 03/01/2019 Settling back into work as we kick off 2019 (which we all know is going to be a bit of a rollercoaster ride!), the MPG team has taken some time to reflect on the key challenges and opportunities our customers and wider community are likely to face: 1. Events will be more important than ever before In times of extreme uncertainty, imminent change and heightened risk – meeting face-to-face with other professionals facing the same challenges is one of the best ways to proactively acquire valuable intelligence and essential contacts. Responsible companies will want their ‘fingers on the pulse’ of their customers and their industry. Many will find that sharing and collaborating with their industry peers is the best way to find solutions and opportunities. In 2019, event marketers will need to be highly attuned to the burning questions and priorities of their customers – attendees, sponsors, exhibitors, speakers and other event stakeholders. Our deep empathy and a keen understanding of what matters most will be essential in creating and effectively communicating event value propositions and marketing messages. 2. Event customers will be more discerning and protective of their time At MPG we have always believed that event customers will always prioritise ‘return on time’ over ‘return on money’. If an event product very effectively meets a market need – the cost of participating in an event becomes less of an issue. Event customers will demand an excellent return on the time they invest in an event and will pass harsh judgement if any of their time is wasted. In 2019 it will be even more important for event content, speakers and programme formats to be highly relevant and very well executed to deliver exceptional ‘value for time’ and a good experience. Event marketers will need to get products to market early. We will also need to ensure our messaging is highly relevant and compelling to stake a claim to some precious days in diaries. 3. Strong brands with excellent events will win For B2B media brands, in-person, hybrid and virtual events will become even more important for brand engagement and value delivery – especially within ‘core customer’ groups. Brand equity will be a key part in attracting customers to events – with the confidence and trust they have in a brand playing an important part in decisions to devote some of their precious time (and budget) to participating in an event. Events businesses will also start prioritising brand building as they recognise the importance of being more customer-focused rather than product-focused. More B2B media and events businesses will understand that their brands belong to their customers and that being responsible brand custodians means investing in the unique and genuine value a brand delivers to the community it serves. In 2019, event marketers should relish and take full advantage of the opportunity to strategically build brands that will help attract high quality event customers – embracing the exciting opportunities for strengthening content-led, inbound and brand-led marketing. 4. Referral and influencer marketing will come to the fore In times of uncertainty, event customers will do all they can to reduce the risk of wasting their own time or their company’s money. They will also be more mindful of protecting and building their personal brands – carefully considering how their managers, peers and potential future employers perceive their involvement in the events they choose to participate in. Event customer acquisition and retention will rely more on validation and referrals from trusted colleagues and influencers – to reduce risk and protect reputations. In 2019, event marketers need to truly embrace the ‘human-to-human’ movement. Our marketing programmes need to consider how key individuals – who are influential with our event customers – will become brand advocates and publicly support our events. And we’ll need to be acutely aware of ‘WIFM’ (‘what’s in it for me’?) when putting together plans to get the right messages to the right people at the right time. 5. Customer insight and data will be in high demand for good decision-making To be more confident in their decisions and strategies, senior managers will push their teams harder to produce valuable insight on customers and their behaviour (particularly their propensity to purchase) throughout an event cycle. Events business leaders know this data is critical to drive growth and reduce risk, and they are also aware that the required data points are readily available with the right digital marketing tools and approach. Event marketers are the natural owners of customer insight and in 2019 will need to take more responsibility for collecting and analysing data that helps the business understand how customers are engaging with their events (and potentially the wider business). Business leaders will also have to make strategic investments in the skills and resources needed to make this possible. If this investment is made well, the return should be excellent – especially in the long run. 6. Deeper personalisation will be key to event customer engagement Although artificial intelligence is showing strong potential for delivering a more personalised customer experience, in 2019 most organisations will still be relying on a more manual approach to ensuring the content and messages served up by marketing to targeted audience groups is highly relevant. Getting the right message to the right person at the right time will be more important than ever. And having a well organised customer database is the first step to making any personalisation possible – whether driven by AI or more manual means. In 2019 event marketers will need to focus on getting the most out of their CRMs/marketing database systems – ensuring their #1 priority is organising the database of customer and prospect records so that targeted marketing is possible, even if more manual than we would like it to be. 7. The full range of skills needed for event marketing will be recognised Effective event marketing requires a team of marketers – each with specific skill sets. 2019 will be the year business leaders recognise that they cannot expect one individual to have all the required skills around strategy, data and analytics, campaign planning & project management, content marketing, copywriting, design, email marketing and marketing automation, social media and pay-per-click advertising (and more). Marketing is a deep and broad discipline, and events require a very specific type of product marketing that is very different from other types of product marketing. In 2019, event marketers will be recognised as a unique, valuable and scarce resource. Businesses will start thinking differently about how they acquire and retain the skills needed to create and drive effective event marketing strategies and campaigns. Upskilling, outsourcing and partnering will be explored as ways to fill the critical resource and skills gap in event marketing. Even though these predictions take in to account the unique challenges we’re likely to face in 2019, we believe all the above would be on the horizon regardless of Brexit or Trump-fuelled uncertainty. As consumers become more powerful, a more collaborative and sharing-based economy emerges and our world becomes fully digitally-enabled, event customers will demand more from the event brands they choose to nail their colours to. Event marketing needs the right kind of investment to make the essential strategic contribution required to drive growth – which is possible even in difficult times. B2B media brands and events-focused organisations that can think differently about how they invest in marketing for the best return will be the winners in 2019 and beyond. MPG accelerates the growth for conferences and exhibitions. We deliver: Event Growth StrategiesOutsourced Event Marketing Get in touch to find out how MPG’s marketing approach has consistently achieved 40%+ annual growth for events. Continue Reading Topics: Analytics and intelligenceBrand strategyEvent marketingLead generationMessagingVirtual event platforms
How are event marketing leaders creating high-performance teams? Insights from MPG’s Round-Table by Helen Coetzee, on 28/11/2018 GET REPORT Event marketing is being transformed. Organisations are becoming more customer-focused, and attention is shifting from outbound to inbound strategies amid changing customer expectations and rapidly downsized databases due to GDPR. In this new era, where marketers have more data, technology and influence at their fingertips than ever before, the strategic impact and responsibilities they hold within organisations is growing exponentially. It is up to marketers to ensure all stakeholders understand just how important best-practice marketing is to the future success of a business, and to build the most efficient and skilled marketing functions to deliver on this potential. MPG’s round-table, held on 9th November 2018, brought together some of the UK’s most influential B2B event marketing leaders to discuss the key challenges involved in building a high performance event marketing team. Round-Table Discussion Participants: Nicole Abbot IQPC UK Matt Ackroyd The Telegraph Babak Daemi GovNet Lubtcho Dimitrov Capacity Media Vivian Linecar Haymarket Hannah McCulloch Hanson Wade Matthew Tremlett Pageant Media Sharise Wilkinson KNect365 Key Insights from the Round-Table Discussion MPG have put together an overview of the key points from the discussion, providing valuable insight into the following areas: The shift to more customer-focused organisations How to increase event marketing’s contribution across an organisation Why it is so important for the marketing function to have an investment mindset The value of marketing performance measurement Ongoing changes in tactical and strategic marketing practices The opportunities tech and data offer marketers Marketing’s evolving role in project management Challenges in staff recruitment and retention DOWNLOAD KEY INSIGHTS Event Marketing Leaders Round-Table Series MPG runs a series of events dedicated to marketing leaders. These gatherings enable discussion and the sharing of ideas around the most important challenges and opportunities in event marketing today, as well as important trends impacting the future of event marketing. Sign up to event updates to join our community: SIGN UP TO EVENT UPDATES Continue Reading Topics: Community marketingEvent marketingMarketing operationsMarketing strategySkills training
Unlocking the Potential of Marketing: Some Sage Advice for Events Business Leaders by Helen Coetzee, on 01/11/2018 Our guest blogger – experienced event and content advisor Tim Mann provides insightful tips on how events business leaders can be confident in the return on their investment in marketing. “By improving the reporting process for the marketing team, you are also helping the marketing team communicate with other functions, enhancing their value to the organisation. Marketing reports, made accessible and actionable, should be shared with all functions in the business – especially sales.” As is the case in all types of organisations, senior executives focused on the success of B2B events have to quickly process information from a variety of sources to make good decisions – on an operational and strategic level. A cause of frustration I often encounter when working with senior executives is how difficult it can be to efficiently receive and understand data provided by B2B community marketers. Frequently, meetings with B2B community marketers or the reports they provide tend to overflow with analytics – where important context and actionable insights can be difficult to pinpoint. It can be unclear how marketing spend is being allocated, which channels or elements of an B2B community marketing campaign are working best, or what is being done to optimise marketing performance in the months and weeks leading up to an event. This can strain relationships between marketers, executives and other stakeholders. So, what are the reasons for this and how can you address this challenge? The language of leadership and the language of marketing Marketing is a frequently misunderstood function. The analytics and language of its reports can be impenetrable to ‘outsiders’, especially when compared to other functions such as sales – despite the fact both functions should be closely aligned. CEOs, Managing Directors or Divisional Directors (P&L holders) in B2B Media and events businesses still tend to come from a background of content or sales – giving them a stronger, innate understanding of how non-marketing functions operate. Even if marketing has been a career path to senior management, the function has changed so much in the past five years that marketing experience gained years ago is probably of limited use. Compounding the problem, changes in recent years in the technology and tools being employed by marketers has resulted in marketing spend and the reliance on marketing investment increasing, as well as the volume of data and analytics rising. This growing cost and complexity of marketing has widened the disconnect between marketers and their senior executive team who see vast resources being sucked up, but hard-to-find or difficult to understand evidence of a return-on-investment. Ask the right questions… As a CEO or MD, you have to make sure your marketer(s) know what analytics and insights you need to see on a regular basis. Establish the data points, metrics, context and resulting insights and recommendations that are most valuable to your decision-making process and provide clarity for marketers on when and how you wish to see this information presented – usually in a combination of routine reports and meetings. …get the right answers Ensuring reports and meetings provide the information you want may involve rebuilding the whole process from scratch, which you need to be prepared to do in order to effectively manage your marketing function. Also be prepared to improve and refine this reporting and meetings process as you go along – building on what you learn about the value and accessibility of information your marketers can provide. A useful comparison and possible starting point may be your sales report. As marketing should be, sales is focused on financial results and customer engagement, and is effectively a marketing channel. Sales reports tend to speak the language P&L holders understand – communicating activity, engagement, forecast revenue and commercial outcomes. Good sales reports will also include a focus on quantity and quality of leads generated and conversion rates. Ideally marketers should provide the analytics and insights ‘further up the funnel’, and while showing joined up results with sales where relevant, ensure their reports also answer the following questions: “What, where and how are we spending?” “What are we aiming to achieve and what is the expected ROI? What does success look like?” “What results have been generated by marketing investment to date? How have these results been generated?” “Are there signs we should adjust or change our approach for better results?” “What is marketing doing to analyse results on an ongoing basis and flex to respond to results to maximise ROI over time?” Asking these important questions and insisting on context, benchmarks and insights will result in an intelligence-based approach to marketing decision-making, strategising and investment. Bring all functions into the conversation By improving the reporting process for the marketing team, you are also helping the marketing team communicate with other functions, enhancing their value to the organisation. Marketing reports, made accessible and actionable, should be shared with all functions in the business – especially sales. ‘Sales and marketing’ are effectively one process and need to be joined up for optimal results – yet they often operate in silos. I’ve regularly seen campaign meetings and plans launched by sales with no input from marketing and vice versa. Are sales people aware of the content and messaging marketing is communicating? Do marketing know who sales are talking to? Get marketing and sales people in the same room to understand each other’s strategies, activities and results so they are better able to align and integrate. Better information + better communication + better teamwork = better results As a business leader, you have the responsibility to ensure all functions are pulling their weight and well-supported and enabled to do so. The contribution marketing makes and how to lead marketers effectively can often be one of your most difficult tasks – often made more difficult if you’re not ‘speaking the same language’. But, if you work on this relationship and ‘help them to help you’ make good decisions, your investment in marketing should pay for itself many times over. Tim Mann currently works with a number of privately owned events and media businesses on overcoming the challenges of scaling and achieving faster growth. His work encompasses developing leadership capabilities, building and executing event and portfolio growth strategies and all actions that lead to sales growth. Previously to this Tim worked as Managing Director for several businesses involving conferences, executive forums, exhibitions, publishing and research. Connect with Tim on LinkedIn. Continue Reading Topics: Analytics and intelligenceCommunity marketingEvent marketingLead generationMarketing technology
B2B Events Growth Framework: Six Areas for Strategic Focus by Helen Coetzee, on 12/09/2018 Over the past 12 months, the most popular reads on MPG’s website have been the 9 Strategic Success Factors in Event Marketing blog series by Kirsty Joynson and How successful events can transform a B2B media business – a report based on research conducted with some of the most well-respected leaders from our community of B2B events professionals. (more…) Continue Reading Topics: Community marketingEvent marketingMarketing strategyProject management
Knowing Your B2B Event Customer: Developing Buyer Personas by Helen Coetzee, on 26/07/2018 Great event marketing is about great communication. But B2B community marketers can often spend so much time crunching numbers in spreadsheets, working on CRMs and databases, budgets and attendance targets that it becomes easy to forget our important role of effectively communicating with our customers. (more…) Continue Reading Topics: Audience acquisitionCommunity marketingEvent marketingMarketing strategyMessaging
Event Marketers: Brand Experience is your new Strategic Priority by Kirsty Joynson, on 09/07/2018 In recent years, the remit of the B2B community marketer has expanded – mostly to cover more strategically critical areas of an event’s value proposition. The marketer’s role is no longer limited to planning and delivering a pre-event campaign to get ‘bums on seats’. It extends to how customers experience the event itself – i.e. the ‘brand experience’, or more often called the ‘customer experience’. (more…) Continue Reading Topics: Brand strategyCommunity marketingEvent marketingMarketing strategyMessaging
GDPR for B2B: A Practical Approach and a Strategic Push by Helen Coetzee, on 23/05/2018 No business will be left unchanged by GDPR. Publishers and events businesses that rely on large data sets are particularly vulnerable if they lack a solid strategy to deal with the emerging opportunities and threats. Digital brands very reliant on advertising revenue will be particularly hard hit if Google gets away with its GDPR-instigated plan to force publishers to work with a limited number of ad-tech vendors. For B2B, legitimate interest has been seen as the ‘get out of jail’ card and provided great relief. However, this still comes with a tranche of GDPR compliance requirements and tasks. But those companies that are focused only on ticking the boxes in their compliance checklist are making a gross misjudgement. There is a lot to be gained, in terms of sustainable growth and competitive advantage, from aligning your whole business strategy with GDPR. Three critical insights As the MPG team has worked through a number of GDPR projects over the past few months, we’ve identified three essential things business leaders need to acknowledge about GDPR and its impact: The individual elements of GDPR are not difficult to understand or execute. But, even for small businesses, once they are combined as comprehensive GDPR compliance project there is a lot to do, and a range of interdependencies and decisions to be made. Getting your tech, data flows and processes fully lined up to become and remain compliant takes time and money, and if done well, should reap great rewards. Every organisation has a different starting point and end goal. A good GDPR compliance strategy will take these in to account, while balancing commercial risk with legal risk. So, it’s not a simple ‘box ticking’ exercise to be swiftly delegated down the line. Those who treat it as such are missing a golden opportunity to get their platforms and data in to good shape for future success. The winners in B2B media will be those who already have a brand-led gated ‘content and community’ model or can relatively quickly put one in place. But this is only possible if your audience prizes your brand’s content and community and trusts you to use their data to consistently serve up timely, unique and valuable information and connections. Coalface priorities As 25th May is nearly upon us, most business leaders will want to first ensure the following most urgent compliance tasks have been completed: Decisions made on which of the six lawful bases for processing personal data will be applied to customers and prospects. Usually, current customers who have signed up for a paid for service can be dealt with on a ‘contract’ basis, whereas others can generally be processed under ‘consent’, or if B2B ‘legitimate interests’ is also an option. If you have chosen legitimate interest, make sure you do a legitimate interest assessment. Ensure you have a privacy notice on your website that explains, in plain language, what you do with personal data of customers and prospects. See the ICO’s guidance on how to do this. Link the cookies message on your website and a message below all data capture forms on your website to this privacy notice. Under the ‘right to be informed’ requirement, send an email to all customers/prospects data (not under contract) you wish to continue processing after 25 May: If you’ve chosen legitimate interest: informing them you intend to process their data and why, letting them know why you have their data in the first place, what you intend to do with it and giving them the opportunity to ‘opt out’ of the relationship If you’ve chosen consent: asking them to consent (or re-consent) based on information you have included in your new privacy notice. Getting these three things done by 25 May will not make you GDPR compliant but will certainly help mitigate the risk around non-compliance. GDPR’s strategic opportunity The most successful organisations are looking beyond GDPR compliance requirements to the strategic opportunity: to build stronger, more engaged audiences that become valuable communities. To achieve this, it is essential to get your strategy right around gated content and networking opportunities for a curated audience. In other words, using a combination of free and paid for content with subscriptions products and events to attract a defined group of business people with common challenges and who get value from intelligence and connections you can provide via a ‘community-led platform’ or membership model. The holy grail is being able to directly monetise such a membership model via intelligence-led subscription products and ‘must attend’ events, with further revenue possibilities from limited number of premium packages for carefully selected vendors to access the community. Organisations that have, or plan to religiously pursue this holy grail will understand the value of the new regulations. GDPR rewards companies that build strong customer relationships and trusted brands, and who also put the tech and processes in place to look after these relationships. In order to take advantage of the rewards GDPR can offer, a commitment to full compliance is essential. A practical and comprehensive approach Under the new laws, every organisation that handles customer/prospect data needs to comply fully with GDPR. There are no short cuts and no exceptions. Even companies not compliant by 25 May should commit to working towards comprehensive GDPR compliance – to operate lawfully and to take advantage of the opportunity to put in place and execute a winning strategy. So that you can understand the ‘shape and size’ of a GDPR compliance project, here is an outline of four of the main compliance project elements: A data protection plan: MPG’s template contains 48 tasks in 5 categories: accountability, external visibility, suppliers, relationships with other companies, international data transfers and staff training. A map of customer/prospect data you collect, process and store A database of suppliers, as well as a supplier questionnaire completed by and data processing agreement signed by all suppliers that process data on your behalf Documentation: privacy policy, data protection policy, data retention policy, record of consent (if needed), legitimate interest assessment, IT security policy, data subject access request procedure, data protection impact assessment procedure, data breach response plan. To get things done you need to take the following steps: STEP 1: Appoint a senior executive to take ongoing responsibility for data protection. STEP 2: Set up a formal and dedicated GDPR compliance project, sponsored by senior management and supported from the whole organisation. STEP 3: Determine the skills and resource levels you will need to plan and implement your GDPR compliance project. STEP 4: Allocate a dedicated budget for your GDPR compliance project. STEP 5: Start! There are no loopholes, quick fixes or short cuts. GDPR will arrive on 25th May and will be here to stay. Those who tackle GDPR head on – strategically and comprehensively – will be rewarded. Continue Reading Topics: Community marketingDatabase developmentEvent marketingMarketing strategyProject management
How to Create an Excellent Content Programme to Grow your B2B Event by Helen Coetzee, on 10/05/2018 Over the past 18 months, I’ve worked with a number of excellent exhibition and tradeshow organisers who understand that having exceptional content at the heart of their events is a key part of a winning formula for growth. While usually willing to invest in this area, they are often unsure of how to get the best return from this investment – with many reporting that the content they added to their events has not had the hoped-for impact on visitor quality, visitor numbers and overall revenue growth. (more…) Continue Reading Topics: Audience acquisitionContent marketingEvent marketing
#11 | Rigorous Execution: Event Marketing Strategy Success by Kirsty Joynson, on 18/01/2018 In this blog series we’ve delved into a huge range of strategy, tactics and skillsets that can take your event marketing to the next level. Hopefully, event marketers following our posts have been able to pick up plenty of ideas and guidance they can successfully apply to their own working techniques. (more…) Continue Reading Topics: Event marketingMarketing operationsMarketing strategyProject management
#10 | Event Marketing: The Ultimate Project Management Challenge by Kirsty Joynson, on 15/12/2017 Event management is a complex process. The sheer scale and complexity of events can be overwhelming. Many great event concepts fail in execution due to organisational issues. When events fail to meet expectations, one of the most common reasons is a lack of project management – with no one single project manager appointed. At times, even if one is appointed, it may be someone with a lack of influence, or someone simply in the wrong role or with the wrong skill set. (more…) Continue Reading Topics: Brand strategyEvent marketingMessagingProject management
#9 | B2B Event Marketing: Measure It To Manage It by Kirsty Joynson, on 08/12/2017 One of the most underrated skillsets in event marketing is agility. Marketers who possess the ability to intelligently adapt strategy and fine-tune tactics in the heat of a campaign will always outperform those who take time to change direction or hesitate under pressure. To be truly agile, marketers must embrace the power of analytics and continually measure what return on investment (ROI) their campaign is generating. This allows them to proactively refine campaign tactics on the go and ensure their event has the best chance of success possible. (more…) Continue Reading Topics: Analytics and intelligenceEvent marketingMarketing operationsProject management
