Smart Event Marketing

Smart Event
Marketing
Smart Event Book Series

Smart Event Marketing (Smart Event Book Series)
Title
Master Steve
Author
Somayeh Amiri, Tara Kamangar
Colleagues
Keyvan
Layout
Designer
Silk Road Publishing (Toronto, Canada)
Publisher
Printed Book: 978-1-990236-23-5
EBook: 978-1-990236-24-2
ISBN
www.MasterSteve.com
Website
Attributions:
Images Credits:pch.vector / Freepik
Note: The author of this book gives the right to use
the present content, provided that the source is cited,
to professors, educators, teachers, lecturers, and aca-
demic and non-academic educational centers, for an
indefinite period.
The copyright of this bookis internationallyregistered
for the author.

Contents
Introduction.........................................................................................................................7
Chapter 1: Event Marketing Requirements..............................8
1. Knowing an Event...............................................................................................10
2. Defining the Goal of Holding an Event..................................................15
3. Identifying the Target Market Location ............................................... 16
4. Making a List of Event Activities................................................................17
5. Identifying the Audience for the Event Activities ........................... 19
6. Web Design ........................................................................................................... 21
7. Making a List of Necessary Items..............................................................23
8. Making a List of Income-Generating Items.......................................24
9. Making a List of Income-Generating Groups ..................................26
10. Making a List of Associations and Unions ........................................29
a. Becoming a Figurative Sponsor ......................................................31
b. Widespread Notification .....................................................................31
c. Absorbing Visitors and Participants .............................................32
d. Increasing Sale .........................................................................................32

4
Chapter 2: Event Promoting Methods.......................................34
1. Collaborating with Advertising Agencies .............................................37
2. Collaborating with Organizations and Associations Pertinent to
Your Target Market ...............................................................................................38
3. Advertising Slogan ............................................................................................39
4. Face-To-Face (Direct) Marketing ............................................................. 40
5. Event Presentation.............................................................................................43
6. Letter Invitation ................................................................................................44
7. Ambient Advertising.........................................................................................49
8. Print Advertising Products ...........................................................................49
9. Collaborating with Other Events ............................................................ 50
10. Funding (Sponsorship)...................................................................................51
11. Customer Referral System .........................................................................52
12. Affiliate System ................................................................................................54
13. Customer Reward System ..........................................................................55
14. Online Presence ...............................................................................................58
a. Preparing the Structure of An Online Marketing Plan for
the Event........................................................................................................... 60
b. Online Marketing Action Plan ........................................................64

5 Smart Event Marketing
c. Analyzing the Online Marketing Action Plan ......................... 79
d. Revision, Modifications, and Optimization ............................81
15. Collaborating with Media ...........................................................................82
a. Ad Ordering ............................................................................................... 87
b. Advertorial...................................................................................................89
c. Press Release ...............................................................................................91
d. Press Conference.....................................................................................99
16. Using Executive Team and Participants in Marketing............. 104
17. Incentive Plan ................................................................................................. 108
18. Free Product .....................................................................................................110
19. Coupon ................................................................................................................ 111
20. Promotional Gift ...........................................................................................112
21. Contest and Prize Draw...............................................................................113
22. Cold Calling.......................................................................................................114
23. Character and Model ...................................................................................115
24. Using Celebrities ........................................................................................... 116
Chapter 3: The Importance of Event Visitors..................... 117
a. Selling Tickets ................................................................................................... 120
Chapter 4: Marketing after Holding an Event ..................122

6
List of Tables & Figures
Table 1. Details of knowing an event ........................................................... 13
Table 2. Details of knowing an event: the goal of holding an event ....15
Table 3. Details of knowing an event: the event’s target market
location ......................................................................................................................... 16
Table 4. List of event activities .........................................................................17
Table 5. List of event’s advantages .................................................................18
Table 6. The relation between assets and audiences .........................20
Table 7. Necessary items and equipment for holding an event ...23
Table 8. Income-generating opportunities of an event ....................25
Table 9. Income-generating methods out of event’s resources ...27
Table 10. Income-generating methods ......................................................28
Table 11. List of unions, associations, etc. pertinent to your event ...... 30
Table 12. Types of media ....................................................................................84
Table 13. List and characteristics of media with common audi-
ence ................................................................................................................................86
Figure 1. The process of event online marketing .................................59
Figure 2. Principles of assessing event online marketing ................79

Introduction
Up to a few decades ago, event holding had not been con-
sidered as an independent business. Most people viewed
event as a peripheral activity in addition to the other main
businesses. However, event has become a popular business
in recent years.
Such as any other business, event also requires proper
marketing and introduction to realize its goals by absorb-
ing appropriate and sufficient audiences, meaning, partic-
ipants and visitors. Just like the case with other businesses,
two main goals, branding and sales, are pursued.
You need marketing operational methods, plan, and
strategy to absorb the audience, get financial resources to
hold the event, and gain income by selling its services.
In this book, event marketing is discussed through a
smart view. By smart view, we mean various aspects of
this topic are considered, and as a result, new solutions are
found according to the circumstances of one's event.
First, the items you need to provide before the event
marketing are determined, and then, 24 event marketing
methods are outlined.

Chapter 1
Event Marketing
Requirements

Each event has its own special character.
An event without a special character is
not an event at all.
Events are unique; they don’t resemble one another.
There is no event that is an exact copy of another event.
Copying an event is almost impossible because events' vis-
itors are different.
Event is a set of factors, and to you as the event orga-
nizer, some of these factors are not controllable.

10 Event Marketing Requirements
To do marketing for any event such as a conference,
networking event, trade fair, etc., you first need to know
what that event is all about.
.

. Knowing an Event
In this stage, you need to know:
ƒ
What type of event you have? (conference, trade
fair, webinar, etc.)
The type of event plays an influential role in
determining the marketing methods. For example,
a webinar which is held online needs online mar-
keting methods above all to receive recognition in
its target market.
ƒ
What is the topic of your event?
You will recognize your target market and
select more suitable methods for your event's
marketing by knowing the topic of your event.
For example, when you hold an event on music,
your target market includes artists and music
fans. Therefore, you need to conduct ambient
advertising on your other event marketing meth-
ods based on these people's taste in accordance
with the event's topic.

ƒ
Who are the event's audiences?
There are two classes of audiences for an event:
9
Participants: individuals who are work-
ing with you in organizing the event. These
people include booth holders, sponsors, and
speechmakers.
9
Visitors: These are the individuals who play
no part in holding the event but simply pay a
visit to it.
In some events, visitors must buy tickets or cer-
tain conditions are required to attend the event.
In some other events, free entry for all visitors is
granted. You determine the type of entry based on
the type of your event.
Having proper knowledge of your audience will
guide you in selecting the marketing methods. For
example, consider an event which participants are
representatives from other countries. The type of
introduction and advertising location for this event
is definitely quite different from an event with local
participants. The more information you gather on
your audiences, i.e., participants and visitors, the
better you advertise your business. This is because
your ultimate goal of all your marketing activities is
to absorb the audience.
The marketing strategy for absorbing participants
differs from the strategy for absorbing visitors.

Therefore, you need to write two types of plan in
your event marketing plan to absorb each group. Vis-
itors often can be common. For example, you have a
food fair; people who visit the fair are certainly work-
ingin food-related areas.There is no reason forthe two
event groups to be always different. They can always
be same thing. However, you need to categorize them
into two groups to clarify who your audiences are and
what the target market you're looking for entails.
ƒ
What is the proper time to hold the event?
According to their topics and circumstances,
many events can be only held during certain time.
For example, if your event requires open outdoor
space, the weather during the time the event is held
is a determining factor. Therefore, you must always
consider the type and venue of your event when
you are planning an event.
You need to know how much time you have
at your disposal until the event and make plans
accordingly. Some marketing activities need time
to pay off sufficiently. For example, if you have less
than a month to the event, and you haven’t been
active on any social media platforms so far, using
social media-based marketing methods is not suit-
able for you. Creating a user account and increasing
the number of followers take time. Therefore, you
can't set up a new and popular profile account and
advertise your event through content providing.

ƒ
Which place is most suitable to hold the event?
First, investigate your event's requirements from
various perspectives and then, choose a place which
provides you with the resources you need. For
example, if the venue's access for audiences is not
desirable, considering access options is a means to
absorb the audiences.
Event venues are usually reserved from months
in advance. You may have to decorate the event
venue in a special way.
You will gain general knowledge about your event
by finding the answers to these questions.
As the case with my other books where I empha-
sized the importance of creating a comprehensive
table for every task, here as well, while planning
your event, you may need to write the obtained
information in a table. This is a sample:
Type of
Event
Topic Visitors Participants
The Event
Date
The Needed
Venue
Fair
Presenting
Cultural
Products
School Stu-
dents
University
Students
Professors
and Instruc-
tors
Publishers
Authors
Educational
Institutions
The
Beginning
of a New
Academic
Year
Indoor Arena
The Area of At
Least 10000
Square Meters
Easy Access
Adequate Venti-
lation
Table 1. Details of knowing an event

Table 1 is filled as a sample table. Create a simi-
lar table for your event and keep it in front of your
eyes because it is an excellent guide for choosing
the proper marketing and advertising methods. For
example, when academics are your audiences and
cultural products are the topic of your event, you
install advertising billboards near universities and
educational institutions or apply online marketing
tools on social media where university students and
teachers are members. In the following sections,
this table becomes more comprehensive and other
columns are added.

.

. Defining the Goal of Hold-
ing an Event
The second step in planning for event marketing is
defining the goal of holding the event. Do you intend to
gain profit and have more sales? Or are you focused on
branding and gaining the event more recognition?
Sometimes, events are only held to develop culture in
a specific area and business goals are secondary to them.
Depending on the type of goal you have in mind, the
method used to introduce different event can be unique,
based on the peculiarities of each event.
After determining your goal, you need to add another
column (titled goals) to Table 1 and write down your event's
goals in there.
Type
of
Event
Topic Visitors
Partici-
pants
The Event
Date
The Needed
Venue
The
Event's
Goals
Fair
Pre-
senting
Cultural
Prod-
ucts
School Stu-
dents
University
Students
Professors
and Instruc-
tors
Publish-
ers
Authors
Educa-
tional
Institu-
tions
The
Beginning
of a New
Academic
Year
Indoor arena
The Area of At
Least 10000
Square Meters
Easy Access
Adequate Ven-
tilation
Brand-
ing
Table 2. Details of knowing an event: the goal of holding an event

.

. Identifying the Target Mar-
ket Location
In the third step, you determine where your target mar-
ket is located and what sections you need to cover. Is your
target market in the local area of your city or province, the
entire country, or at an international level?
Determining your target market's location plays a signifi-
cant role in both marketing ambient advertising and online
marketing. In online marketing tools such as social media
(which will be discussed in details in the next chapter), you
can show your ads to the viewers based on location.
In this stage, add another column to the table you have
created and write down in the new column the location of
your event's target market.
Type
of
Event
Topic Visitors
Partici-
pants
The
Event
Date
The
Needed
Venue
The
Event's
Goals
The
Target
Market
Location
Fair
Cul-
tural
Prod-
ucts
School
Students
University
Students
Profes-
sors and
Instructors
Publish-
ers
Authors
Educa-
tional
institu-
tions
The
Begin-
ning of
a New
Academic
Year
Indoor
Arena
The Area
of at Least
10000
Square
Meters
Easy
Access
Adequate
Ventila-
tion
Brand-
ing
Western
Area of
the Coun-
try
Table 3. Details of knowing an event: the event's target market location

.

. Making a List of Event Ac-
tivities
In the fourth step, write down your event activities.
Don’t forget that you move forward from the event plan
towards the marketing plan. In fact, your marketing plan
depends on your event plans and activities.
Make a list of various parts of your event such as speech,
seminar, exhibition, etc.
Write the list of activities in a table like Table 4 with full
details. Using this plan, you outline your event and can
easily refer to any part of the plan at any time. This plan
is a perfect guide and can be used to write a great part of
your marketing plan.
hour
Day
10-12 12-13 13-14 14-16 16-18
Day 1
Opening
Ceremony
Introducing the
Participants
Refreshment
and Rest
Exhibition
and Sales
Exhibition
and Sales
Day 2 Speech 1
New Product
Launch
Refreshment
and Rest
Exhibition
and Sales
Exhibition
and Sales
Day 3 Speech 2 Q&A Panel
Refreshment
and Rest
Exhibition
and Sales
Closing
Ceremony
Table 4. List of event activities

When you determine what you want to present and what
plan you have, write your advantages and special cases in
another table. These points can be items such as the areas
in which you have a unique quality. It can be the fact that
the chosen venue is very suitable for your business. It can
also be the fact that you have chosen a proper date or have
selected a place in which an important event in your work
field is happening. It can be that because people who are
collaborating with you are not involved with other compa-
nies in this particular area or business niche.
All these items can be your positive characteristics that
your competitors lack. They are, in fact, your competitive
advantages.
Make a list of your program's special attractions then, go
after the audience of your event to bring home the bacon.
Positive Points and Advantages of the Event
Collabo-
rating with
Governmen-
tal Organiza-
tions
Broad-
casting
the Event
on TV
Channels
Specified
Space for
Interview
Technical
Q&A Panel
Sufficient
Area for
Booths
Running
a Contest
Offering
Gifts and
Prizes
Table 5. List of event's advantages

.

. Identifying the Audience for
the Event Activities
In this section, you must first make a list of your assets.
ƒ
Write down in your asset list whatever you can use
in your advertising or as a feature which distin-
guishes you from other events.
Assets such as space, advertising brochures, gifts,
etc. are quite influential in attracting the audience
and in event marketing.
ƒ
Create a new table similar to Table 5 and enter your
assets in the first column. Then, refer to Table 1
which you have already prepared and identified the
event audiences in there.
ƒ
Write the type of audience for each of the assets
you have in Table 5.
For example, one of your assets is to have a sit-
ting space for rest where visitors can use. Write in the
opposite column of this asset the elderly visitors so
you can emphasize more on the assets pertinent to
these people while you are advertising to attract them.
A section is for providing a place for the belong-
ings of participants and booth holders. The audi-
ences for this section are the participants. A section
is given to the food service you have provided, and

this section can be for either one group of audi-
ences or both of them. This is how you write down
the type of audiences in front of each asset.
List of Assets Type of Audience
Easy Access to the Event Venue Visitors – Participants
Prepared Food Service Visitors- Participants
A Place to Keep the Booth Holders' Belongings Participants
Adequate Space for Sitting and Reception Visitors
Table 6. The relation between assets and audiences
So far, you have already done a better part of the work.
This means you now have some useful information such
as the event and its audiences' characteristics, the event
activities and a list of assets. You can use this information
to get prepared and make a file to introduce yourself. You
can apply the information you have gathered up to this
stage in your event presentation.

.

. Web Design
In this stage, you need to launch an online section. Hav-
ing a website is a fundamental aspect of using online mar-
keting tools. Your website must:
ƒ
Contain new information for the audience.
You can put on the website the event schedule
you have prepared in the previous stage, so your
audiences know what happens at each hour of the
days the event is held.
Website is a suitable platform to introduce your-
self and introduce the events you have previously
held. It can also be used to introduce speechmak-
ers for events. You can prepare short videos of the
speechmakers and hosts and put them on the web-
site for interested individuals to view.
ƒ
Be designed in a way that the audience can easily
find the answer to their questions.
Being user-friendly is one of the most import-
ant features of a good website; that is, when the user
enters your website, there must be no confusion
and any piece of information the user wants must
be easily found. Easy access to contact information
must be provided and all options must be properly
placed on the pages so the user can click on them
without facing any problem.

ƒ
Contain up-to-dated content.
You need to update your website content regu-
larly and put new changes or happenings related to
your event on that same website.
ƒ
Provide the option of contacting and interacting for
the audience through chatting directly or filling the
contact form.
Online support makes the audiences realize to
what extent you care for them. If a user enters your
website and wonders about something, he/she pre-
fers to find the answer in real time. The fastest and
most accessible contacting method is online sup-
port. Therefore, provide the option of online chat
in your website and put someone in charge of it.
This person must be trained and well-informed
about everything that happens in your company.

.

. Making a List of Necessary
Items
In the seventh step, you need to write down the neces-
sary items for holding the event. These items are catego-
rized into two groups:
ƒ
The required items and equipment to hold an event
that are common in most events. For example,
lighting and sound recording equipment are some
of the common items in most events.
ƒ
The other part depends on the list of assets you
have prepared in the previous stage. For example, a
billboard will be required if you have ad billboards
in the list of your assets.
Mails, posters, flyers, visiting cards, and videos
are the most important items in this group. While
designing and preparing each of these items, you
must check for whom you want to do marketing
and what objectives you have.
You need to create a table in this stage, as well,
and write down these items and equipment in two
separate columns of this table.
Primary Necessary Items Secondary Necessary Items
Lighting and Sound Recording Equipment
Visiting Card
Table 7. Necessary items and equipment for holding an event

.

. Making a List of In-
come-Generating Items
In the eighth step, prepare a list of income-generating
items including sponsors, selling the booth, selling adver-
tising spaces such as posters, billboards, and promotional
options on gifts.
The following items are some of the methods to gener-
ate income out of an event:
¾
Selling tickets
¾
Selling booths
¾
Absorbing sponsors
¾
Selling ambient advertising spaces
¾
Selling online advertising spaces
¾
Advertising and promotion on gifts such as bags,
card straps, or any other object which is going to
be given as a gift.
¾
Taking ad orders to publish on the event magazine
¾
Selling spaces for side talks.
Consider any kind of income-generating method out
of the opportunities provided for you by the event, and
create a table similar to Table 8. Assign a numeric or letter
code to each method and write down in the opposite col-
umn the amount of income each item generates.

Code of the
Method
Income-Ggenerating Methods
Amount of
Generated
Income
A Selling Tickets $1000
B Selling Booths $3000
C Financial Sponsor $4500
D Billboards at the Entrance $2000
E Indoor Billboards $5000
F Backdrop Banners $3000
G Floor Stickers in the Venue $1500
H Promotional Gifts $500
I Staff Uniforms $4000
Table 8. Income-generating opportunities of an event

.

. Making a List of In-
come-Generating Groups
By preparing a list of income-generating methods
and your target market, you can see from which group
of people you can earn income. Each income-generat-
ing method is suitable for one of your target groups. For
example, financial sponsorship is the suitable method for
associations, and selling booths is suitable for food com-
panies.
As mentioned before, you have two groups of audiences
(visitors and participants such as booth holders and finan-
cial sponsors) in every event.
ƒ
In front of the list of income-generating methods in
Table 8, write down from which group of audiences
you can earn the income related to that method,
and add the name of income-generating individu-
als.
For example, if you have a proper website or an
active account on social media and if website ads
are one of your income-generating methods, write
down the names of people who generate this source
of income for you. Examples of such people are
speechmakers who introduce themselves through
your website.

When you have a VIP room for speechmakers,
say, five, ten, or twenty speechmakers use the room,
have their interviews with media, and do the photo-
shoots. That room is a place for VIP people to hang
out. When you want to absorb a financial sponsor,
you are already equipped and offer this VIP place to
the financial sponsor to be recognized by import-
ant individuals.
Income-Generating
Methods
Income-Generating
Target Market
Type of
Audiences
Available
Resources
Selling Booths
Food Distribution
Companies
Participants Booths
Backdrop Banners
Speechmakers
Event Venues
Participants
Website
Social Media
Selling Tickets Visitors Visitors Website
… … … …
Table 9. Income-generating methods out of event's resources
Check and see the generated income out of each
part goes to which group. Add a column to put the
code for income-generating groups.
In marketing plan, you determine a market-
ing strategy, not for every single method, but
for each group of income-generating methods.
Therefore, you integrate your work by prepar-
ing this table.

Income-Gener-
ating Methods
Income-Gen-
erating Target
Market
Type of
Audiences
Available
Resources
Code for the
Income-Gen-
erating Group
Selling booths
Food Distribu-
tion Companies
Participants Booths B
Backdrop Ban-
ners
Speechmakers
Event Venues
Participants
Website
Social
Media
C
… … … … …
Table 10. Income-generating methods

.
10Making a List of Asso-
ciations and Unions
You deal with associations and unions both as visitors
and as participants.
Create a table similar to Table 11 on Excel or any other
program and make a list of all the unions, associations, gov-
ernmental organizations, and companies which works are
pertinent to your event's topic along with their details and
categorize them. Put similar items into one category. For
example, categorize all unions, organizations and associ-
ations in the same group. However, if their field would be
irrelevant to yours, you would need to consider each one
separately.
Divide your list into primary and secondary titles as
much as possible. For example, assign a title to govern-
mental sections, organizations, and associations, and men-
tion the secondary titles under it.
Assign a title to companies which field of activity is per-
tinent to the event's topic. For instance, if your event's topic
is food, you should categorize the retail or packaged food
companies under the same title, and consider the next title
for the wholesale or unpackaged food companies or those
with farms.

Associations Unions
Governmental Organi-
zations
Food Science &
Technology
Protein Products
Syndicate
FDA
Meat Products
(MPPSO)
Aquatics' Production and
Export (APEX)
Ministry of Agriculture
Jihad
Dairy Industries
Society of Pasta Producers
and Exporters
State Fisheries
Organization
Food & Beverage
Importers
Dairy Products and
Supermarkets
Agricultural Insurance
Fund
Dried Fruit Exporters Grocery Sales
… … …
Table 11. List of unions, associations, etc. pertinent to your
event
Collaborating with unions, associations, and other gov-
ernmental organizations seemingly does not directly pay
off for you. Depending on your working policies, you may
occasionally offer them certain privileges such as discount
cards that are costly. However, the costs you pay to attract
such entities' collaboration will be returned to you just as
the case with all the other marketing expenses. Collabo-
rating with and inviting such entities bring you advantages
which include:

a. Becoming a Figurative Sponsor
Becoming a figurative sponsor for you means that no
money is given to you and you're not financially spon-
sored. You may even have to pay for it, but in exchange,
you use the reputation of the corresponding organiza-
tion in your event's favor. For example, you agree with
the Food & Beverage Importers Association to insert
their name in the event's poster and introduction. Add-
ing the name and logo of such organizations boosts the
event's credibility. In exchange, you offer them a privi-
lege, as well.
b. Widespread Notification
Most governmental organizations, associations and
unions have exclusive media and notification networks
at their disposal. If any of these organizations make
announcements about your event, thousands of people
will be informed. In comparison to public media, such
media's main advantage is that their audiences are your
target market. A public medium may have millions of
audiences who watch the news about your event, but less
than 1% of them may care; while the audiences of a tech-
nical association's journal may be 1000 people at best, but
the difference is that all of these people are your target
market.

c. Absorbing Visitors and Participants
A great part of audiences (both participants and vis-
itors) are members of associations, unions, and orga-
nizations which work in the same field as your event's
topic. Therefore, using these centers, you can access
your target market. For example, make an offer to
unions to pay them a certain fee in exchange for every
participant who attends your event on their behalf.
Consequently, unions will make available audiences for
your event, and eventually, you get what you want and
unions benefit financially. In fact, this method is one of
the most useful marketing tools named affiliate mar-
keting which will be extensively discussed in the next
chapter.
d. Increasing Sale
You increase your sales by offering gift cards and
considering discounts for members of these centers.
For example, if your event is a food and beverage fair,
you announce to the Grocery Sales Syndicate that
you sell the fair's booths to this syndicate members
with 15% discount. This offer persuades the members
to attend the event and your sales will subsequently
increase.
You can do the same about selling products to visitors.
For example, you consider 10% discount on items pur-
chased from the event for members of an association.

Another method is to consider discount for organiza-
tions, so they prepare discount vouchers for their employ-
ees from your event.
Most organizations give discount vouchers to their
employees on different occasions. You can agree with
these organizations to offer them discount; in exchange,
their employees' discount vouchers will be valid for your
products.
So far, we discussed 10 headings to prepare yourself for
event marketing; that is, you need to pass these 10 ordeals
to start the action.
These stages are prerequisites for writing your event's
marketing plan. This highlights the importance of mar-
keting in every business, especially in an event. You never
get into the process of marketing without passing through
these ten stages.
Your marketing is directly related to the information
and the tables you have prepared. You can prepare your
items for marketing only on this basis.
You can have any kind of comprehensible
categorization for yourself while preparing
your tables. What matters is that you need
to categorize the items and information,
and you need to insert them in tables.
Notice

Chapter 2
Event Promoting
Methods

If you performed the market preparation stage smartly
and made the market recognize your name, you take a big
step in your event marketing. If the audience doesn’t rec-
ognize you, a great part of your relations to absorb finan-
cial sponsorship and potential customers will be fruitless.
When you fully realize whom to target, consider a suitable
title for your event, which can be turned into your brand.
Define an indirect promotion strategy based on the
event's type and features, the type of your event's audi-
ences, and the places where you can find these audi-
ences. This is quite an important step in making effective
relations with the target market.
Then, try and make the target market understand you
and realize that your event is a real deal. You can use social
media, various advertising methods, emails, etc., as your
preparation methods. Make announcements in places
where audiences come and go. For example, put up your
advertising flyers in a ministry where the audiences come
and go. You can also put them up at the secretariat build-
ing of a union or a place a particular association or unions
have their meetings. You can also distribute your flyers in
shows and events where these audiences attend.

36 Event Promoting Methods
You start making relations with the target market
after preparing the groundwork and making the initial
announcements.
In the following sections, event marketing methods and
practical and operational solutions for promoting your
event in your target market are discussed in detail.

.

. Collaborating with Advertis-
ing Agencies
Identify the advertising agencies which work in your
event's target market and persuade them to collaborate
with you. Close contracts with them and make them in
charge of your event marketing. This will help your busi-
ness and make you reach the target audience.
This group must gain adequate knowledge about your
event because they may collaborate with you without
adequate knowledge and apply ordinary methods imple-
mented on every other event.
Sometimes, marketing agencies agree with you to receive
20-25% commission fee. They give 15% discount on sales to
customers because they assume that theywill receive 25% from
you and get 10% for themselves. Make it clear whether you are
on board with this strategy and giving discounts or not?

.

. Collaborating with Organi-
zations and Associations Per-
tinent to Your Target Market
Collaborating with organizations and associations
helps with your sales and with generating income out of
the event. In exchange for asking them to promote your
event, consider certain benefits for them. These benefits
can be booths, tables, speech hall, seminar, etc. This both
increases your job's reputation and realizes the sales for
you.
Agreeing to collaborate with you depends on the way
you negotiate, the extent of your mastery over the subject,
the reflection of knowledge, and the uniqueness of your
job.

.

. Advertising Slogan
As the one who holds the event, you need to have a
specific slogan. You can use a single slogan in all of your
events and this slogan can represent you everywhere.
However, large businesses usually have many slogans for
various products. The same goes for this business, and you
can have various slogans for each event in addition to the
main slogan.
¾
Have some slogans for various occasions.
¾
Use great subjects and happenings, and show your-
self as a part of these great occasions by preparing
the relevant slogan.
¾
There must be no insult to any certain group or
ethnicity. The advertisements which insult the
competitor brand have failed to yield the right
results.
¾
The slogan must direct, simple and easy to remem-
ber.
¾
Ensure you also use slogan that directly promotes
your event.
¾
There is no limitation in making slogans, but it
is better to be brief and in accordance with your
activity.

.

. Face-To-Face (Direct) Mar-
keting
In B2B businesses, this marketing method is quite use-
ful. Your audiences are visitors and participants and there
are businesses in both groups.
A part of direct marketing is those famous long and
face-to-face meetings. This talk can happen in an event or
in other companies' workplace.
¾
Consider a section for making relations with key
figures in companies in the event's marketing
plan.
¾
It would be best if you had a proper communica-
tion strategy for direct marketing. You must talk
about some serious stuff with the audience in a
short time. That's it. It is a similar situation to exhi-
bitions where you have a short window for com-
municating or when you have in-person clients for
selling insurance.
You need to have plans for talking from the
moment you enter the meeting to the moment you
say goodbye. The topics you bring up must be for-
mulated based on the company's policies and the
marketing plan. Ensure you also talk on the topics
that are interesting and would add values to the lives
or businesses of your audiences.

During the meeting, talks may get stranded; so,
in the last five minutes of the meeting, talk about
things that would help you nail everything you want.
In face-to-face strategy, the importance of first
and last five minutes is greater than the rest of
the time. The first five minutes usually result in a
positive or negative attitude from the other party
towards you. In the last five minutes, you must
leave something behind that sticks in audience's
mind.
¾
Try and make healthy and friendly relationships
with individuals who work in companies.
¾
While using this method of making relations, be
aware of personality and moods of the person you
meet. Respectful jokes are extremely effective in
making relations in direct marketing.
Your decisions about people must
always be fluid.
¾
When you consider face-to-face strategy in your
marketing plan, define it properly and teach its
methods to your employees.

¾
While negotiating (especially for absorbing finan-
cial sponsorship), you must show that you are a
professional event organizer and you can absorb
the actual audience to the event.
¾
You need to reflect the mastery of subject mat-
ter while trying to get audiences for your event so
people and sponsors can believe in your capability
to hold a successful event.
¾
In any opportunity you get, talk about your com-
pany's brand and the events you have already held.
Do something to have access to a major part of the
target market and inform them of your business.

.

. Event Presentation
Prepare a presentation of your event. Use the informa-
tion you have already gathered in Tables 1 to 6, set up a
suitable presentation, and use it in various places. Send the
presentation file to companies and organizations which
can be your audiences. Make two versions of this file:
ƒ
A brief version in 4-5 pages.
ƒ
A detailed version in 20-50 pages. The detailed ver-
sion must be complete. The other company's needs
must be identified, and adequate information must be
available on meeting these needs through your event.
Through the presentation file, you will convey this
message to the target company that "our event can be a
goodchoicetomeetyourneeds".Instead of self-flattery
and trashing the competitor, talk about a list of what the
target company needs and how to resolve them.
If necessary, you can use special yet unique promotion
which is more influential; that is, you prepare an exclu-
sive presentation for the corresponding company. For
example, an introduction/promotion presentation for
sponsors must differ from a letter to a private company.
Define the general structure of your compa-
ny's promotion in the presentation, but don’t
make it limited to a standard, rather, custom-
ize it depending on the type of customers.
Note

.

. Letter Invitation
Letter invitation is one of the main tools to absorb
financial sponsorship and sell booths. Consider the fol-
lowing points in applying this method:
¾
Formulate a general letter, explaining the event
and the company’s info.
¾
Prepare the letter differently for each of the event's
target group.
¾
There must be a stated reason in the letter for each
group of audiences to collaborate with you.
¾
Be aware of the differences in the letters to avoid
making mistakes in sending them.
¾
The more orderly and less cramped your letter is
structured, the faster your message is conveyed.
Consider a standard template for letters and invi-
tations and always stick to it.
¾
The letter's general structure must be the same for
different target groups. You only need to consider
some parts to provide recommendations. In this
case, a quick review will tell you to which group the
letter belongs.
¾
Use a professional letterhead for the letter.

¾
Follow the letter-writing standards which are com-
mon in the country in which you work. For example,
in English-speaking countries, the letter is dated. The
company's name and senders' names and address are
written on the top of the page. Then, the recipient's
name is inserted. Follow the local standards if you
are in a country where things are done differently.
¾
It will be much better if you find your recipients'
names and know to whom you're sending the letter.
¾
Put some thoughts on various parts of the letter.
Even if you use experts to write your letter, the
person in charge of this task must understand the
audience's circumstances and type of the event so
he/she can formulate the letter in accordance with
the invitation to attending the event.
¾
At the beginning of the letter, introduce yourself
briefly. Then, describe your event and organiza-
tion as concisely as possible. In the next part of the
letter, convey the main message to the audience.
For example, let them know how they can become
a financial sponsor and what good it does for
them. In the last part of the letter, explain that the
full details of your offer are attached and let them
know that they can contact a certain individual or
department if they have any questions. At the end,
the letter must be signed by the management or
the section manager, and the signer's name and
position must be mentioned.

¾
Formulate the letter based on its recipient's post
and position. Your presentation can be either
lengthy or brief.
You may have an in-person presentation. That
is, you accompany your letter. This presentation
can be brief. However, when you are going to send
something to people, the package must be suffi-
ciently expressive in the first place because there is
no one along to explain it.
¾
In the letter, write whatever you want the recipient
to find out about your event:
ƒ
What do you have to present to them?
ƒ
What role can their group play in your event
and what charms does it have for them?
When the letter's recipients find the answer to
their questions, you will definitely yield the right
results at the end.
¾
Follow in the letter all the writing and punc-
tuation rules such as paragraphing, proper
usage of colon, comma, and other punctuation
marks.
¾
Post the letter by express mail to an accurate recip-
ient by inserting his/her name and position, and
avoid bulk mail postage.

¾
Be organized in keeping the letters and sending
them to avoid errors in postage; for instance, you
should avoid sending the letter for the 2015 event
instead of the letter for the 2017 event! Also, don’t
send the invitation for sponsoring instead of invi-
tations for the officials.
Be quite careful and remember that you must
name the files differently for each category when
you prepare different letters.
¾
The letter envelope must be appliable to other set-
tings you have in the website, email, etc. Maintain-
ing harmony helps your branding, as well.
¾
The letter envelope should be in size of a flyer, and
you shouldn’t need to fold it. This aspect affects
how quickly you will be recognized and you will
come out as a professional.
After sending the letter and presenting the matter to the
audiences, one of the important principles is to follow up.
In follow-up:
9
You need to be in contact with the corresponding
individual or department.
9
The information you present to the audience in
every follow-up should not be a repetition of pre-
vious information, and you need to have something
new to say.

For example, you once talk about the benefits the
recipient company will gain from your event's visitors.
The next time, you may introduce the participants
or explain the benefits of the seminars you hold.
For example, you tell them that you have a depart-
ment named media relations. You maintain that no
matter how much they spend, they won't be able to
find all the options at one place and promote them-
selves. Still, because of these media platforms, it is
possible for them to gain recognition for their busi-
ness. Each time, formulate the information and do the
follow-up from a different angle.
9
The offer you give must be pertinent to the audi-
ence's work setting. Don’t say the same thing to mul-
tiple individuals.
9
Preparing the groundwork, organized letters and
information, all show how professional you are. When
audiences realize that you and your event's services
can be beneficial to them, your chance of success in
follow-ups and getting the right results will increase.
In marketing, 5% of the job is to inform
the right individual, and 95% of the job is
to follow up on it.

If your customers feel that you are a professional expert
in your job, they will trust you. In addition to building
trust, you must make them believe that you are bringing
them benefits and advantages.
The stronger customers believe in you, the deeper their
trust of gaining benefits become, and they will pay more
attention to what you present to them.
.

. Ambient Advertising
This type of advertisement includes billboards, putting
up posters and stickers on buses and other public transpor-
tation vehicles. In applying these tools, you need to consider
your target market and audiences' location. For instance, a
company is going to be your financial sponsor and pay you
2 million dollars. To show off your capability, you can rent
the advertising billboard in front of the company.
.

. Print Advertising Products
Prepare posters and flyers of your event which repre-
sent it. Make a pamphlet exclusively for your event and
put there the invitation letter, the event's presentation and
flyer in addition to your visiting card. Give this pamphlet
to your targeted individuals.

.

. Collaborating with Other
Events
One of the event marketing methods is to collaborate
with other events. This method is currently common in
the world.
¾
Each event organizers attend the other event and
advertise their own event. For example, Singapore
International Jewelry Expo is advertised in Honk
Kong Jewelry & Gem Fair.
¾
Based on a mutual agreement, both events' orga-
nizers share their permanent customers. This
move is done in form of combined offers or
attending each other's events.
¾
The other method is for each event's organizers to
sell the other event's offer packages. Sometimes,
buying booths from an event doesn’t reduce cus-
tomers in the other event because, say, the location
of their target market differs.

.
10Funding (Sponsorship)
One of the methods of gaining recognition and promot-
ing yourself in the target market is the financial sponsor-
ship of other events pertinent to yours. For example, you
are the holder of an event regarding construction mate-
rials, and you attend as a financial sponsor in an event
regarding architects. This can be done in two ways:
ƒ
Like any other sponsor, you pay money to the event.
ƒ
You make agreements with the event holder so that
you two can be sponsors for each other's events
without paying anything because you have com-
mon benefits and audiences.

.
11
Customer Referral System
Customer referral is useful in every business, and event
holding is not an exception. In the past, it was common to
offer discounts or free samples to customers who would
refer a customer. The customer referral system is the
modernized version of this old tradition.
In this method, your audiences become your event's
marketing agents. By absorbing others, they bring benefits
for both you and themselves. Regarding events, this sys-
tem can be applied in three sections: selling tickets, sell-
ing booths, absorbing sponsors.
ƒ
Selling Tickets
If tickets are required for attending your event,
you can give a commission fee to someone who
increases your ticket sales by referring customers
and absorbs visitors to your event. This method
helps you to sell more tickets and get more audi-
ence at the venue of your event.
ƒ
Booth
Offer commission fee to someone who refers you
a participant for buying a booth because this person
has helped in generating income out of the event.

ƒ
Sponsor
Sponsors are quite influential in the event's
income-generating process, and absorbing them
is of great importance. Offer a commission fee
to anyone who somehow refers you a sponsor or
makes a sponsor close a contract with you. Consider
the commission fee either as a fixed amount or as
a percentage of what the sponsor provides for the
event.
The event's sponsor may attend the event with
its product. Let's say a printing office becomes your
event's sponsor. Instead of paying money, it stands
in charge of printing all the event's print products.
You need to have a strategy beforehand and con-
sider the referrer's commission.

.
12Affiliate System
Using modern customer referral systems called affiliate
systems, assign exclusive links for advertising usage to those
who are willing to collaborate with you in absorbing the
event's audiences so they can advertise your event online.
To make sales through such links, including absorbing
visitors, booth holders, or sponsors, pay a fixed payment
or commission fee to the advertiser.
This system has its unique complications. If this method
is applied properly, it will significantly affect your event's
success. For example, the tracking may not be conducted
accurately. Let's say someone has referred 50 visitors to
the event, but it is not trackable for you. However, some
modern applications are designed for this method and
have solved the problem; you can use these applications
on your website.

.
13
Customer Reward System
In every business, the goal of a customer reward system
is to keep the old customers. Holding an event depends on
audiences' attendance, as well. As mentioned in the first
chapter, two main groups, meaning, visitors and partici-
pants are the audiences for every event.
Having permanent visitors, booth holders, and spon-
sors tremendously facilitates the job for you. That's why
you need to look for reasons to keep the event's audiences
and persuade them to attend your future events.
There are various methods to apply the customer
reward system in an event:
ƒ
Offering gifts
You can give your audiences some gifts as their
loyalty rewards. The size of a gift does not guar-
antee the right results. Gift makes your audiences
loyal to you and your events, but it also imposes
some expenses on you. Have a strategy and offer a
gift which is:
9
First, relevant to your event.
9
Second, valuable for the audience
9
Third, (in terms of costs) in accordance with the
event's budget and the profit you are going to gain.

ƒ
Discount
Discount can be offered in exchange for buying
tickets, buying booths, sponsoring or buying the
event's products. For example, if someone pur-
chases tickets from you for two events, he/she will
receive discounts.
You can consider certain discount package for
booth holders and sponsors, and offer them dis-
count if, say, they buy booths or become sponsors
in several events.
ƒ
Offering Other Services Rather Than Discounts
As the loyalty reward, offer other services which
audiences need. For example, give subway cards to the
event's visitors to use it for transportation to the event.
ƒ
Joint Plan (combined offer)
In this method, several companies execute a joint
plan, accept each other's privileges and offer them to
customers. Forexample,you can collaboratewith trans-
portation companies such as Uber and make plans with
them so on the day of the event, they'd take passengers
to the event's location with lower fare. This move is in
your favor as you would give your audiences a reward
by lowering the transportation cost. Also, this is a ben-
efit for the transportation company, as well, since they
would have more customers because of your event.

This plan can be applied more widely with col-
laboration between several companies to offer ser-
vices in a service-providing network.
ƒ
Immediate Reward System
Using this method, you consider an advantage
for your audiences. For example, you give them a
free product immediately after buying a booth in
the event.
ƒ
Customers' Membership in Customer Club
By creating a customer club, you offer rewards or ser-
vices to its member based on members' points. For exam-
ple, offer a ticket of entertainment shows to visitors who
are members of your event's customer club, or you can
hold special events for the club members. For example,
hold a training workshop on booth holding for those booth
holders who are your customer club members.
You can consider consumer goods for the club mem-
bers. Let's say your event is a schoolbook fair. Most of your
visitors are families with student children. Therefore, sta-
tionery goods are among your audiences' consumer goods.
The smart move is to offer the members of your customer
club coupons to buy stationery goods.
In the book "Customer Rewards System", this topic is
discussed in details. You can refer to this book for more
information.

.
14Online Presence
Nowadays, as the Internet has become more popu-
lar, many audiences are available online and on social
media. Focusing on the online world is one great method
of absorbing financial sponsors and selling booths and
advertising spaces you have at your disposal in the event.
Your goal of event marketing is either branding or sales.
No matter which one you have as your goal, you still need
to grab the attention of the event's audiences.
Your event may be an online one, such as online sem-
inars or webinars. In this case, you put online marketing
as the core focus of your marketing activities. However,
using online marketing tools is quite productive for other
events, as well. Of course, you may reduce or increase
online marketing share depending on your work policies
and, most importantly, based on the access you have to
your audiences.
Advantages of online marketing:
9
Lower cost in comparison to other marketing
methods
9
Flexibility and customization of advertisement
9
Providing accurate analysis, feedbacks and
reports

9
Selecting the target market and focusing on it
9
Wide diversity in online marketing tools
9
Wave making
9
Extensive range of audiences
Online marketing has a general process which is shown
in the following figure.
Preparing the
Structure of
Event's Online
Marketing Plan
Action Plan for
Event's Online
Marketing
Analyzing the
Action Plan
Revision,
Modiﬁcation and
Optimization
Figure 1. The process of event online marketing

In the following section, the aforementioned process
and how to implement each stage in the event are dis-
cussed.
a. Preparing the Structure of An Online Marketing
Plan for the Event
Preparing the plan's structure is the main stage in online
marketing for an event because it is the basis of your work.
The rest of your path is defined based on what you deter-
mine in this stage. To be able to prepare the structure of
your event's online plan properly, you need to take the fol-
lowing actions:
1.
1. Primary Research
Research your competitors and the market, and record
any information you gather. Find the answer to questions
such as:
z
What is happening in the market?
z
What actions do other events perform?
z
Which online marketing tools are more applicable
for the event?
z
What tools do your competitors apply?
z
…

List the information you gather from the market and
competitors and keep this information so you can record
all the stages in a comprehensive table.
Analyze the information you gather on your
event's market and competitors.As a third per-
son, you are more capable of identifying the
cause of your competitors' failure or success.
Use the help of experts to analyze the
obtained information.
2.
2. Setting Goals of Online Presence
Setting goals determines your path and the formulation of
strategies for you. Determine your goal of online marketing.
z
One of these goals is to promote the event and to sell
tickets. Using the online setting, you can introduce the
event to more people, allowingyou to make more sales.
z
Another goal is to do branding using online marketing.
Consider a set of goals for yourself and compare it with
the list of online marketing tools you have acquired during
the research stage. See using which method each one of
these goals can be accomplished.
Notice 1
Notice 2

3.
3. Knowing the Target Market
¾
The target market is your event's potential visi-
tors. Know the target market and differentiate it in
terms of certain features such as gender, location,
education, language, etc.
¾
Research the target market's behaviors. For exam-
ple, do the people in the target market purchase
the event's tickets for themselves or do they give
them out as gifts? How often do they spend money
on attending an event? To what extent are they
present on social media?
¾
Define the target market in full detail. For exam-
ple, your target market is, say, working women
aged between 30 and 50 living in District 2 in Teh-
ran. These details facilitate your job in designing
campaigns and advertisements. For example, if
your event is the concert of a pop singer whose
fans are mostly high school girls, you need to
look for pages on social media visited by these
people, so your event's advertisement can reach
the real audiences. When this is done, you stand
a chance of getting more people to attend your
event.

4.
4. Selecting the Online Marketing Method
Online marketing has various methods and each one real-
izes certain goals. Before anything else, you need to know all
types of these methods which are introduced in the follow-
ing chapter. Then, pay attention to your event's target mar-
ket and see which method is more efficient for them. For
example, according to your research, your event's audiences
are active on YouTube; therefore, you need to consider being
active on YouTube as the head of your marketing plans.
5.
5. Allocating Budget
Based on othercosts and revenues generated out of the event,
allocate a certain amount of budget for online marketing.
z
This budget must be in proportion to the methods
you have chosen.
z
If you're low on budget, you will have to choose
between the methods based on their proportion to
your goals. You may have already chosen a certain
advertisement type, but your budget may be lower
than its costs.Therefore,youwill remove that method.
The final decision is made by the budget.
Some online marketing methods such as advertising
campaigns can be implemented using any budget, and
you can apply these methods.

b. Online Marketing Action Plan
Full knowledge of online marketing methods is required
to run the action plan. This item is discussed in the follow-
ing section.
1.
1. Website
Every event requires an independent website as the
event's promoter.
z
The event's website must have its exclusive domain
without being a part of any other website. This is the
case unless your goal is to show that the event belongs
to a certain group. In such case, you need to create the
event's exclusive pages on the corresponding group's
website.
z
The viewer of your event's website see at first sight the
extent to which the website's design and style are in
accordance with the field of industry you're working
in. The web design must be professional, and contents
must be orderly arranged.
z
Your website must be in harmony with the event's
setting, your niche, and your other works. The col-
ors applied in the design should not lead to any pre-
sumption.

z
Design the website so that uploading information and
making modifications become easy and you don’t
have to depend on the web designer to do them. You
need to be able to upload your information such as
texts, photos, and videos on your website effortlessly.
z
Your website must be SEO-friendly and you need to
apply SEO (Search Engine Optimization) methods to
it. Hire a professional group to do the job, or you can
learn by yourself the basics of what is needed to be
done.
z
Your website must be mobile-friendly and it must
be properly viewed on mobile screens because many
audiences view your website on their phones, and
if you don’t have a mobile-friendly version of your
website, you will lose a great share of your viewers.
z
Consider a section on your website to provide infor-
mation about your event for the media.
z
Another section of the website includes the informa-
tion that you need to provide for the booth holders
and other participants, such as financial sponsors.
Separate this section from the section in which you
provide information for the visitors. Categorize the
provided information so that a booth holder finds the
section for the booth holders at the first sight, and a
visitor immediately finds his/her exclusive section.

z
If side talks and various events are going to happen,
separate them on the website and provide guidance
for viewers, so they know where to search if they want
to have access to the information on side talks and
events. This information includes addresses, parking
access routes, nearest hotels, and so on so forth.
z
You can also post the list of booth holders on your
website.
z
If there are certain points you want others to see, put
them on website in spots with better exposure. For
example, in the Canada Kids Festival project, how
much various officials support the project really mat-
ters to us. We have posted on the website a long list of
officials ranging from the prime minister, the provin-
cial premier, the mayor, senators, members of Parlia-
ment to members of local Parliament, aldermen, and
others who send us letters and support us in any way.
z
If you have a signup form, it must be put on open dis-
play on the website. Registration method is different
for every event and depends on the event's working
strategy. In one method, the customer can select the
corresponding event and fill the registration form,
or he/she can sign up to attend the events in gen-
eral, and then enter any event he/she wants. Apply-
ing these methods depend on your strategy and the
web designer's job. There are numerous applications
that provide the events signup services. In many busi-

ness fairs and events in the world, you are directed
to another website for signing up. This other website
provides services regarding the signup processes.
z
Take media seriously. It is not a bad idea to tell the
media that you'd give them an exclusive media pass-
word because of the respect you have for them. That
is, you give them a special form and a password using
which they can enter their own exclusive page.
z
On all the website's pages, provide some share options
so people can share their information. Link your
social media pages to the website.
In the next step, you need to open your pages
on social media and create your event on your
pages so other users can follow you. Your com-
pany may have an account on social media. Still,
it would be best if you created your event's special
pages on major social media platforms, including
Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so the event's
audiences follow you on those pages.
z
Design exclusive landing pages for financial sponsors
and booth holders so they can share their exclusive
campaigns and people who are directed through links
can see these pages.
The website's viewers first go to your homep-
age and view the landing pages based on the cam-
paign which has directed them to those pages.

They become interested in signing up or adding
the information to their calendars in this stage. At
the ending part of signup form, provide the option
"add to calendar" so the event can be immediately
added to the phone's calendar or other tools.
When you managed to drag the audiences to
your landing page by digital marketing tools, these
audiences will most likely fill the forms, as well.
The audience is aware of prices, tax, and final
cost and can close the contract right there. There-
fore, put a much briefer form on the website, so
if the audiences were not willing to close the con-
tract at the time, they give you their contact info
so you can be in touch with them.
z
Provide the option for online payment. Arrange the
infrastructures in a way that all processes can be done
online.
z
To gather "leads", try and ask the website's viewer for
brief info in various ways (i.e., their email address,
phone number, names, ages, etc.) and make more
extended contact with them.
z
Reach your website's options to a point where full
information can be accessed to turn viewers into cus-
tomers.
z
In online marketing, absorb the audiences using con-
tent strategy. Activate the contents on social media
and websites.

2.
2. Application
It is not necessary to have an application, and you need
to know that this option is not much of a use on its own.
Rather, it must be applied in addition to the website. Using
a mobile or computer application is recommended when
it meets the daily needs. Some users resist using the web-
site, but they get along better with an application.
You can benefit from an application in two ways:
ƒ
Selling tickets
ƒ
Online streaming
Some events have an online streaming option,
and audiences can stream the event live or watch a
recorded version of the event by buying tickets.

3.
3. Online Shopping
Nowadays, most tickets are sold online, and this must be
one of the main strategies in your event marketing.
z
For ticket selling, you can benefit from collaboration
of media or other events which audiences are com-
mon with yours.
Give some tickets to the media to sell by con-
tacting the common audiences and receiving a
commission on sales. By using this method, media
earn income for themselves.
Online ticket selling is conducted in two ways:
ƒ
The first method is to sell through online ticket ven-
dors. Open a user account on their website, offer
your tickets and sell them.
ƒ
The second method is to sell through your event's
website.
z
Identifythe target market's location and its details, then
find the credited ticket distributors in that area. Here,
as the case with any other business, you must have the
highest amount of supply and sales. The more ticket
you offer, the higher your chance of success gets.
z
Provide a setting for ticket selling in any place you
think your audiences are present.

4.
4. Content Providing
Content providing is another method of absorbing the
event's audience using online tools. Formulate a profes-
sional plan and strategy for your content providing. Make
a list of anything which has the potential to become a con-
tent.
z
You can provide various contents such as texts, pho-
tos and videos from the event preparation stages, the
meetings you hold, and the event venue you choose.
z
You can provide contents about everynewparticipant or
booth holder who joins your event. Simply using photo,
text, and video to make notification and announcing
that company X has joined the sponsors or participants
in your event is a type of content providing.
z
Any agreement with any association or organization
can be turned into content.
z
Designing the event venue can be a subject for con-
tent providing.
z
If contacting and meeting celebrities is possible for
you, use these people for content providing.
z
The world's top news pertinent to your line of work
and be turned into a content for you. Analyze the
relation of that news with your market and present
this analysis.

You can turn these pieces of news into an inter-
esting tool for your advertising and show that such
occurrence has highlighted the importance of your
event, or you are going to hold a talk session due to
the changes in currencies to evaluate the impact of
currency fluctuations on your own guild.
z
Use your provided contents on social media, websites,
blogs, and emails which you send to audiences.
z
Make diverse short videos that represent the job you
are going to do.
z
Post a professionally made video made by companies
that have excellent resumes. Such video is definitely
more practical and receives more feedbacks.
z
Make videos in different settings with various sub-
jects.
z
While recording the video, make sure there is no
camera shake. Also, start recording (press the start
button) from the moment you really intend to start
talking, and when it's over, stop recording (press the
stop button) after a short pause.
z
Post your videos on different social media platforms,
websites, and YouTube. However, don’t forget that
social media can never replace those networks which
main job is video sharing.

5.
5. Online Advertising
There are various methods for online advertisement.
Google Ads, social media, presence on different websites,
and any kind of online advertisement for which you pay a
fee are a part of online advertisement.
The most common online advertisement methods
include display advertising and pay per click. Click means
a user is directed to the landing page through the link you
have provided. For example, you pay 1000 dollars to Goo-
gle for advertisement in exchange for every 10000 clicks.
z
The tool you select for online advertisement must
exactly target the event's audiences. For example, put-
ting ad on Facebook to advertise an event for brain
surgeons is a wrong way of doing it.
The right choice of appropriate notify-
ing channels in online marketing will
absorb the right audience for you.
z
Another rule you need to obey is campaign diversity.
Launching a single campaign is putting all your eggs
in one basket.

Various campaigns have different meth-
ods of making relations with audiences.
z
See what kind of campaign gives you better feed-
backs and boost it. Sometimes, you have several types
of audiences and you need to define a campaign for
each type separately.
z
Before launching advertising campaigns on an
extensive scale, test them on a limited scale in trial
form so you can find the errors and launch the
campaigns on an extensive scale after the errors are
fixed. By doing that, you will be able to see easily
what needs to be adjusted and what must be main-
tained.
z
In online advertising, design is of great importance.
Not only should the advertisement be appealing
graphically, but it's also quite important to maintain
the harmony. If you have several advertising cam-
paigns, keep them all integrated in terms of color
and design. The color and designs you use in the
event must be in accordance with your advertise-
ment.

6.
6. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Google is the most important and main search engine.
You need to follow SEO principles and conduct the con-
tent providing properly to appear on Google search results
about topics related to your event. When you arrange
your contents properly with certain keywords that inter-
net users usually search, you place your brand in a vantage
position for visibility.
7.
7. Email Marketing
Email is an oldest and most practical marketing tool. It
is simply known as electronic mail. There are numerous
applications for sending emails and many service provid-
ing companies are active in this field.
z
Prepare small-sized emails which are linked to your
exclusive pages.
z
Choose the right email subject which is relevant to
your event.
z
Consider the certain rules in your country regarding
sending emails.
z
Design the email in a mobile-friendly manner.
z
In notification emails, upload distinctive links from
audience's required contents.

z
If you have a signup section, attach to the email the
direct signup link to save audience's time. In this case,
many people sign up and you get what you want with-
out any trouble.
z
You can also attach to the email the links to ticket sell-
ing.
z
Design your emails based on different campaigns and
types of your audience. The email you send to absorb
financial sponsorship should be different from the
one you send to invite visitors.
z
Obviously, you must send emails more than once.
Therefore, make a schedule to make it happen during
a certain period so that emails get sent based on a pre-
defined schedule.

8.
8. Social Media
Social media is one of the main online marketing tools.
Social media's advantage is that you can use them to have
access to many audiences with a very low cost.
z
Create a user account on various social media plat-
forms such as YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, etc., and
start content providing in accordance withyour event.
z
If you have already held other events, post their pho-
tos and videos on social media pages so the audiences
can see your work.
z
Announce the event activities and introduce guests
and speechmakers on social media.
z
Link your website to your social media pages. For
example, let the user be directed from your social
media page to the website's page where the event's
tickets are being sold.
z
Apply the useful tools on social media. For exam-
ple, Facebook has considered a tool for events, which
allows you to announce your event there. In your
event's exclusive page on the corresponding social
media page, post the event's info, date, and venue
along with your website address.
There are many points about social media and if
you follow them, you can achieve great success. In
my other book, "Smart Social Media Marketing", you
can read the full detailed information in this regard.

9.
9. Online Local Marketing
Google is one of the best local marketing tools. Suppose
you register your event on Google and local directories. In
that case, they will display your event for the users in the
location in question. Social media also have local filters
and show your advertisement to the target market.
Event directory is a new move in the online world. If
possible, register your event in all online event directo-
ries. Your event's registry in these directories allows search
engines to identify your event. Subsequently, your event
will appear when various topics are searched for.

c. Analyzing the Online Marketing Action Plan
The following figure shows the four principles of assess-
ment. Check these four principles regarding your event's
online marketing.
Return on Capital
Tracking Relations with the Event's Audiences
Quality of Results
Persistance
Figure 2. Principles of assessing event online marketing
z
The first principle of assessment is to check whether
costs are compensated or not. Analyze the applied
methods in all marketing activities and calculate the
return on capital. For example, if you have paid 1000
dollars for advertising on Facebook, the visitors who
got to know your event through Facebook must have
brought you a profit of more than 1000 dollars.
z
The next principle is tracking the visitors' relations.
Track the visitors' relations to see through which
online tool they got informed of your event.
z
The next principle is the quality of results. In assess-
ment, you should avoid focusing only on figures and
statistics.

A few years ago, we spent some money on
advertising one of our Facebook events and it
yielded some good results. The following year,
we focused on Facebook and increased the bud-
get for its advertisement. However, after assess-
ment, we realized that the number of visitors we
had absorbed through Facebook was half of the
one from the year before. At first, we assumed
our advertisement has not been successful and
had invested on the wrong move. When we inves-
tigated the results more carefully, we realized
that while being half of the one from the year
before, the number of visitors during the second
year increased our profitability and productivity.
Therefore, instead of focusing on figures and sta-
tistics, you always need to consider the quality of
results.
z
Finally, maintain persistence in our evaluations. Fol-
low a certain pattern in your persistence and repeat it
in your next events.
Test the marketing plans and campaigns. Don’t
think of testing and trial as an extra cost. If your plan
lacks productivity or suffers a flaw, you will realize
it in the test run and avoid the subsequent costs.
Therefore, the test marketing plan campaign gives
you room to adjust and update your plan and cam-
paign before you finally launch it on a large scale.

d. Revision, Modifications, and Optimization
Revise your methods and make the necessary changes
based on the analyses you have done in the previous
stage.
Online marketing is an extremely extensive area and
each of its methods contains several details for implemen-
tation. You can read about this type of marketing in my
other book, "Online Marketing".

.
15Collaborating with Me-
dia
Currently, there are numerous companies that provide
PR services for events. Sometimes, tens of events in the
world have a common PR service and it is a single com-
pany in charge of all of their public relations.
Every event requires PR services which can prepare the
proper verbal and written content and communicate with
the audiences effortlessly by full awareness of the event
and adequate knowledge to make relations.
Media is one of the most powerful communicating tools
in the world. Any type of business you consider is explic-
itly or implicitly affected by the media.
Try to make mutual agreements with
the media.
Based on their nature, media platforms have extensive
audiences. You can offer collaboration to popular media
which audiences are common with your target market,
and you can define certain methods for this collabora-
tion:

z
First method is that media put your ad on their plat-
forms, or you do the sales, or they conduct the sales
process for you in the marketing section according to
the agreement.
z
Another method is that they recommend your offer
to their primary customers. This method is a type
of direct notification far from the media's common
advertising methods in question. The corresponding
media announces to its primary customer that it is the
media sponsor of your event and that audiences can
purchase from them the package to attend the event.
z
The third method is providing a combined offer. For
example, if someone orders an ad to the media, they
can rent a booth from you with 20-30% discount. You
can provide more professional and appealing com-
bined offers according to the policies of the event and
your institution. For example, a free page in a media
platform will be given to the customer who rents a
booth from you.
The event marketing section must check that with which
individuals they can provide combined offers.
Find other events or job and businesses which are interest-
ing for the event's audiences. Businesses which share a target
market with you can be a part of a joint discount plan or your
combined offer. For example, you can announce that people
who buy these businesses' products will be provided with some
benefits and discounts in your event during a certain time.

To facilitate your plan to collaborate with media in your
event marketing, you need to gather more information on
media. The next section will help you in this regard.
There are various types of media and you can collabo-
rate with them in many ways. In the following table, you
can see the types of media in terms of different criteria.
Communication Method Size
Distribution
Range
Content
Audio
Visual
Print
Online
Small
Average
Hypermedia
Municipal
Provincial
National
International
General
Technical
Table 12. Types of media
If collaborating with the media was not possible, you
have to spend certain amount on advertising in media
depending on your budget. For doing so, consider the fol-
lowing points:
¾
First, prepare a list of media platforms which have
common audiences with your target market. Insert
this list in a table and add the media's info.
¾
First, check who the audiences of those media plat-
forms are, and second, check where these audi-
ences are located.
¾
Then, compare the ads cost for each media to the
budget you have considered.

If the ads cost of a media platform is higher than
your available budget, that media platform will be
removed from your event's advertising options.
Of the media platforms that costs are compatible
with your budget, compare the costs with the return
on capital you'll get from each platform. If this bal-
ance is positive in favor of return on capital, order
your event's ad.
This ad will be extremely useful for your brand-
ing. Although radio and television are generally
used for branding, it depends on the type of an
event and on certain points, for example, to what
extent it is possible to use radio and television for
the event, how much budget is allocated and what
amount of return on capital will be gained.
Before contacting the media, thinkabout the following issues:
z
How much budget do you have?
z
Using the amount of money you have at your dis-
posal, what tools can you get?
z
What method can you use to advertise on a media
platform?
Making relations with prominent figures of
eachmediumisaprivilegethatfacilitatesreach-
ing an agreement with that platform. Depend-
ing on the type of media, these individuals can
be hosts, reporters, announcers, etc.
Note

Name
of
Media
Type
of
Media
Distribution
Range
Size
of
Media
Type
of
Content
Prominent
Figures
Contact
Method
Goal
of
Making
Relations
Ads
Cost
A Visual National
Hyper-
media
General Director Email Branding $1000
B Print Local Small Technical Writer Fax
Absorb-
ing Par-
ticipants
$300
C Audio Municipal Average General Announcer Email
Absorb-
ing Visi-
tors
$500
Table 13. List and characteristics of media with common
audience
In the previous chapter, you have prepared a list of asso-
ciations, unions, and organizations relevant to your event's
topic. That list is useful here.
Many of these organizations have their
own exclusive press and media which share
audiences with your events. Therefore, you
must consider their exclusive media plat-
forms in the list of media.
After choosing the media, you can use various methods
that are explained here in detail.
Notice

a. Ad Ordering
Ordering ads is one of the most common methods of
making relations with media. That is, you pay a fee so a
media platform would advertise your event. Various media
types advertise for events, but based on your target market
and your goal, you must collaborate with certain media
that have adequate efficacy.
As the person in charge of holding the
event, you should not order an ad to any
media platform unless this collaboration
distinctively satisfies the secondary goal of
making relations with the corresponding
media.
¾
In accordance with your marketing goals, it is rec-
ommended to contact the corresponding media
once. Then, order your ads to that medium. This is
where you make your way and establish a connec-
tion with that medium.
¾
Conduct your advertisement using a clear plan.
Ordering ads without any goals shows you had no
strategy for this action and collaborating with the
corresponding medium practically does not bring
you any special connection.
Notice 2

¾
You need to follow in practice the same goals you
have defined for your media relations. You have
already researched and identified which one of
your goals will be met in the corresponding media.
Notice that each one of your goals is related to
a certain service and department of that medium.
Therefore, go directly after those departments
and don’t allow them to refer you to the advertise-
ment department. Instead, try and get referred to
the advertisement department through the same
department which you need to collaborate with in
the future. For example, try and get referred to the
corresponding medium's advertisement depart-
ment from economic analysis and news, travel,
industry, or any other service in the medium that is
relevant to your event's topic.
¾
Instead of contacting the medium's advertisement
department, you can open your way to the corre-
sponding medium and department by ordering
a smart ad through someone inside the medium.
Here, the importance of prominent figures of each
medium you mentioned in the table becomes clear.
¾
Some people work with media as brokers and find
their ways to the media's management, advertise-
ment, and marketing departments due to their
relations and workloads, and that's how they estab-
lish your relations with a certain medium. Using
these people's help is beneficial for you because
they get you discounts and benefits.

b. Advertorial
The difference between advertorial and advertise-
ment is that you indirectly introduce and advertise your
event in an advertorial. Since every event can be consid-
ered as a piece of news and an occasion, using this spe-
cific type of communication method is effective for the
event. Many people resist the idea of advertisement and
don’t feel positive about it. However, they hear in adver-
torial some news about the event you intend to hold.
So, advertorial is another way to get audiences to your
company.
¾
In this type of media relation, you need to make
relations with the news and reports department
of a medium instead of the advertisement depart-
ment.
¾
For advertorial, first you need to know the cor-
responding fees. Then, formulate a professional
news report and give it to the pertinent depart-
ment in the medium in question.
¾
To provide an advertorial for an event, it is some-
times better to work on an explicit advertisement
about the event you intend to hold or about your
previous events. That is, introduce your group
along with the news/report.

¾
The same department you have targeted in the
medium is recommended to be put in charge of
preparing the advertorial. That is, you pay this
department to formulate your report. Using this
method, you will have a professional reporter
to write your news/report. This gives credibility
to your news and event. It makes many people
trust your events and wants to do business with
you.
¾
Advertorial gives you a free hand to involve
one or more individuals. Your ad may require a
photo. Therefore, the medium's photographer
also becomes involved in the task. These are
some excuses to boost your media relations.
You can do the advertorial before holding
the event to introduce it. You can also do it in
form of a report of the event after the event
is held. In any case, you do marketing for
future events using this method.
Note

c. Press Release
Press release objective is to make announcements about your
eventwhich eventuallyhas an impact on absorbing the audience.
The subject you have in mind for preparing
the press release must have news value so it
can grab the media's attention.
¾
Formulate a press release about everything that
happens regarding your event and has news value,
and release it to pertinent media. For example, vis-
iting your event by an important person is a pos-
itive occurrence with news value. Let's say your
event is a car exhibition, and one of the reputable
universities in the country joins your event. Such
case can be covered as a news story and you can
formulate a press release for it.
¾
Send your press release for a list of media plat-
forms you have already made in a table format.
¾
If your press release is technical, you need to
release it to certain media platforms which can sat-
isfy your goal or suit your audiences.
Sometimes, you drag the media after you by
releasing a press release, and they ask you for inter-
views. That's how the list of your media relations
becomes updated and extended.
Note 1

¾
If the press release is going to be released during a
certain period, determine that period. For exam-
ple, write on top of your press release to be released
ASAP or on a certain day. Ensure this press release
is released to time.
¾
Put your event's logo and info on the press release
and format it on your letterhead.
¾
You intend to gain recognition by media. There-
fore, maintain the harmony. If you release your
press release today using a certain design and color
and apply different design and color another time,
the media won't remember you.
Every press release has a lead in which all the
keywords you will discuss will be mentioned.
¾
Both the final audience and the journalist must
find out about your press release topic based on
the "lead". Lead can be a paragraph or a bit lon-
ger.
¾
In addition to keywords, you also need to provide
in lead a summary of news and a concise account
of what the reader will read.
¾
Your press release's lead needs to be as brief as pos-
sible and not more than 150 words.
Note 2

¾
The lead must excite the audience. If your lead
is not written carefully and elegantly, the audi-
ences won't continue reading and it will be your
loss.
Maintaining standards in preparing the
press release implies on your smart con-
ducting.
¾
In written language of a press release, you should
never use the pronouns "I" and "we". Ensure you
use third-person pronouns.
¾
After writing your press release, proofread it and
check it for writing and punctuation errors.
¾
Put a title on top of the lead. For example, write
the title "the government's 1-million-dollar sup-
port for the event"; then, continue with the con-
tent of your press release, and after that, provide a
brief conclusion. Insert the relevant photo of the
press release under the conclusion. For example,
add a photo of a meeting you have had with the
cabinet. At the end, write down your company's
info as the event organizer. Put down in the con-
tact info the personal phone number or email
address of the person who will be the media liai-

son on behalf of your company so the media can
contact the person in charge as quickly as possi-
ble.
It is better for new founding companies which
are still unknown to the media to provide a brief
explanation about their field of work before writ-
ing the contact info.
¾
The whole package of your press release must not
exceed 500 words and one single page.
¾
The Press release must be written in consice and
direct language.
¾
Write your press release as simple as possible and
avoid using unfamiliar and sophisticated terms
because the audience will face problems in under-
standing the press release. You write the press
release not for yourself but for the audience. Your
goal of writing the press release must be to con-
vey a message to the audience.
¾
Apply story-writing techniques to write your press
release to receive better feedback from your text.
¾
Many press releases are formulated with a multi-
media format in the modern world. That is, there
are photos, videos, and audios attached to them.
Since these files take too much space, it is impos-
sible to email them. Therefore, add the download
link for the corresponding file on your website in
the specific section for press releases.

The press release is not formulated for the
media. The media is only a means to convey
your message to audiences.
¾
Don’t use inaccurate, worn-out, or out-of-date
information in your press release because it
reduces your work quality and repels the audience.
Press releases are important tools in opti-
mizing the brands in search engines.
¾
Consult with SEO experts so they provide a SEO-
friendly content for the press release by making
the necessary changes. These changes must be
applied in the version you release to online media.
However, the version for print media can be for-
mulated differently.
¾
Some companies hire professionals to formulate
the press release so they can follow the rules of SEO
more properly. A part of SEO is related to observing
Google's standards and writing style. Another part is
about knowing the target market's location and deter-
mining the audiences' keywords in the corresponding
area. This makes your press release, and by extension,
your company visible to the target audience.
Note 3
Note 4

¾
One of the SEO methods is to design a landing
page for the content you release to online media.
That is, there would be a link in the press release
to the corresponding page on your website. With
that, those who are interested in knowing more
about it can be immediately directed to the cor-
responding page. In this case, the press release in
question becomes a nice selling tool for you. The
PR department is indeed in charge of releasing the
press release, but it is considered as a part of mar-
keting process. Therefore, while the press release
is not direct sales method, the marketing strategy
is always considered in its preparation. Hence, you
always need to provide a landing page for the press
release.
If your goal of preparing the press release is
marketing and sales, you will lose both the
media and the audience.
No media platform will release your mar-
keting and sale-oriented content without
charging you.
Note 5
Note 6

¾
The audiences expect to read a news text.Therefore,
they should not face a marketing-oriented content.
If that happens, you will lose the audience. Hence,
formulate the text as a reporter-journalist without
enforcing the sales perspective. However, you need
to have a sale strategy behind the text because you
are making announcements and formulating news
on something that is related to your event.
¾
Act smartly. Search on various media platforms
and observe the type of provided press releases
related to the event's topic. Of course, you need
to consider the fact that whatever is released is
not necessarily professional. Therefore, do multi-
ple types of research to realize what methods are
applied in professional press releases.
The better your press release is provided,
the higher priority the media consider for its
release.
¾
Before designing the press release, it is better to ask
the target media what structure they recommend
and what format and file extension the file needs
to be sent. Try and follow the media's standards,
especially in the case of popular media platforms
that you need.
Note 7

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