Guest lecture for the University of Bedfordshire, on marketing and communications for events management. February 2014.

1. Events Marketing &
Communications
Nicola O’Loughlin
Chartered Marketer, MCIM, MA

2. About Me…
• Chartered Marketer and member of the Chartered
Institute of Marketing (CIM)
• CIM Professional Diploma in Marketing
• Masters in Events Marketing Management, London
Metropolitan University
• BA (Hons) Media Studies, De Montfort University
(Leicester)
• 8 years in events and marketing, including both charity
and business sector.
• Blog – www.oloughlinmarketing.com
• Twitter – @nicola_a

3. Why should events be part of your
marketing mix?
4 main reasons to hold an event:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Branding & Awareness
Lead Generation
Customer/Client/Supporter Engagement
Education

4. 3 Key Questions
1. Who is my target audience?
2. Is this event relevant to the target
audience?
3. How will I get my target audience to
attend?

5. Event Planning
• Your event planning should include a marketing plan
from the outset.
• Include costs of marketing within your overall event
budget
• Include timeline for when marketing activities and
communications will take place
• Don’t forget to include post-event marketing within
your marketing plan

6. Marketing Your Event
Email marketing
Direct marketing
PR
Advertising
Social media

7. Email Marketing
Pro’s
Con’s
• Easy to use
• Quick to set up
• Range of templates and
providers which can be used
(i.e. Dotmailer, MailChimp, etc)
• Inexpensive
• Your message reaches people in
the place where they are most
likely to respond instantly (i.e. at
their desk)
• Can reach a high number of
people with relative ease.
• Need to have a database
of contacts
• Cold contacts can lead to
poor open rates
• Could be seen as spam
• Impersonal

8. Direct Mailing
Pro’s
Con’s
• Easy to use
• Usually seen as more
personal than email
• More people keep a hard
copy than an email
• Open rates seen to be better
than email
• Need to have a database of
contacts
• Doesn’t always reach the
intended recipient
• Postage expensive (especially
when sending bulk mailings)
• Requires more action to
make the booking

9. Press / Press Releases
Pro’s
• Newspapers and
publications are always
looking for copy now, so
well-written content is
often appreciated
• You write the messages
and information
• Can include any
information you want to
communicate, such as
human stories and calls
to action
Con’s
• Not sent to a targeted
audience, unless using
trade press
• Cannot control the
final published copy or
that the information is
included in
publications
• Often a low response
rate
• Audience demographic
usually fairly vague

10. Advertising
Pro’s
Con’s
• Your own design – so
can be eye-catching,
have your intended
messages, etc
• You control the input
and frequency of
publication
• Can be done in a wide
range of methods and
places (TV, radio,
newspapers,
magazines, online,
etc) to best suit your
target audience
• No guarantee that
your intended
audience will see it
• Audience
demographic usually
fairly vague
• Often a low
response rate
• Can be very
expensive, so usually
not available to
smaller events

11. Social Media
Pro’s
Con’s
• Often inexpensive
• Reaches wide audience
• Intended audience can be
segmented and targeted
• Can regularly change
messages
• Can get influencers to share
your message for wider reach
and credibility
• Audience can access your
messages at any time
• Need an established online
presence to start with to get
best results
• No guarantee that your
audience will see or
consider your message, due
to frequency of received
messages on Twitter,
Facebook, etc.
• Can be time consuming

12. Post-Event Marketing
• “Legacy” – an event doesn’t end when you
pack up your equipment, and neither should
your marketing.
• Your post-event audience should include
those who didn’t attend the event.
• Follow up and measure ROI (return on
investment) from your event

13. Post-Event
Publicity, including
Twitter conversation
about the event. This
all contributes to
ROI.

14. For further information, get in touch:
Nicola O’Loughlin
nicola.e.oloughlin@gmail.com
@nicola_a