Stretching Your Event Marketing Budget
As we all sit and wait for herd immunity (please God, soon), let us take a minute and imagine the what’s next.
Live events will most certainly be highly regulated, (over) sanitized and smaller. Regarding the latter, I think it likely that exhibit sizes will not only shrink, but events themselves will be more localized. Safe to say there will be some among us who will still eschew air travel, and this practice will certainly be embraced by HR departments looking to avoid any employee pushback if shown resistance to attending an event. Why get on a plane when one can drive? So, therein lies the reasoning behind smaller exhibits at smaller, local venues.
However, more events may mean greater cost. How about an alternative program that anticipates this trend? If a client can map out a series of smaller, local events why not offer an extended rental option to stretch the budget? This does not preclude the ability to change either the design architecture and/or graphical content from event to event. The program would simply reserve the use of modular hardware components for a dedicated mobile tour of pre-planned events…all at a discounted rate. The residual effects of this are many.
Budget Control – Marketers can lock in event costs for the entire show cycle.
Shipping Efficiency – With venues already identified why ship the exhibit materials from show-to-warehouse-to-show? By shipping from show-to-show you remove one leg of shipping costs!
Manageable ROI – Multiple smaller events provide a new analytical metric for determining the effectiveness not only of smaller, more intimate events, but even geographic data to see if certain locations around the country bring greater returns.
Less Employee Stress – Easier, less taxing travel means not only less wear and tear on your staff…it also cuts down on travel costs and potentially fewer nights in hotel/restaurant expenditures.
Greater Employee Engagement – Local shows might also give staff who ordinarily would not attend an event to get out there and meet customers. Maybe you take some non-sales team members (think engineers) and let them speak to customers directly. Who knows? You may gain a new idea/insight/product from having those creative types, typically behind the scenes, out in public!
This might be some of the new revelations and opportunities the new marketing environment will reveal. So, let's get started planning some re-imagined local events with less cost, better potential ROI and new market insights!
