Corporations hosts hundreds of events throughout the year in order to receive the results they desire. These Washington, DC Corporate event ideas range from networking events, consumer activation, trade shows, product promotions and much more. With all the variations of DC events, planning successful DC corporate events becomes essential.
Thankfully I have a few tips that will make your DC corporate events more than successful, but well attended.
Define Your Corporate Event Why Factor:
When I meet with my clients who state they want us to plan their corporate event, I ask them what is the purpose of the event. If they struggle to answer this question, I ask why are you willing to spend money on an event just to have one. You have to first understand your Why Factor and what drives this event before producing it. Return On Investment makes the countless hours and funding worthwhile.
This is goal setting at its best. Once you have identified your goals you can then create a plan to accomplish them. Are you a charity looking to raise $1,000,000? If so, you must determine what kind of event will help you reach this goal. HINT: It’s not every or any event.
Identify Your Corporate Event Logistics:
Since you now have a set of goals in mind, it’s time to determine how your event will achieve them. The leg work begins with your logistics. Here are a few questions to consider:
How many people are you intending to host?
Where will this event take place?
What is your event budget?
What vendors are needed to help you make this successful?
Who will serve as the main Point of Contact?
How will people register to your event?
These along with many other key questions will come into play when arranging logistics and have to be answered before you launch your event.
Create A Corporate Event Target Audience:
If you are creating an event for your DC company, more than likely you will have a target audience. Take a real estate company for example. Their target audience are people who are looking to buy, sell, or rent a home. This is not everyone as everyone is not in the market to be a homeowner. Because of that, everyone should not be defined as your target audience.
To better define your target audience ask yourself:
Who do I really want to attend my corporate events?
What do I want them to walkaway with from my event?
What makes your event any different from others?
When you answer these questions you begin to see who your audience looks like and what they care about the most. Use these audience traits as marketing leverage when creating ads.
Generate the Marketing Buzz:
While word-of-mouth is a powerful tool, it has to be in the mouths of the right people. Simply passing along your corporate event activities to your friends wont work. Think to yourself, how do you hear about events and news on a weekly basis? Are you getting this from social media? Maybe you’re getting event news from a newsletter you’re on, or hearing it on the radio.
When it comes to social media, Capitalize On The Power Of Social Media. The reason why social media is so powerful is because everyone is always on it. We all receive information differently. Some love a great short video. Others love reading a blog post like this. A great graphics is all some need while others just want to know who is attending.
For those who may not have time to be on social media for hours and might miss your ad, use email marketing. Keep your emails to the point and only send them when you have something really important to talk about. You just booked a Keynote Speaker? Great talk about it. The most important thing you want to do via email is to explain why it’s important for your audience to attend.
If you have celebrities or popular speakers attending, ask them and influencers to talk about your event. I can’t tell you how many times an event is held and the main attraction never says a word about it. Sure you know they are coming because it’s posted on the event website, but they don’t make mention on their own website or social media. You are failing to reach their audience when you don’t ask these key people to speak up.
A few easy ways to get them involved:
Do a blog post interview
Do a video interview
As them to do a short candid video talking about them and your event
Give them useful and consistent content or graphics to share
Host a pre-event with them in attendance such as a VIP party with a sponsor
Focus On People And Not Ticket Levels:
Successful DC corporate events realize that people make events. We all know that many events come with a ticket level. I want you to focus on making everyone feel like a VIP no matter the ticket type. Certainly the ticket levels gives people various benefits, but how you make people feel should not be determined by price. If I purchased a $50 ticket to your event, would I feel the same as someone who purchased a $125 ticket? Your answer should be yes because the experience should be exceptional for both ticket holders. Yes they may be doing something different, but the end result should be the same.
Want to know more on successful DC corporate events? Contact us for a free consultation here or complete this form.