Category: Marketing blog

A corporate event is an unbelievable way to raise awareness of a business’s brand and build a stellar reputation. But, more and more companies are using a party as a marketing method to attract customers. It isn’t hard to see why when event attendees in the UK spend £65,000 a year in registration. With all the competition, planners need to figure out a way to stand out from the crowd and get the message across. World-class bands will make a mark, but they are unrealistic. Bosses should focus on the little things to wow the guests. Here are four of the best.

Catering

Attendees love freebies, especially when they are delicious. Food is a fantastic addition to an event because it creates a social atmosphere. While people eat and drink, they talk and laugh and mix with the rest of the guests. Enjoying the night will reflect favourably on the people and the company who put it together and invited them in the first place. There’s another reason contract catering is vital: energy. Spending all night on your feet is hard work, and guests feel the same way. Appetisers are small shots of power that keep the people on their feet until the very end. Of course, a couple of glasses of wine helps to forget about the tiredness.

Free Ticket

Taking a freebie to the next level is providing those invited with free entry. No one is going to grumble when they arrive and are presented with booze and food, and that’s just the beginning. There is a psychological aspect, too, in the sense that guests think “why not?” when they know they don’t have to shell out for a ticket. Most importantly of all, the night is about raising awareness of the brand and the company needs to address as many people as possible. Asking for a fee is a sure-fire way to limit traffic.

Effective Staff

Events revolve around the hospitality crew doing their job. It’s shocking, then, that lots of planners use amateurs to cut down on costs. The servers are apart of the company for the night because how they act then reflects on the business. Hiring non-professionals or only a small team might come back to harm the firm’s reputation. The best parties have a large number of workers circulating the room so that guests are catered for throughout the evening. There is nothing worse than waiting a lifetime to get a free drink!

Auction

Winning a competition is one way for attendees to go away with a smile on their face. Gifts and prizes that are different and valuable will leave them jumping for joy. Walking away with a present isn’t just good for the guest but the business also. The company needs to find a way to direct the people in the room towards the brand yet can’t ask during the event. It’s too tacky and unprofessional. Revealing the results of the prize giveaway online ensures guests will follow-up after the party is over.

Ultimately, businesses need to remember that big things can come in small packages.

There’s one marketing strategy that is very effective, but which seems to be used less and less by employers across pretty much sector. What is it? The strategy whereby you treat your staff really, really well.

That might not seem like a marketing strategy at all,m but hows many times have you been out a parties, events and the like and had someone ask you where you work or what you do for a living? More times than you can remember, I’m sure! Chances are your employees, if you have any, have been asked the same and all of the usual follow up questions about how much they enjoy their work, what they do, etc., too!

Starting to get the picture?If your employees are happy at work and treated very well by you, they will sign your praises to anyone who will listen, which is probably more people than you might think, and you’ll fast get a reputation as a great company that  really cares about  people – think what that could do for your business!

How to Treat Your Employees Well

If you’re sold on the idea of treating your employees even better, not just for the marketing benefits, but so that you can be a good boss and create a happy working environment too, here are a few things you can do:

Offer Benefits

This is a no-brainer really – the more benefits you offer your employee, whether it be performance related bonuses, employee financial wellbeing services or even something simple like a nicer chair to help with their back problems, the happier they are likely to be and the more positive press you’ll get. It really can be that simple.

Let Them Have Their Say

Looking for something that won’t cost you much, or even anything at all? It’s simple – let your employees have their say, Get them involved in the day to day running of the business; allow them to pitch ideas and actually take them seriously and make changes when it’s clear certain practices aren’t working out well. This will make your employees feel valued, which will almost certainly increase their loyalty to you and your brand. Give it a try, and I bet you see results sooner than you think.

Always Be Honest With Them

As an employer who wants to keep the staff onside, and who cares about the wellbeing of your employees, one of the worst things you can do is lie to them. If you keep quiet about budget cuts, potential redundancies or anything like that it is only likely to build resentment and loosen the bonds of loyalty, which will probably result in some pretty poor PR for you.

Let Them have Freebies

Not only will giving your employees freebies or letting them have very generous discounts keep them happy and loyal to the brand, but it will increase advertising for your products when they show off their newly acquired toys to friends and family too. It’s another no-brainer.

Use any or all of these tactics to ensure your staff are well treated, and they will repay you many times over.

When you’re running a business that operates locally, you will undoubtedly still benefit from using online marketing, however, how you go about advertising your business digitally will need to be a little different from how online-only businesses go about it. This is because you will need to focus your efforts much more on one geographic location than they would need to.

If you’re not sure how to approach the marketing of your local business online, here are some tips to help you out:

Make Sure Your Website is Mobile Friendly

Whether you’re a local contract cleaning company, a local bakery or a greengrocers operating in your local market, you need to have a website. Why? Because today, the first thing that most people do is Google for the services they’re interested in and move on from there.

As well as having a good website in place, it is even more important that you make it mobile friendly. You need to do this so that people can use their phones to find you when they’re in the area and looking for a place to go right then and there.

Search Engine Optimise for Your Location

This is a pretty obvious one, but if you’re targeting customers in a particular location, then you need to optimise your website for that location. You can do this by including location specific information to your website, along with the products and/or services you offer locally, using highly targeted keywords to help you along the way. If you have little experience with SEO and marketing, it might be worth seeking professional help. Why? Because this, more than anything else will determine whether your business is amongst the most or least visible online in your area.

Include Your Opening Hours and Address

This should be a no-brainer, but so many local companies neglect to add their opening hours and address to their own website and social media profiles, let along Google and the various local online directories. This is a massive own goal because, even if you do everything you can to get your results to the top of the search engines if people have no way of finding you, then they’re probably going to move on to the next result and go elsewhere.

Include Numerous Points of Contact

It’s always a good idea to make it as easy as possible for your audience to contact you. So, make sure that you provide an email address, phone number, live chat and social media access along with your physical address. This is particularly important if you run a business where your services need to be booked as opposed to, say, a local shop, where people can just walk in.

Post Often on Social Media

Most local people these days tend to look to social media for recommendations, just as much as they do Google, and that’s why it has never been more important that you post regular, interesting posts on social media. This will help to increase your number of followers and the amount of shares you get, which will raise your profile and encourage more locals to do business with you.

Do these things, and you shouldn’t have a problem being seen online!