Getting Closer to Your Customers (and Potential Customers)

In a world saturated with so much digital communication, it is the power of face-to-face meetings that best enhance relationships and drive sales. Personal interaction with a targeted audience can build brand loyalty and generate new interest.

Like most marketing programs, clearly defining your objectives and expected outcomes is critical at the beginning of the planning process. In today’s economic climate with limited marketing dollars available, a focused approach to whom you market and what you are selling works best.

User conferences, topical educational seminars, or customer events that address issues of concern to the audience are an excellent way to create Focused and Integrated Marketing and drives Relationship Selling between your audience and staff.

Key elements of a successful customer event include:

Well-Rounded Attendee List – Include your current customers, perspective customers, key influencers, industry writers, editors, and suppliers to give your audience a well-rounded group of attendees and a 360-degree view of your meeting’s mission.

Offer a Complete Solution – Offer a trade show or sponsor fair to showcase a wide variety of products and services for your audience to consider. This demonstrates that you are concerned about their overall success and not just selling them your products.

Education – Book and promote speakers who can present a new idea or perspective. This sets the stage for a great event, gives context, and opens your audience up to new ways of thinking and doing things.

Real Life – Present best practices and live demos, which provide proof of successful ways to accomplish your audience’s goals.

Let the Customer Talk – Case studies and roundtable discussions are an excellent way to let your customers speak, demonstrate their results, and let the audience decide for themselves what might work for their organization.

Networking – This still ranks as one of the highest reasons why people come to customer events. People want to meet successful people from their industry, pick their brains, steal their clients, and make contacts for future job opportunities.

Enhance the Attendee’s Personal Brand – Offer a seminar on how to become successful within your organization but also successful in your own right. Offer sessions on how to be a better speaker, negotiator, team member, and leader. In this world of 140 characters or less, provide instruction on how to become a better writer. In this world of business casual, people still need to know how to dress for success and a session about business style and etiquette would be very beneficial. Your LinkedIn personal profile is about you the business professional, and workshops that offer tips on making the most of this powerful tool would surely be well attended.

Social Media – In some ways, spending time twittering and updating Facebook posts flies in the face of what face-to-face communications are all about. However, a well thought out social media plan for your next event can enhance the experience, allow for ways to reach other attendees, and ask questions of your speakers. Take a look at our Showcase to see how we are redefining the Networking Café with Media Walls, which gives attendees a complete view of the conference, and what people are saying.

Make it Memorable – Burn that impression! Bring in that big name speaker, have a great party, and make your breakouts more interactive and fun.

Create a Community – It’s not just about your attendees meeting people from your organization. It is about the attendee meeting suppliers, sponsors, a writer from an industry magazine, and even competitors. Customer events create the possibilities for people to make lifelong friendships. Sponsor these community-building events and attendees will remember that your company was responsible for such a great experience.