Maximize the ROI of Events with These Tips
Guide
Investing in events is an excellent way for businesses and organizations to pursue various strategic goals. These range from motivating your workforce, penetrating new markets, and reinforcing relations with your existing customers.
As with any type of investment, events come with both risks and opportunities. They can contribute to your profitability, have a neutral impact, or negatively affect your bottom line. 41% of marketers believe that activation events is the most effective marketing channel. However, the effectiveness of each event is mostly dependent on its planning and execution.
Let’s explore in greater detail the concept of ROI of events, how to measure it, and some helpful advice on organizing high-ROI events.
What is Event ROI?
Event ROI (Return on Investment) refers to the total positive value a business gets from hosting an event minus the cost of the event. This value can help managers understand whether or not they are achieving their desired outcomes from hosting an event.
In order to calculate event ROI, companies must take into account both the costs of the event and its benefits.
The first part is usually the easier one. It involves summing all investments made to create and run the event, such as venue fees, marketing costs, staffing expenses, and so on.
Evaluating the financial benefits is a bit harder, as these encompass all direct and indirect rewards obtained from hosting the events. Direct rewards include any sales generated from the event (as well as donations or sponsorships), while indirect rewards refer to factors such as enhanced brand recognition or sales leads generated during the happening.
Calculating these two components gives businesses a clear idea of whether a business has achieved its desired results through organizing an event. Conducting this analysis has several benefits.
First of all, it allows a business to pinpoint which events are delivering the most bang for their buck and where they should be allocating resources for maximum efficiency. For example, a safety and compliance event may maximize ROI by going over safety procedures and awarding department with zero or low work incidents. Their ROI would be measured in part, by each year’s performance.
Additionally, it supplies key data points that inform decisions about what type of content to include during an event’s lifecycle – from pre-event promotion strategies to post-event follow-up tactics – so as to continuously optimize investments over time. This is especially important for events like product launches or brand activations as they develop marketing strategies.
Finally, measuring an event’s ROI also helps business owners differentiate performance across different channels like digital or physical platforms in order to budget appropriately based on previous successes.
How to Measure Event ROI?
When creating goals and objectives for an event, it is essential to consider the desired outcomes that will benefit yourself as well as any stakeholders involved. This could include:
- increasing sales or leads generated from attendees;
- improving customer satisfaction;
- building relationships with potential partners or influencers in attendance.
It is also helpful to set specific targets such as “generate ten new leads” or “increase customer satisfaction by 20%.” Setting clear expectations upfront will help you evaluate whether or not your efforts were effective after the fact.
Once you have identified desired outcomes for your event, it is time to establish metrics for evaluation purposes so that progress towards achieving those goals can be tracked over time.
These metrics could include things like:
- number of attendees registered versus total capacity;
- amount spent per attendee; percentage of people who completed surveys after attending;
- number of leads generated during/after the event;
- the present value of additional projected revenues generated as a result of the event due to increased brand recognition, improved customer satisfaction scores, or positive reviews.
These metrics must be measurable so that accurate data can be collected throughout the process, which will later be used when calculating ROI of the event.
By adding up all expenses associated with hosting an event, subtracting them from any revenue generated directly or indirectly as a result of the event, and then dividing this figure by the total cost associated with running said event, one can calculate the return on investment.
Measuring Event ROI isn’t rocket science but does require careful planning and execution beforehand, along with tracking results afterward.
Some Helpful Tips on How to Maximize Event ROI
Maximizing event ROI requires the implementation of a comprehensive pre-event strategy. This typically includes the creation of an effective marketing plan, a social media campaign, and networking efforts with potential attendees.
Onsite strategies mostly focus on increasing engagement, excitement, and participation among attendees. This could include interactive activities or games as well as providing incentives such as discounts or freebies. Find ideas on how to make your conference stand out on this article.
Post-event follow-up is also essential in order to maximize ROI. This could involve sending out surveys or emails asking for feedback from attendees so that organizers can learn what worked well and where they need improvement for future events.
By utilizing the strategies discussed in this article, event and production companies can maximize their return on investment and create successful events. Learn more about how to leverage events for marketing.
An Example of a Successful Event with High ROI
To help you get acquainted with these concepts, let’s take the case of an industry-leading event with high ROI: a conference held by a large technology company.
The company can use pre-event marketing strategies such as email campaigns, targeted ads, and social media posts to reach potential attendees before the show begins.
Onsite strategies can range from giving away free swag bags full of promotional items like t-shirts or USB drives that are branded with the company logo for maximum visibility during the show itself.
Afterward, follow-up emails can be sent out to thank attendees for coming along and offering discounts on future products or services from their business portfolio.
This strategy has the potential to generate increased brand awareness among target customers who attended the show, leading to higher sales figures after its conclusion than before it had started.
The company can also hold multiple events throughout its stores nationwide over several months. To draw more people into each store’s individual event, it can use targeted advertising methods such as radio spots or print advertisements in newspapers and magazines which cater to specific demographics.
Moreover, offering special discounts during certain times can further incentivize customers to attend, thus driving up foot traffic at each location while also increasing overall sales figures across all participating stores countrywide.
This concept also works if you are looking to attract new talent or retain employees with incentive trips with excursions for employees or company retreats.
What is a good ROI for an event?
The ROI of events depends on multiple factors, including their type, size, scope, objectives, planning, and execution. A good event ROI is typically estimated at 10-20%, though higher returns are possible depending on the outcome.
Seasoned event planning companies, like Event Solutions, can help you conduct a careful analysis of event costs such as venue rental, catering services, marketing materials, and personnel, as well as make decisions that can maximize the direct and indirect revenues generated by your event. Finally, they can conduct a post-event assessment to determine if the event was profitable and to what extent.
If you are planning a corporate wellness retreat, product launch, grand opening, all hands company meeting, or other corporate event, submit your RFP to our team.
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