An event is a great way to promote your business, and is a little different (and far more interactive) than your standard digital marketing techniques. People won’t necessarily go out of their way to find out information about your specific business, however if you’re hosting an event, it means there’s something in it for them.

You have a way of attracting them down to your premises and grabbing their attention, and while they’re there, having fun you have the chance to tell them more about what you do. Here are some things to bear in mind.

Promote Your Event

When you’re running an event, you need to make sure people know about it so they will attend. You could send out information over your social media accounts and email lists.

You could invite clients and past customers, you could even put balloons and banners outside your store to attract passers by and take advantage of any foot traffic. You could hand out leaflets in a busy area a few days beforehand with details of your event and what you’re doing.

Make It Fun

The reason people will attend your event is because there’s something in it for them. So things like free food and drink, music, stalls and more are all worth setting up. You could hire a food company like South Catering, or you could invite food vendors down to sell their own products (if they’re not in direct competition with what you do).

Play games, run competitions, offer face painting and a bouncy castle for kids. Make your event interesting and entertaining so people want to come down, stay for a while and enjoy themselves. All of this can help them to see your brand in a more positive way, and they’ll be taking in information about what you do even if it’s on a subconscious level if you put up things like signs and posters.

Showcase your business

It might be the fun and games that attract people to your event, but once they’re there you want them to find out more about your company. That’s the whole point after all! If you’re a food business, you could create samples of what you sell and hand them out for free. If you sell electronics, you could set up a console game and host mini competitions to get people using the products.

Whatever it is you do or sell, make sure people are getting to try and learn more, they can ask questions and generally gain a better understanding of your business. Hand out business cards, flyers or leaflets. You could hand out merch such as pens and keyrings with your business name on.

You could run a competition and gain entries by taking email addresses- that way you can build you email list for marketing.

An event is the perfect way to attract potential customers, offer them something for free (food, drink or just fun!) and while they’re there, get across your business information.

It doesn’t have to be in an aggressive way where you’re pushing them into buying, simply having a quick chat and introducing yourself as the owner and handing out business cards can be enough to help you become a recognised brand by people in the local area.