Email marketing may seem a fairly old school method of marketing your next event in a world full of messaging and social media channels. However, it’s still one of the most effective ways to get in front of your target audience and get results.
Email marketing is one of the few ways you can build up an authentic connection with your audience to keep your event alive. It doesn’t need to be spam or come across as a personal note between friends. It has its own unique identity. Your audience won’t have given you their contact details lightly. If you manage to create the right tone, you’ll build up a relationship between you and your attendees and build a great profit creation tool.
You can build on any existing relationships with your audience, subscribers, and leads by providing them with relevant and valuable information to help them with their ticket buying process.
The most important thing to remember with email marketing is that it isn’t about you; it’s about your audience.
If you always keep this rule in your head when writing your messages to your subscribers, they’ll not only be more likely to open your emails but will look forward to receiving your updates.
How to get started
Creating an email marketing campaign can be broken down into a few key steps.
Define your audience: If you want to create an effective email, it needs to be relevant. Like all marketing, you need to start with your buyer persona. Think about what your attendees and audience are looking for from you and tailor your message from there.
Set your goals: There’s plenty of information out there about industry averages for setting goals for your campaign. You can set goals for open rates (where they open your email) or even click-through rates (if they click on a relevant link in your email). Once you’ve picked your goal, you’ll now have something to work towards.
Create a way to sign-up: You’ll need to create an email list. If you need help doing this, or even if you’re starting from scratch, you can find out more details here. If you have an email list ready to go, you’ll still need to create several ways for new people to subscribe to your emails. Email lists can take a while to build up, so don’t be discouraged if you don’t see a huge amount of sign-ups straight away. Treat every subscriber like gold, and you’ll soon see your email list grow.
Choose an email campaign type: There are many options you can choose from, whether you want to send out a weekly update or just announcements for your event. It’s best to have a campaign type in mind so you can plan out what you’re looking to share with your audience.
Make a schedule: After selecting your campaign type, it’s important to put together a schedule of when you want to contact your audience. This will depend on the campaign type you’ve chosen. Inform your audience upfront about what to expect and stick to a consistent schedule, as this will help build trust and make sure they don’t forget about you!
Measure your results: When marketing anything, you’ll also need to measure everything. This is how you’ll know what’s working and what isn’t. Keeping an eye on all these small details will ensure that you can make the most out of your efforts and see great results.
Build up that email list
You can build up your email list in many creative ways – check out our previous blog here to build up your list effectively. Traditionally, there are two key ways to build up your email list: lead magnets and opt-in forms.
Lead magnets: A lead magnet is pretty much as it sounds. It attracts potential email subscribers to your email list, usually in the form of an offer. The offer can be anything relevant to your event and should be valuable to your audience.In recent years people have been increasingly protective over their personal information, so you’ll need to make sure your offer is super relevant and valuable, as their personal information is just as valuable to you.
Your lead magnet should be actionable, easy to consume, relevant to any future content you wish to publish, and a stepping stone to ticket purchase.
Opt-in forms: Your opt-in form will need to be attention-grabbing if you’re looking to get your audience to give you their personal information. It’s the gate between you and your future leads and can be an incredible asset to your marketing toolkit.The form should be simple and set up to offer double confirmation of your intent to market to that person. Don’t set up too many fields to fill in – generally, just a name and email will be enough.
Make sure the process flows. Take yourself through the experience several times, so you get a real feel for your users’ experience. This is one of the first impressions you’ll give your audience, so it’s important to make sure it’s a positive one.
Email marketing can be highly effective when done right, and we at Helm are here to help you through the process. In our next blog, we’ll be taking a look at best practice for email marketing, as well as the regulations you should follow. Keep up to date via our blog as well as on LinkedIn!
Market your event via email more effectively with Helm Tickets
For many businesses and events, digital marketing is key. Online ads and social media marketing have become incredibly accurate and act as a measurable tool for reaching your event’s target audience.
But what if you want to create something real? Something more tangible?
To keep your event and its brand at the front of your audience’s mind, you can cover an entire spectrum of marketing techniques, including complimenting your digital marketing efforts with offline marketing campaigns.
There’s still an abundance of ways to engage with your local audience and regional fans in a tangible way. Here are a few great ways to start:
Be where your fans are
When creating a physical offline marketing campaign, it’s always important to think about not just how you’re going to reach your fans and audience but also where you’ll reach them.
For example, if you’re running a punk rock gig, are there any shops or bars you think your audience might go to? You could consider targeting tattoo parlours or skate shops or anywhere that might play music similar to yours. It’s about hitting the locations that suit your niche.
By doing a bit of research, you’ll be able to get in front of your potential audience organically. You won’t just be reaching out to their existing customers; they’ll also be reaching yours.
Great design creates excitement
Creating posters and flyers has always been an essential part of event promotion, and they can still be incredibly effective alongside a digital campaign. Having a well-designed poster can set the tone of your event and is a great tool to communicate with your potential audience visually.
They can inform and motivate ticket buyers and become a part of your event’s physical history.
There are 2 things you’ll need to consider when creating your flyers and posters:
Design: What kind of emotion and message do you want to convey? Punk? Corporate? Professional? Handmade? You can use this design on all your physical marketing materials as well as your online campaigns. This ensures your event branding is consistent and instantly recognisable.
Distribution: Posting your flyers on telephones poles won’t quite be enough. It would be best to have your posters and flyers exactly where your potential audience will be.
You can even use social media to reach out to brands or businesses that share an audience with you and ask if they’d be happy sharing your posters and flyers on your behalf, creating a partnership with them.
Offer meet and greets
If you have a well-known speaker or artist performing at your event, you have the potential to hold VIP meet and greet experiences at your venue. It’s great to do this in advance of your event, as it acts as an effective way to reach and engage your audience and generate excitement for your event. It’s also a great opportunity to sell tickets!
If you manage to secure a partnership with any local businesses, you could reach out to them and see if they’d be interested in holding the meet and greet at their location. This way, you’re where your fans are, and it’s mutually beneficial to both you and your partner.
Create a contest with ticket giveaways
Nothing gets people quite as excited as a freebie does! Contests are a great way to promote your event and act as a great way to engage with your audience.
You can use your potential partners by doing ticket giveaways that require visiting their place of business. Or create a prize that’s a combination of your tickets and maybe a gift card (or similar) prize from your partner. Once again, creating a mutually beneficial deal.
Offer tickets to your local radio station for giveaways. Radios may charge for the promotional privilege, but if you choose a station whose audience would match yours, it can be a great way to reach that specific audience in your local area. Spending that money could be a great investment to increase your ticket sales.
You can combine physical and offline promotions. Create a social media contest where they have the opportunity to win tickets by posting a photo of themselves with your physical poster in the wild.
In an increasingly digital world, there are still plenty of options when it comes to marketing your event offline. All of the best marketing strategies combine multiple marketing techniques, advertising your event online and in the real world.
Updates to how you receive your payouts are coming soon! Here’s a quick insight into how it’ll work and what it means for you and your event.
Custom Payout Schedule
Currently, all payouts are carried out monthly, but now we’re giving you a choice when you’d like to be paid. The new options will be available to you once you’ve received 3 monthly payouts from us.
Until that point, payouts are set to the default of ‘monthly’. This is to reduce the risk of fraud and make sure all our organisers are legitimate. As we all know, security is of the highest importance in today’s climate. We pride ourselves on being the ticketing platform that is safe, secure and reliable, so we want to ensure our platform is consistently safe for our organisers and the attendees.
Once you’ve received your 3 monthly payouts from us, you’ll unlock the following options to choose from:
Weekly
Fortnightly
Monthly
Quarterly
We’re also updating your payouts page with the following information:
Next payout date
Next payout amount
A record of all previous payout amounts and dates, which will be linked to the downloadable pdf statement
We aim to give you access to the vital funds you need when you need them. We know having a reliable cash flow is an essential factor in running any event, and we want to make sure we’re able to take away some of the stress that comes with waiting for payments.
There are, of course, a few situations we had to consider and plan for:
Your account must be verified for you to receive payments
If you’re yet to enter your bank account details, we’ll be sending you an email to let you know that if you don’t enter them before your next payout date, we won’t be able to pay you your funds. We’ll be checking this 7 days before your payout date is due to make sure you have plenty of time to update your details. If you don’t manage to update them in time, any funds will carry over to the next payout date.
The minimum payout amount will be £75 (or the equivalent in your currency, e.g. $75/€75 etc.), which will apply to all currencies. If your account balance at the time of payout is below this, you’ll receive an email explaining that no payout has occurred because your account doesn’t have the minimum balance available. Inside this email will be a link to request an on-demand payout (carry on reading to find out more!) Any balance you have under £75 ($75/€75) will be again carried over to the next payout date.
Your selected payout option will be locked until the next payout period. So, if you choose monthly payouts, you won’t be able to change them until the current month is over.
On-demand Payouts
And now for the biggest payouts update… on-demand payouts! Currently, there’s no option for you to request an on-demand payout if your balance is below the minimum payout amount of £75 (or the equivalent of your payout currency, e.g. $75/€75), so we’ve decided to create this as a new feature, on the “My Payouts” page. This will allow you to request a payout of your current balance* on demand. Like the new payouts schedule, this feature will only be available to you once you’ve verified your account and have entered your bank account details.
Any on-demand payout will be subject to a small fee for each on-demand payout
This means that if you’ve already had your default payout completed (i.e. 1x monthly payout), you’ll now be able to request an on-demand payout of your full balance from within your organiser dashboard. This might be useful to you when:
You get paid monthly but want to have an additional payout within the same time period. For example, if your event finishes after your selected payouts schedule and you don’t want to wait another month to receive your funds.
If you get paid monthly, but your ticket sales don’t add up to the minimum payout amount, you’ll be able to make an on-demand payout for any funds under £/€/$75
On-demand payouts apply only to the following payout options:
Fortnightly
Monthly
Quarterly
So remember to keep this in mind when selecting your payout schedule.
There are also a few limitations for on-demand payouts:
You’ll only be able to request 1 on-demand payout per month
If you are requesting more than £500, you will only receive 50% of your available balance or £500 (whichever is the greater amount). e.g. if you have a balance of £580, you will be allowed to request up to £500. If you have a balance of £3000, then you should be allowed to request up to £1500
You’ll only be able to request an on-demand payout instead of your usual selected payout option if your balance is below the minimum payout amount or if you’re likely to receive your payout faster than the normal timeframe (even if it’s just a week early)
A “brand’s story” has become a huge marketing buzz-phrase in recent years. But how clear are you on what that means? And how you can use it to elevate your event?
When you harness the power of brand storytelling you’ll be able to engage more effectively with your attendees – developing an emotional response to your brand and building a greater level of community.
What does brand storytelling mean?
In basic terms, brand storytelling is about helping your attendees connect emotionally with your event’s brand. It’s about creating a narrative that humanises what you do and communicates with your audience on a deeper level instead of a purely transactional one.
Brand stories bring your brand to life and give it character. They make it a living, breathing entity with its own ideas and beliefs. They give it its own voice and a distinct way of communicating and set the tone through which your brand sees the world.
Why should brand storytelling be an important part of your event?
You may be thinking that your tickets have been selling just fine without any real thought towards your brand’s story, so why bother making the effort now? It may be that you have without trying, and created a brand story organically, which is a great start. The next step is to get this down into a written document so you can clarify all the details of your brand and its ethos. This will ensure consistency across your marketing channels as well as providing an easier onboarding process for any new staff.
If you fall into the category where you feel like you don’t have a distinct brand personality yet, putting the work into developing one can help you stand out within your niche. By creating a clear idea of who you are and what you stand for, it makes it easier for your attendees to understand if you are what they’re looking for.
It goes far beyond just writing a great ‘about us’ section on your website. You have to connect with people’s imaginations when you sell to them and brand storytelling is the perfect tool to allow you to do that.
So where do you start when creating your brand story?
Every brand and event has its own individual story. Below is a list of questions that act as a great starting point for you to think about. You can either write your answers down or if you’re not the event’s creator maybe work on getting an interview with them to get the details of how the event came to be.
What led to the creation of the event?
When and where was your event launched?
What were you doing previously to the event being created?
What goals did you set out when you first created the event?
Were there any challenges along the way? How did you overcome them?
Has your event changed or developed from its creation? If so, how?
Who are your event attendees and why do you think they choose your event?
Have you reached the goals you previously set out?
What would you like to achieve with your event in the future?
Do you have any wider values that you consider to be essential to your event?
Creating a clear narrative and timeline gives you an idea of where you’ve been and where you’re heading. It can also help you define your audience more clearly.
A “brand’s story” has become a huge marketing buzz-phrase in recent years. But how clear are you on what that means? And how you can use it to elevate your event?
When you harness the power of brand storytelling you’ll be able to engage more effectively with your attendees – developing an emotional response to your brand and building a greater level of community.
What does brand storytelling mean?
In basic terms, brand storytelling is about helping your attendees connect emotionally with your event’s brand. It’s about creating a narrative that humanizes what you do and communicates with your audience on a deeper level instead of a purely transactional one.
Brand stories bring your brand to life and give it character. They make it a living, breathing entity with its own ideas and beliefs. They give it its own voice and a distinct way of communicating, and set the tone through which your brand sees the world.
Why should brand storytelling be an important part of your event?
You may be thinking that your tickets have been selling just fine without any real thought towards your brand’s story, so why bother making the effort now? It may be that you have without trying, and created a brand story organically, which is a great start. The next step is to get this down into a written document so you can clarify all the details of your brand and its ethos. This will ensure consistency across your marketing channels as well as providing an easier onboarding process for any new staff.
If you fall into the category where you feel like you don’t have a distinct brand personality yet, putting the work into developing one can help you stand out within your niche. By creating a clear idea of who you are and what you stand for, it makes it easier for your attendees to understand if you are what they’re looking for.
It goes far beyond just writing a great ‘about us’ section on your website. You have to connect with people’s imaginations when you sell to them and brand storytelling is the perfect tool to allow you to do that.
So where do you start when creating your brand story?
Every brand and event has its own individual story. Below is a list of questions that act as a great starting point for you to think about. You can either write your answers down or if you’re not the event’s creator maybe work on getting an interview with them to get the details of how the event came to be.
What led to the creation of the event?
When and where was your event launched?
What were you doing previously to the event being created?
What goals did you set out when you first created the event?
Were there any challenges along the way? How did you overcome them?
Has your event changed or developed from its creation? If so, how?
Who are your event attendees and why do you think they choose your event?
Have you reached the goals you previously set out?
What would you like to achieve with your event in the future?
Do you have any wider values that you consider to be essential to your event?
Creating a clear narrative and timeline gives you an idea of where you’ve been and where you’re heading. It can also help you define your audience more clearly.
How can brand storytelling help you better communicate with your audience?
One of the most important parts of brand storytelling is understanding your audience. For example, the language you’d use to write a children’s book would be completely different from the language you’d use to write a crime novel.
This works the same way when writing a copy for your event so it speaks directly and clearly to your attendees. To understand what will get them excited about your event, you need to look past mere demographics – you need to know and understand them as people. To do this you’ll need to create target personas.
Identifying the key ‘types’ who attend your event and the underlying needs of that individual are key to understanding how to communicate more effectively with them. Take a greater interest in what makes them tick. What bothers and irritates them? What challenges are they facing in their daily lives? What are they worried about and scared of? What do they dream about?
The more you know and understand about your attendees, the better you can reach out and communicate more effectively with them. Create different stories for each persona about who you think they might be as people, and from there you can tailor your message to be more appropriate for each persona.
How do you identify your events persona?
When you have identified the personas of your attendees, it’s time to take that approach to identify the persona of your event. You have to imagine your event as an actual person, and build a description of that ‘person’ in the same way you would any other persona.
Ask yourself the same questions you’ve previously used to identify who your attendees are, to help you build the image of a real person. Whilst this may seem a bit ridiculous, it can help you build a tangible personality for your event’s brand story. From there it becomes far easier to work out your brand’s tone and how it should express itself.
How can this affect your day-to-day communications?
You should aim to communicate your brand’s and event’s story through every step your attendees will take whilst interacting with your event brand on and off-site. Whether that be through your website, social channels, advertising, or even your event registration, customer service and post-event thank you a message.
It goes beyond just ensuring your brand has a consistent tone of voice: it’s about consistently stimulating people and continually communicating the values of your event. Brand storytelling is about always expanding the narrative you’ve created. By telling personal stories you’ll be able to trigger an emotional response from the attendee. It’s about reinforcing that human element in an ever-digital world.
How are you able to keep your brand story original?
When making sure you keep your story and narrative original, it may be best to turn to the stories of your attendees. They are the crucial element when it comes to running an event and they can be a fantastic source of inspiration.
Sharing their stories and their experiences with you builds confidence and loyalty and it’s the best way to demonstrate the impact your event has on your attendees. Making your attendees a part of your brand story and your communications will ensure that your event and its values will always seem authentic.
Everyone loves a good story, especially one that’s organic and authentic, so if you want your attendees to be more engaged with your events, give them a narrative they can engage with. Put your event attendees at the centre of your brand’s story and you will have their attention.
Help build your brand and event story here with Helm Tickets!
Everyone loves a good story, especially one that’s organic and authentic, so if you want your attendees to be more engaged with your events, give them a narrative they can engage with. Put your event attendees at the centre of your brand’s story and you will have their attention.
It can be expensive to hire out a videographer to film your event and turn that raw footage into perfected final videos. But you don’t always need to hire a videographer to achieve that professional level of video.
High-quality video production has never been cheaper. The camera quality of the latest smartphones has been getting better with each new release, so shooting your own footage is now a far more available option. With a high-quality smartphone camera and a gimbal (non-essential), you can take your shots and edit them in a variety of free video editing programmes.
Only a small number of smaller business and events go to agencies for freelancers to produce their videos. More and more people are turning to DIY techniques to produce great video content on a budget.
Video creation doesn’t have to be time-consuming
Producing professional level video may seem like a huge task, especially if you don’t have a huge marketing team behind you as support. But if you’re already attending your event why not get your phone out and start filming?
As previously mentioned, most modern smartphones have incredible cameras and with an image stabilizing device such as a gimbal, you can easily produce high-quality video content.
Even if you don’t have enough time to film your whole event, it’s always worth filming short clips to capture the energy of your event to share with attendees and potential future attendees.
If your event day is looking a little hectic, consider taking on a volunteer or a delegate to do some of the filming work or share your event live on social media (e.g. Instagram stories). This footage can be uploaded immediately with little to no editing needed.
Video has a great and tangible return on investment (ROI)
If you want to really see the power of film you need to look into the numbers. When asked which type of content sees the best return on investment (ROI) on social media, the top response in a survey found that it was video marketing. 88% of marketers said that they were satisfied with the ROI of their video marketing on social media.
Your competitors may already be using video marketing to promote their events and may already be seeing an ROI. If you want to get in on the action and make your event stand out from the rest you can upload a video into your event listing on Helm.
