How to market your next event to the key influencers?

As an event organizer, you’re undoubtedly familiar with the concept of promoting your events. In the past this was done primarily through word of mouth and traditional media such as radio, television, and newspapers. In today’s world of event marketing, we rely more and more on the internet to get messages out there to the public.

At the risk of sounding cliché, the internet can do just about anything. You can use online ticketing to sell tickets to your event without ever having to leave your office. You can upload registration software and allow your employees to download it and continue working in the field on their computers.

If you really want to market your event to the fullest, aim your efforts at key influencers. Influencers are people with large audiences and the reputation to get your message spread far beyond anything you may have accomplished on your own. Court these influencers by:

• Provide them with exclusive discount for your event
  People love the idea of exclusivity; if you can give potential influencers some sort of inside information about your event, they may feel compelled to share it so that the information can appear to come from them and this can help improve their personal exposure and influence.
• Visit their blogs and forums
  Speak with influencers directly in their own environments to help them feel comfortable. After you have spoken with them directly you can progress to social connections and emailing, assuming they will want to learn more and share information about your event.
• Connect with them on social media with personalized content
  Don’t send a generic message, and don’t try to contact everyone you think could be an influence all at the same time. Again, people like to feel special, and canned responses, or messages from their friends that you’re hitting up everyone pretty much back to back can be pretty off-putting.

Marketing your event to key influencers who have access to your target audience can make a positive impact on the attention given to your event and may even help increase registration and attendance later on down the line.