What is B2B event marketing and why you should still consider it

It’s been said that the best salespeople are those who are sharp as a tack when it comes to building relationships. B2B event marketing has proven to be highly effective for this goal. 

Not just that, it’s also a time-tested and versatile strategy for reducing sales cycles and expediting pipeline generation. Here are some statistics to back those up. 

According to The Changing Environment of Exhibitions and exponents.com:

• On average, a company sets 31.6% of its marketing budget for events
• 77% of business decision-makers found at least one new supplier in the last trade shows they attended
• 92% of trade show attendees are on the lookout for new products
• 99% found unique value in this B2B marketing strategy that they did not get from other channels

Looking at these numbers, it’s safe to say that businesses see a lot of potential and opportunities in these events. 

Given that, in this post, we’ll talk about:

• What B2B event marketing is
• Why it’s important
• What are some types of event marketing
• Best practices you should consider

By the end of this post, you’ll be up to par with how you can take advantage of it for your brand. So keep reading to find out. 

What is B2B event marketing?

B2B event marketing was traditionally defined as an avenue for in-person interaction between brands to build awareness, generate leads, strengthen relationships, and facilitate customer retention, sales acceleration, and the actualization of other business goals. 

B2B events aim to accelerate pipeline generation and shorten sales cycles, resulting in faster, larger, and more sustainable returns on investment (ROI). As Statista reports, 79% of US marketers generate revenue using this strategy. 

However, with the current advances in technology coupled with pandemic restrictions, B2B events have evolved from being a strictly offline marketing strategy to an online one, nonetheless reaching other businesses on a more personal level compared with other online methods. 

Offline or online, B2B event marketing enables the exchange of knowledge between brands, allowing them to position themselves as thought leaders in their respective fields and help others overcome challenges with the products and solutions they provide. 

Said, whether it’s a physical or virtual face-to-face event, B2B events are growth hacking strategies to foster relationships, ultimately driving business revenue. 

How is event marketing effective?

Endless Events reports that a staggering 87% of C-suite executives trust in the influence of live events, moving them to invest more in this marketing strategy moving forward. In a nutshell, B2B events improve: 

• Brand awareness
• Lead generation
• Fostering relationships
• Gathering feedback
• Understanding competing brands

Brand Awareness

Sageworld.com reports that 88% of businesses join marketing events for brand awareness. While social media marketing remains a proven, invaluable tool, this space can be too crowded to allow one brand to stand out. 

Hence, marketing events are seen as a way to stand out from the crowd and build a lasting impression on brands that matter. It paves the way for one-on-one conversations to engage with prospects, allowing you to understand their challenges and pinpoint the right pain points, thereby positioning your brand more effectively when introducing your products or services as a solution. 

B2B events also help manage brand reputations, so you can control how the audience perceives them. 

It’s ideal for niche-focused services, such as Amazon listing optimization software. Not many people may be aware of it, so an event showcasing this technology will benefit brand visibility, especially for those in the FBA industry. 

Lead Generation

In terms of qualified leads, or potential customers with the highest chances of conversion (also known as hot leads), event marketing helps filter for this kind of audience and nurture them.

Digital channels, paid or organic, will appeal to the target market but mostly attract people who are not warm enough for conversions. In other words, while these strategies have their benefits, event marketing is much more effective for hot lead generation. 

Why?

Business decision-makers usually attend these events. Often, these kinds of leads are difficult to reach through digital channels. 

Source:cience.com

B2B events create a unique setting, bringing together brand executives or business decision-makers in one place, making it a gold mine for brand awareness, relationship strengthening, and revenue generation. 

These are backed up by more statistics from Sageworld.com, which reports:

• 51% of those who attend these events request a sales representative visit
• 70% of event attendees look to strengthen relationships with other businesses
• 72% aim to get new leads when attending

Fostering Relationships

One thing that marketing events allow businesses to do is converse with potential clients to discuss their concerns and challenges, and offer solutions, whether it involves promoting your brand directly or indirectly. 

Sharing knowledge alone can build your credibility as a thought leader in the industry. This is especially valuable because one of the main reasons businesses attend B2B marketing events is to gain knowledge. If you can provide them additional knowledge, they’ll likely rely on your brand for insights and consider your services and products as solutions. 

It also allows prospective clients who are starting to gain interest in your brand to know about it on a deeper level through your interaction with them. You can showcase your brand, convey how it will add value to their business, how it can streamline processes, or solve problems. 

This will be incredibly beneficial for inbound marketing services for SaaS marketing brands. 

Plus, you’ll be able to quickly address any questions that might otherwise take time to reply to on digital channels like social media. 

As a whole, B2B marketing events allow you to interact with brand executives right away, where you can convey knowledge, promote your brand, and answer queries promptly, allowing them to expedite deciding whether or not your brand provides the value they need.  

Gathering Feedback

B2B marketing events allow you to get live feedback on what potential clients find valuable about your product or services and how it has or will benefit them. 

It also allows real-time insight into shortcomings, drawbacks, and improvements they want to be added. 

This way, you receive current information from qualified leads about how to improve your services, allowing you to reassess your offer and adjust your strategies accordingly. 

A great example is if you own a visual merchandising business like an online mannequin store. Marketing events will bring you up-to-date with the current display needs of clothing businesses so you can tailor your equipment to the needs that are not yet catered to by your current product line. 

Understanding Competing Brands

B2B events allow you to rub shoulders with highly competitive brands in your industry, where you can explore their engagement tactics, promotion initiatives, management skills, and lead generation programs. 

You also get to explore and learn from their sales pitches, strategies that helped them be successful, other things they do that your brand still hasn’t implemented yet, and prepare you for the next events you’ll participate in. 

Said, you can get ideas on how your brand can grow to their level. It allows you to watch, learn, and grow. 

Say you own a catalog printing business. Knowing what other services competing brands offer, like free deliveries, free samples, or discounted bundled offers, can help you upgrade your service so you’ll be up to par with them. 

Offline And Online B2B Marketing Events

There are two ways you can participate in a B2B event: as an attendee or as a host. Also, including B2B events in your marketing strategy will depend on your marketing goals. 

Broadly, you can categorize marketing events into two types: online and offline events. We’ll talk deeper about what’s included in each category and what will work best for your brand goals. 

5 Offline B2B Marketing Events To Choose From

Traditionally, B2B events are done in person. Here are 5 B2B events you can consider.

Lunch And Learn

A lunch-and-learn marketing event is ideal for V-level executives, those who are one rank below C-level executives, and is usually attended by at least 20 people.

The goal here is not to present a sales pitch but to provide value and insight on the industry, covering a specific topic. 

Those who attend Lunch and Learn events have the goal of learning about solutions to common problems in the industry. So, if you’re hosting this kind of event, research well to identify a prevailing concern in the targeted sector, so that invitees will be motivated to attend. 

You can provide a 15-minute presentation about the solutions for the problem, followed by a question-and-answer session or an open forum where other brands can also offer their suggested solutions or ask about additional related concerns on the topic. 

If you’re a digital marketing brand concerned about the ever-evolving SEO space, a good solution is to gain access to constantly updated SEO training courses or work with a tried and tested SEO agency to stay up to speed with recent advancements. 

It’s also recommended to invite previous and current clients who benefited well from your service as a solution to a business concern. As many say, “happy customers are more convincing than the best salespeople”. 

When crafting your invitation for a lunch and learn event, answer questions like: why should they attend the event? What’s in it for them? Getting these questions covered will make invitees more convinced to participate. 

VIP Dinners

VIP dinners are more exclusive events, ideally with only 10 C-level executives as attendees. 

This limited number will make attendees feel important, a great convincing tactic since people thrive with special treatment. 

Since C-level executives will be attending, you can make them feel more special if you have senior executives of your brand attend the event as well. This way, conversations will connect on the same level. 

VIP dinners are great for warming up hot and existing leads, further engaging them, and helping them move through the sales funnel more quickly. 

To make attendees feel more special, VIP dinners offer a valuable opportunity to provide them with an exclusive experience by pampering them in some way. 

Say you’re promoting an online remote work tool to automate tasks for team members, giving these executives a free trial of your remote task manager for at least 6 months will provide them with invaluable experience with your service. 

User Conferences

User conferences are great when your customer base has grown to at least 600-1000 clients. You can organize user conferences to make your customer base feel like they’re part of a community.

In this setting, you can offer professional coaching, interactive presentations, and networking opportunities. This way, you can establish and solidify your presence in the market so you can increase customer retention when they feel they’ve made the right investment decision, as they see value in the conference. 

Source: pamdidner.com

Attendees for user conferences can range from 500 to as many as 2000. The bigger the audience, the more likely it is to establish brand confidence with your attendees. 

User conferences don’t just focus on customer retention; they can also help strengthen partnerships and expand marketing efforts to additional prospects. With this in mind, you can divide your audience into:

• 30% prospects
• 30% partners
• 40% of current customers

Additionally, consider inviting as many press representatives as possible to increase brand awareness further. You’ll also need to prepare a video marketing strategy, collaborating with video and graphic experts to enhance brand awareness campaigns before and during the event. 

User conferences typically require a substantial budget, so they must be planned as far in advance as possible to ensure goals are met and the ROI covers the event costs. You can even consider hiring an events planner to ensure the event runs smoothly and everything is taken care of. 

Charging tickets when you’re just starting will result in poor registration and attendance. Unless you first establish the value of the conferences you organized, your audience won’t be so willing to invest in it. 

Once you’ve established the value of your conferences and people trust you better, you can start charging tickets to make up for the conference operation costs. 

Trade Shows

Trade show events are exhibitions of brands within the same industry, where they can showcase their products and services and network with others. This is great for CRM brands and their alternatives or competitors.

Like user conferences, trade shows tend to be costly and are ideal if you want a quick return on investment (ROI). Still, it must be planned thoroughly; otherwise, you’ll just be burning your budget without reaching the optimum results expected. 

A valuable element to include in a trade show is a speaking session, allowing you to dedicate time to promoting your product or service to attendees. 

It must still be done tactfully, though, by not making it sound like a sales pitch. One way to do this is by inviting clients to participate in part of the presentation. This makes the benefits and the solution your brand presents more convincing. 

Ideally, a trade show consists of booths where businesses can present their branding strategy. It’s also great to offer good-quality giveaways that are related to your brand. 

Source: priceweber.com

If it’s a comic con kind of conference, offering costume giveaways is a sure way to attract attention. 

For a cybersecurity conference, a good giveaway can be a security awareness booklet. 

Don’t cheap out with the giveaways; otherwise, people will perceive your brand as low-quality. 

Additionally, a valuable goal to aim for during trade shows is to schedule one-on-one meetings with prospects. This way, you can convey brand value on a more personal level. 

You have to plan thoroughly on how to execute this, too. Most of the attendees are, again, company decision-makers, meaning they are busy individuals with tight agendas. 

Hence, you have to prepare a demand generation strategy to draw them to your booth and get them to agree on one-on-one meetings. 

Roadshows

Roadshows are about bringing the event to people rather than the other way around. These are effective for new markets, such as a brand in the cryptocurrency space or a new business solution for cold calling, like a predictive dialer.

As a roadshow is typically intended to be, these are one-day events held in several locations, usually aimed at promoting brand awareness or positioning the brand as a solution to an industry concern. 

Source: promotion1.com

Like trade shows, road shows can be budget-intensive; therefore, thorough and careful event marketing planning is vital to maximize networking opportunities. 

Added to the demand generation strategy, you must also consider logistics. 

Generally, road shows should be free to join. Brand awareness in a new market will work effectively if you gather as many potential audience members as possible, and offering free passes to the event will help achieve that goal. 

Customers doing presentations are still invaluable in these kinds of events, so you must also arrange their participation in multiple locations. 

To drive more attendees, work closely with partner brands. If you’re working in the online restaurant space, working with people who use your online food ordering system will get you more people involved. They usually have local networks they can utilize. 

Although it’s cost- and labor-intensive, when planned strategically, roadshows can generate a significant number of B2B leads, especially when a good impression is made on the minds of the audience. 

2 online B2B marketing events to choose from

Webinars

Online seminars are great for discussing business solutions. It can include a discussion, a lecture, a presentation, a demonstration, and a workshop on the brand being promoted.

You should also include a forum or a question-and-answer session to address queries and pressing concerns that might be the only thing stopping them from converting. 

This is great if you’re building additional brand revenue, such as through affiliate marketing, and offering a way to create personalized programs for your business. 

As for perks for attendees, you can offer audio or text files as giveaways, as well as access to applications. 

Live Streaming

Live streaming events are used mainly by businesses for brand awareness. An excellent platform for this type of event is Everytale, which offers chat functions combined with polls and tests. It allows for real-time interaction, which works almost like attending offline events and interacting directly with attendees.

Live streaming can also allow you to give your audience a glimpse of the company, the people behind it, and the way things work, as long as you have the correct streaming software for the job. 

B2B event marketing best practices

You can’t call an event successful simply by organizing and finishing it. Granted, the execution is a remarkable feat but it can only be called successful if the marketing goals are achieved. 

Here are some best practices to consider to reach B2B event marketing goals:

• Assemble an event-specialized team
• Launch a lead-up marketing strategy to build anticipation
• Specify and align event objectives by creating frameworks and KPIs
• Prepare high-quality giveaways related to your brand
• Schedule as many one-on-one meetings as possible
• Invite happy and satisfied clients to do presentations
• Create a post-event marketing plan, clearly defining the roles of team members, partners, and brand ambassadors
• Follow up on C-level and V-level prospects fast, ideally within the week of the event

Conclusion

When attending events, people always consider what’s in it for them, like the benefits they can get from it. Creating an event strategy that provides value and positions your brand as a thought leader in the field is a key element for a successful event. 

Again, events are resource-intensive, so they must be planned as thoroughly as possible so that no efforts and resources will go to waste. 

Always aim for one-on-one interactions, as this is the most effective way to build relationships and achieve customer retention. 

People buy from people, so it’s always a good idea to give clients a role in convincing prospects to work with your brand. 

At the end of the day, if you’re able to increase brand visibility, strengthen relationships, and produce tremendous ROI on B2B marketing events, your efforts are successful.