Ever thought about running a live event but just don't know where to start?
Luck for you, we've pinned down internet marketing expert and live event genius Rich Brooks to share his top tips.
Rich organises and runs The Agents of Change Digital Marketing Conference and speaks on stage in front of local and national audiences… so he certainly knows his stuff!
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As someone who sells products online, why run live events?
- I think the number one reason is that it's difficult.
- A lot of people want to just run their business behind closed doors because it’s easy.
- Putting on a live event is a lot of work, and because it’s a lot of work your competitors are not going to be doing it.
How do you decide on the target audience for your event?
- For me personally, I have an event here in Portland Maine and we sell a virtual pass for the live stream so there is no reason I wouldn’t advertise it to a global audience.
- In the case where you aren’t doing a live stream, I think that you would probably want to go more local.
- You need to decide what kind of event you are going to have before you can decide what kind of audience to target.
What outcome do you want from your event?
- For me, it’s always been about breaking even, rather than making loads of money.
- My hope is that I have raised mine and my company profile to such a degree that people will call me or my company to do digital marketing for them.
- It's about brand awareness and exposure.
How do you attract people to attend the event?
- I would say that two thirds of the attendees come from our mailing lists.
- The other third comes from Facebook advertising.
- I would say that two thirds of our attendees have already bought from us before. We get a lot of repeat customers.
What steps do you take to get people to attend the event?
- We start ticket sales really early. For example if the event is in September, we'll start ticket sales in May.
- That gives us a good few months to get ticket sales confirmed and then we'll sell tickets at the event for the next year.
- To get people buying tickets nice and early we have an early bird offer with the tickets at a lower price.
- After that, each month we increase the price to create a sense of urgency which gets more people buying tickets.
How do you structure your events?
- We schedule the event at the same time each year so it's an annual thing that people come to expect.
- Our conference is our biggest project of the year!
- We have three keynotes. I do one myself and then we get two other speakers.
- The day itself is split into other sessions with marketers that I bring in.
- We don't really have a theme. I curate on the fact that I want to have a couple of big-picture keynotes and then get into the nitty-gritty.
A book that you would recommend…
Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini
What is your top success habit?
Every day I make a to-do list.
Who do you look up to?
My parents.
What are your favourite apps right now?
Waze.
Here’s the big one… who do you like more, Rob or Kennedy?
Because Kennedy's voice is so melodic I’m gonna give 51% to Kennedy.
Finally, where can folks go to find out more about you?
You can head over to theagentsofchange.com or find me on Twitter.
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