This presentation helps fairs determine an online marketing game plan with an editorial calendar, improve their websites, analyze their statistics, prioritize social media including Facebook and Twitter, learn about the latest trends, maximize mobile and make money with email marketing. It also gives specific online marketing ideas.

1. INCREASING BUCKS & BUTTS:
EXPONENTIALLY GROW EVENT
REVENUE WITH ONLINE
MARKETING
KENDRA WRIGHT
AARON PEDERSON

2. MOST IMPORTANT LESSON

3. SIT BACK AND RELAX.
Give us your business card at the end of the
presentation, and we’ll send you our slides.
We’ll also enter you to win the a big TV
we’re giving at the tradeshow.
Come by our booth, and you can enter again
for the TV!

4. MARKETING YOUR EVENT
What do you spend the most money on?
How does it work for you?
Is it getting you the best results?
Is it helping you to grow?

5. RODEO HOUSTON STATISTICS
“How did you hear about the event?”
Newspaper – 2%
Rodeo Advertising – 4%
Radio – 9%
TV – 10%
Website – 46%

6. INTERNET WINS POPULARITY
CONTEST

7. MOBILE IS GOING TO WIN TOO
Source: Morgan Stanley Research

8. ARE YOU FOLLOWING THESE TRENDS?
ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS?

9. PRESENTERS
Kendra Wright Aaron Pederson
President Technical Director
• First job managing events • Leads a team of highly-
for non-profit skilled programmers
• Began building websites in
1995 for Fortune 1000 • Finds the perfect technology
company for the job
• Started own company in • A different breed of techie –
1998 speaks English!
• Brings big-company
experience to the event
industry

10. HISTORY

11. SAFFIRE CLIENTS

12. SAFFIRE ASSOCIATION PARTNERS

14. PALAMINO FEST

17. Our goal is to elevate the event industry by
enhancing its most important virtual front
door –
its online presence.

18. OUR AGENDA
Your game plan for when you get home
Prioritize how to make your website better
Statistics to watch and what to do with the info
How to prioritize social media
Tips and trends for marketing on Facebook
What to do about Twitter
The latest trends and what to do about them
Maximize your mobile presence
How to make more money with email
Tools to market your event from your event grounds
Specific online marketing ideas

19. MAKE A GAME PLAN

20. WHAT WILL YOU SAY?
1. determine your
target audiences

21. WHAT WILL YOU SAY?
2. get your team together -
make sure to include all audiences

22. WHAT WILL YOU SAY?
3. brainstorm all the reasons people come
to your event

23. WHAT WILL YOU SAY?
4. come up with topics
for all these reasons

24. WHAT WILL YOU SAY?
Two things to tell people:
1. What we want them to hear
2. What people want to hear

25. CONSIDER THE “RULE OF THIRDS”
1/3 about yourself and your brand
1/3 about things people might be interested
in that aren’t self-promotional
1/3 interact with people

26. WHERE WILL YOU SAY IT?
Website
Mobile
Email
Facebook
Twitter
YouTube
Pinterest
Blog
Flickr

27. CREATE AN EDITORIAL CALENDAR

28. YOUR WEBSITE

29. YOUR WEBSITE… YOUR PARTY

30. WHY???
It’s a medium we aren’t 100% comfortable
with
We don’t know where to start
Things are changing so fast…
It looked good a couple years ago!

31. HOW DO YOU MANAGE YOUR SITE?

32. YOUR WEB GUY

33. THE GOAL
To be the most successful
and to maintain your sanity,
you must be able to
market your event on your website in real
time.

34. THE REALITY
98% of anonymous online prospects enter a
website
looking for something…
yet still leave anonymous

35. MAKE INFO QUICK TO FIND
Don’t have more than 5-7 links in one place.
Make your information hierarchical.
Use categories and subcategories to
organize your event information.

36. MAKE IT FUN
Use photos to tell your story.
Give people features to click.

37. BONUS POINTS
Schedule the most important things ahead
of time
• Homepage features
• Any messages you know you’ll want to
promote
• Email messages (stay tuned!)

38. Besides your homepage, where do people
go on your website?
(do you know?)

39. MAKE EVENT PAGES INTERACTIVE

40. MAKE EVENT PAGES INTERACTIVE

41. MAKE EVENT PAGES INTERACTIVE

42. MAXIMIZE SOCIAL MEDIA
Facebook or Tweet your ENTIRE EVENT

43. MAXIMIZE SOCIAL MEDIA
Facebook or Tweet an EVENT FEATURE

44. MAXIMIZE SOCIAL MEDIA
Facebook or Tweet a PHOTO of an event feature

45. WHY DO ECOMMERCE?

46. ECOMMERCE=INSURANCE POLICY

47. ECOMMERCE=INCREMENTAL
REVENUE

48. DETERMINING PRICE
80/20 rule
• Approximately 80% of the tickets you sell
online will be redeemed
• Offer 20% discount
• Come out even
Free shipping or print at home
• ESPECIALLY when cheap
to ship

49. SELL MORE NOW
Make your tickets easy to find.
Have minimum clicks to get to the shopping cart.
Integrate the design of your website with the
design of your cart so that the “look” doesn’t
change at the buying moment.

50. ANALYTICS

51. GOOGLE ANALYTICS

52. GOOGLE ANALYTICS

53. 4 IMPORTANT THINGS TO WATCH
• Low visits?
site Improve SEO or
online marketing
visits of your site

54. 4 IMPORTANT THINGS TO WATCH
bounce • High bounce rate?
Improve your
rate homepage

55. 4 IMPORTANT THINGS TO WATCH
actions/ • Not enough action?
Make your website
conversion more compelling
rate (good rate: 2%)

56. OTHER PARTIES TO ATTEND
time • Low time? Add
interactivity and
on site other “stickiness”

57. OTHER PARTIES TO ATTEND

58. FACEBOOK

59. FACEBOOK
901 million monthly active users
One in every seven humans on earth is an
active Facebook user
The most important way to spend your
social networking energy
Facebook trends to know
• People use it on mobile
• People use it for photo sharing

60. FACEBOOK COVER PHOTO
 Be creative! Use this space to make big
announcements, i.e. event dates and
upcoming performers.
 Change it daily during your event to
highlight the day’s activities.
 You can’t put links on your cover photo.

61. FACEBOOK PROFILE PICTURE
 Don’t forget the profile picture!
 It will appear “solo” throughout Facebook; it
needs to be able to stand alone and represent
your brand.

62. FACEBOOK MILESTONES
 Facebook’s timeline
automatically creates
a history of your
event.
 Call out important
photos and events
by clicking the star
on a post to expand
the photo to a
widescreen view.
 You can even pin
content so it will
remain the top post
for 7 days.

63. COOL FACEBOOK
COVERS/PROFILES

64. COOL FACEBOOK
COVERS/PROFILES

65. COOL FACEBOOK COVER PHOTOS

66. TAGGING IN FACEBOOK
Take pictures of the crowd at concerts, post
them and encourage them to tag themselves
Your photo appears in
their Facebook feed!

67. TWITTER

68. POLL
How many of you have a Twitter
account for your event?
How many of you have a personal
Twitter account?

69. TWITTER
Your 2nd priority for social media
530 million accounts
340 million tweets a day
1 million accounts added to Twitter every
day

70. WHY TWEET?
Twitter is current on up-to-the minute
important news and cultural happenings.
Ramp up your publishing frequency, and
make timely content the focus of your
Twitter activities in order to satisfy
information-hungry users.

71. STEP 1: SET UP TWITTER
No more than 15 characters in Username
Example: Amador County Fair
• Too many characters: @AmadorCountyFair
• Use: @AmadorFair
• Use your real business name so search engines & customers
can find you
Include your state in your username if you need to
differentiate yourself!

72. SET UP PERSONAL ACCOUNT TOO
It’s a good place to “practice”
But be careful!
• KitchenAid debate disaster
Follow different people on personal vs.
business, so it’s obvious what account

73. AmadorFair

74. WHO TO FOLLOW IN SET UP
When you set up your account, just follow
the minimum - Industry associations &
businesses
• IAFE @IAFE
• IFEA @IFEAworld
• State/regional organization
• Saffire Events @SaffireEvents

76. STEP 2: CUSTOMIZE YOUR PAGE
Edit Profile
• Add a photo (logo)
o Get 10x more followers
• Add a bio (mission – make it fun)
o Get 8x more followers
Customize your design
• Use your website background

78. NEW! ADD A HEADER
Make a file that is1200 x 600
It will be a background behind:
• Twitter name
• Bio
• Location
• URL
Just another way to convey your brand
Upload it to Profile/Design

79. Amador header

80. STEP 3: DO A FEW RETWEETS
Retweet people you follow
• Look through your timeline
• At first, this is just to get your feet wet
• Give people a taste of what’s to come

81. STEP 4: FOLLOW SOME PEOPLE
Events similar to yours
Big events
People involved in your event
Local businesses
Just for fun
Don’t follow too many until you have tweeted
and have a branded page!

82. PEOPLE INVOLVED IN YOUR EVENT
Sponsors
Vendors
Entertainers
Volunteers
Exhibitors
Board members
Follow people on a Tuesday morning; there may be
better chance they’ll follow you back.

83. LOCAL BUSINESSES
Local businesses
• Amador (county)
• Plymouth (city)
Local press
Pilfer from those we are following & our followers!

84. FINDING MORE PEOPLE TO
FOLLOW
Who to follow – View All (based on interests)
Find friends – if you have:
• Gmail
• Yahoo
• Hotmail
• AOL
People you may know (who your friends
follow)

85. STEP 5: WRITE SOME TWEETS
It’s a chicken and the egg: people don’t
follow people without tweets, but you’ll get
better bang for buck once you have more
followers
Tweet what you think will be helpful to your
target audience
• Don’t be too self-serving

86. “ADVANCED” TWITTER MANEUVERS
Deleting tweets
Favorites (from Profile page)
Replying to tweets
• People can track “conversation”
Lists
• Create public or private
• Subscribe to others

87. WHAT TO POST
Website changes/blog posts/email articles
Testimonials
Photos/Videos
“Insider info”
News of weird/human interest stories
Contests
Questions

88. SPECIFIC IDEAS
Send opening day congrats to other fairs
Judiciously promote big sponsors for retweet
Same with vendors and entertainers
Post thanks to people/groups; they’ll repost

89. TRICKS & TIPS FOR TWEETS
For the highest click-through rates:
Tweet between 120-130 characters.
Write tweets containing “via,” “RT,” “please” and
“check.”
Post weird/human interest stories.
Tweet on the weekends.
Use: www.bufferapp.com or www.hootsuite.com to
schedule social media in advance.

90. WHAT IS THIS?
#

91. THE ART OF THE HASHTAG
A hashtag is how Twitter
users organize themselves.
People start including a
hashtag when tweeting about a topic.
It becomes easier to find that topic in search.
It is more likely to appear in Twitter’s Trending
Topics.

92. ENSURE ADOPTION OF A HASHTAG
You can't!

93. WHAT YOU CAN DO
POST it – relevant places on your
website/blog
PRINT it – event
materials, signage, scoreboards, etc.
PUBLICIZE it – Twitter feed, regularly and
consistently
Make it easy and enticing for customers to
find, adopt and promote hashtags.

94. AN OLYMPIC EXAMPLE
Hashtags preferred by Olympics:
#London2012 #Olympics #GoUSA
Hashtag used:

95. SAFFIRE’S HASHTAG ADDENDUM
Many also use hashtags to add
something parenthetical/funny at
the end of a tweet

96. JIMMY FALLON EXAMPLE
Jimmy Fallon tweets out a hashtag, and
people tweet funny responses
#FactCheck

97. STEP 7: MANAGE YOUR TWEETS

98. TAKE IT A STEP FURTHER

99. STEP 8: GO ABOUT YOUR DAY
Install Firefox extension
• While you are online reading articles, don’t
just post them; highlight text and click Buffer
icon at bottom right to tweet

100. EVEN WHEN YOU’RE MOBILE

101. STEP 9: TWEET ABOUT YOUR
PEOPLE
Now you follow “your people”
You may have even retweeted some of them
Now start writing original tweets about them
• Be ruthless: Keep track of how many followers
THEY have, and tweet about those who have
the most followers – include @ (Twitter name)!
e.g., @saffireevents
• Your goal, especially while you don’t have many
followers, is to get retweeted. So think like
people you tweet about. Hint: People tend to
retweet when you say nice things about them.

102. TWITONOMY

103. STEP 10: TWEAK & REPEAT
Check BufferApp or Twitonomy analytics.
Write down topics that had the most reach.
• Do more of those.
Write down topics that had the least reach.
• Do less of those.

104. TARGETING TRENDS

105. what is the fastest growing website of all
time?

106. PINTEREST
Pinterest was the first site to get 10 million
unique visitors in a month.
Pin event photos (and more) and invite your
customers to follow your boards!
Not your highest priority, but do it! It’s fun!

107. PINTEREST

108. PINTEREST

109. 50% of all web content is…

110. YOUTUBE
Customers exposed to videos are 437%
more likely to engage in your brand.
• Engagement = Purchases
Make your videos raw and not too produced to
help customers identify with your brand.

111. YOUTUBE
3rd in your social media priorities
4 billion videos/day viewed
800 million unique users visit YouTube each
month
44% of YouTube’s users are aged between
12 and 34

112. INSTAGRAM
Mainly for mobile
Known for image “doctoring”
Trends younger

113. TEXT MARKETING
Your customers are texting.
Consider joining the conversation.
Judiciously text deals and special
announcements.
Start offering people the opportunity to sign up for text,
even if you don’t know what you’ll do with them.

114. A QUICK REVIEW
Get a game plan!
Prioritize your website
Improve it using Kendra’s platonic “crush”
Then prioritize Facebook & Twitter
Start dabbling in the trends

115. NEXT UP
Make it mobile
Increase revenue with email
Market from your fairgrounds
Specific marketing ideas

116. MAKING IT MOBILE

117. MOBILE

118. APP OR MOBILE SITE?
0%
BlackBerry
24%
Android
46%
Apple
iPhone
30%

119. APP OR MOBILE SITE?

120. WHY MOBILE?
Customers use mobile search to shop.
• 95% of all mobile searches are for LOCAL
products and services.
• 61% of all local searches result in a
purchase.

121. THE PERFECT STORM

122. WHAT LEADS TO MOBILE
PURCHASE?

123. WHAT TO MAKE MOBILE
As much as you can!
A couple years ago, with Saffire, we debated
how much to charge for mobile.
• Answer? Zero! Because everyone needs
it!
Then we debated what info to duplicate from
the desktop site.
• Answer? Everything! Because the bar is
only getting higher for mobile!

124. MULTI-SCREEN MARKETING

125. MULTI-SCREEN MARKETING

126. MAXIMIZE THE SOFA
Really Old Days
We marketed to people on their sofas
Newspapers, TV, magazines
Fairly Old Days
We relied on inertia!
We had to get people from their sofa to their
computers to market to them online.
This was HARD!
Now
We can market to people on their sofa.
Take advantage of this marketing location!

127. MOBILE CONTENT MANAGEMENT
Update your content in real time.

128. MOBILE CONTENT MANAGEMENT
Manage information about your events.

129. MOBILE CONTENT MANAGEMENT
Edit a quick homepage message.

130. EMAIL MARKETING

131. WHAT’S COOL ABOUT EMAIL?
NOT COOL:
One of the oldest
online marketing tactics

132. WHAT’S COOL ABOUT EMAIL?
COOL:
67% of global marketers rated
email the most successful
digital marketing tactic
Source: CMO Council, May 2012

134. COMPELLING REASONS TO EMAIL
Email is the top revenue generator for many
companies (even above social media)
Email gives some of the fastest
results, often within 24 hours
Email is the most cost-effective marketing
tool

135. ANATOMY OF SUCCESSFUL EMAIL
A Big Email List
Lots Opened
Lots Clicked
$$$

136. GUIDE TO EMAIL MARKETING
MAKE A GAME CREATE A LIST WRITE THE INCLUDE GOOD USE A STRONG TRACK THE LEARN AND
PLAN OF RECIPIENTS MESSAGE IMAGERY SUBJECT LINE PERFORMANCE REPEAT

137. STEP 1: USE YOUR
EDITORIAL CALENDAR
MAKE A GAME CREATE A LIST WRITE THE INCLUDE GOOD USE A STRONG TRACK THE LEARN AND
PLAN OF RECIPIENTS MESSAGE IMAGERY SUBJECT LINE PERFORMANCE REPEAT

138. REMEMBER THIS?

139. FLESH OUT THE DETAILS
Plan for:
• How often will you say it?
• Unless you’re big, don’t publicize
schedule
• What day of the week will you say
it?
o Tuesday (try Wednesday or Friday for fun!)
• What time of day will you send it?
o Mid-morning

140. STEP 2: CREATE A LIST OF
RECIPIENTS
MAKE A GAME CREATE A LIST WRITE THE INCLUDE GOOD USE A STRONG TRACK THE LEARN AND
PLAN OF RECIPIENTS MESSAGE IMAGERY SUBJECT LINE PERFORMANCE REPEAT

141. EMAIL YOUR PEEPS
• Outlook contacts
• Board of directors
• Volunteers
• Sponsors
• Exhibitors
• Past purchasers
• Etc.

142. EMAIL SIGNUPS ON EVERY PAGE

143. GET ADDRESSES ONGOING
Online
• On every webpage
• When people share an event photo
• When they complete an online form
• On Facebook, offer Like and email signup
• On Twitter, promote by teasing pending
campaign
Offline
• Door prize or signup at events
• Any time they purchase something

144. STEP 3: WRITE THE MESSAGE
MAKE A GAME CREATE A LIST WRITE THE INCLUDE GOOD USE A STRONG TRACK THE LEARN AND
PLAN OF RECIPIENTS MESSAGE IMAGERY SUBJECT LINE PERFORMANCE REPEAT

145. WRITE THE MESSAGE
Use ideas from your brainstorming/calendar
Consider a “pyramid” approach
• One main story
• Two smaller features
• Then you can test one against others

146. EMAIL ARTICLES: THE FORMULA
Headline
Image
Text (short, with links)
Call to action
• Consider “Click here to enter now!”

147. WHAT WILL WE SAY?
Don’t tell the whole story.
Goal: CLICKS!

148. STEP 4: INCLUDE GOOD IMAGERY
MAKE A GAME CREATE A LIST WRITE THE INCLUDE GOOD USE A STRONG TRACK THE LEARN AND
PLAN OF RECIPIENTS MESSAGE IMAGERY SUBJECT LINE PERFORMANCE REPEAT

149. WHAT MAKES A GOOD IMAGE?
The best email images are the ones that
make people click!
Use zoom/cropping
Use photos of people looking at the camera

150. STEP 5: USE A STRONG SUBJECT
LINE
MAKE A GAME CREATE A LIST WRITE THE INCLUDE GOOD USE A STRONG TRACK THE LEARN AND
PLAN OF RECIPIENTS MESSAGE IMAGERY SUBJECT LINE PERFORMANCE REPEAT

151. STEP 5: USE A STRONG SUBJECT
LINE
Good content and images
lead to CLICKS…
But a good subject line
(sent at right time)
leads to OPENS!

152. WHAT MAKES A GOOD SUBJECT
LINE?
Include something recognizable
Use action words
Not too spammy
50 characters or less
• Turn into Tweet, with 120 characters, # and
shortened URL
• Turn into Facebook, with 150
characters, graphic and no #

153. STEP 6: TRACK THE
PERFORMANCE
MAKE A GAME CREATE A LIST WRITE THE INCLUDE GOOD USE A STRONG TRACK THE LEARN AND
PLAN OF RECIPIENTS MESSAGE IMAGERY SUBJECT LINE PERFORMANCE REPEAT

154. TRACK THE PERFORMANCE
Kendra’s Law:
If you’re not measuring marketing,
you’re not marketing!

155. WHAT TO TRACK
Per email
• Open rate
• Click-through rate (CTR)
• Response rate – web visits, revenue
Over time
• House file size
• Churn (percentage who leave your list)
• Cost/email
• Revenue/email

156. SAMPLE OPEN RATES
Varies by client
• 9-15% on low end
• 30-35% on high end
Who has the highest open rate?
• Good subject line
• Clients who sell online
• Clients with a strong brand
• Sent at right time/day (Tuesday mid-
morning)

157. SAMPLE CLICK RATES
Not as much variance
• Around 10-20%
Depends on call to action, so use action words
• Get More Info!
• Sign Up!
• Buy Now!
• More Photos!
Again, don’t tell the whole story!

158. STEP 7: LEARN AND REPEAT
MAKE A GAME CREATE A LIST WRITE THE INCLUDE GOOD USE A STRONG TRACK THE LEARN AND
PLAN OF RECIPIENTS MESSAGE IMAGERY SUBJECT LINE PERFORMANCE REPEAT

159. Specific Online Marketing Ideas

160. DEEP THOUGHT…
Ask questions that get people
to talk about themselves in relation to your
event

161. GRAB THEIR ATTENTION
• Consider funny – tweets from mascot, etc.
• Personal/human interest stories get a lot of
hits
• Posts with photos get more views!
Think about what
YOUR AUDIENCE
would want to click!

162. MAKE PEOPLE FEEL LIKE INSIDERS
• Be the first to know about X via social
media!
• See behind-the-scenes looks at our event!
Your customers feel special,
and they are more likely to be long-term
followers.

163. MULTIMEDIA
• Photo contests on website and Facebook
• Caption that photo
• Funny video upload
Photos and video are
naturally VIRAL and give you more event
photos!

164. GET PEOPLE TALKING
Show live tweets on concert side screens
Have a vote or quiz
• Answer on text, app, QR code, etc.

165. CONTESTS WITH PUBLICITY BONUS
Have a contest for front row concert seats
• Text, tweet or post on FB page NOW =
publicity
Do giveaways with charitable tie-in
Allow groups to get $ for their orgs for
advance sales; host trip for winners

166. CONTESTS WITH PUBLICITY BONUS
Do giveaways with charitable tie-in
Allow groups to get $ for their orgs for
advance sales; host trip for winners

167. SATURDAY @ 9 a.m.
Hands-On Lab:
Real-Time Marketing
From Your Event

168. TO REVIEW
Create an editorial calendar
Get your website up to snuff
Get on getting a mobile website
Prioritize email, especially during your event
In this order, focus on this social media
• Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest/Instag
ram
Improve your tracking

169. FAIRS EVERYWHERE

170. FAIRS EVERYWHERE
1.
2.

171. FAIRS EVERYWHERE

172. FAIRS EVERYWHERE

173. BULLS EYE
Leave us your business card, and we’ll send:
• These slides
• The Editorial Calendar template
• A free subscription to The Dirt
• Follow us on Facebook (SaffireEvent) and
Twitter (@saffireevents)
• Ongoing webinars