Making the most of local events is a great way for you to boost sales and market your small business.
While running your own event takes a fair amount of time, effort and creativity, attaching your marketing to a local event can make your life a great deal easier. Local events such as street fairs, festivals, outdoor concerts, and sporting can provide a great avenue to run special offers and introduce customers to your products or services.
You don’t need to have an enormous marketing budget to profit from local events, simply start small and grow. To help maximise your sales opportunities, here are in-store and online ideas that are sure to help your business stand out.
Run event themed promotions
- Don’t be scared to run an event themed marketing campaign encouraging potential customers to buy from you. It’s also an excellent way for you to align your business, service or product with some community spirit. For example, decorating your store in Fremantle Dockers colours during the Western Derby could help you reach new customers, while also creating some memorable banter with your regulars.
- Run promotions where customers that show their event tickets, or are wearing team colours, receive a special deal. For example, if you own a café offer a free drink upsize when customers show their concert tickets.
- Introduce limited edition products that align with a local event. For example, the next time Katy Perry makes an appearance, introduce a limited dessert item covered in sprinkles and fairy floss.
- Make sure your staff are aware of the campaign and share photos and video clips of them in your social media pages.
Run an online promotion
- Launch a social media campaign. Social media allows you to get creative and engage with your customers across a multitude of social media platforms. It’s also an inexpensive way to get your message across to a large audience at a minimal fee. For example, offer a free remedial massage to the funniest Instagram post your business is tagged into during HBF Run for a Reason or Chevron City to Surf.
- Think of creative ways to drive website traffic by using a special QR code and offering discounts during this period. Discounts not only serve as a ploy to attract more customers, but can result in boosting sales.
- Run a digital marketing campaign. By conducting A/B split testing for example, you can develop digital marketing campaigns to small segments of your target market, testing them against other versions and making small tweaks until you can correctly predict the desired response rate. By doing this, you no longer have to worry about your budget because every dollar you spend will actually be an investment with an expected and predictable return.
The trick is to plan ahead and revisit your marketing strategy to motivate customers to purchase your products and services. Be sure to tailor your marketing campaign to the right audience and think of things that your customers will be looking for.
Yes, local marketing takes some time to master. But don’t worry, the more you interact with your customers and community the easier it gets.
Explore the many on and off-line marketing channels and learn more about how to market your business, marketing tips, how to prepare a marketing plan and our affordable marketing workshops.
More information
Looking for more useful information on how to market your business? We have the following resources to help you:
- attend our practical Marketing your Business workshop
- read our 8 steps to marketing your business
- see our marketing and promotional strategies - including a free marketing plan template.
- learn how to find your customers online with our three easy tips
Photo credit: Tourism Western Australia
