Email Marketing Simplified 2015 Captures Worldwide Attendee Interest by Going Virtual with vFairs

Highlights 

Smart Simple Marketing leveraged the virtual space for maximized output and global audience engagement with vFairs. The global event marketing event allowed them to gather more than a thousand attendees in one place – virtually. The highlights of the event were the exhibit hall and webinars. 

The B2B marketing event attracted SMEs and startup CEOs to connect with attendees through virtual exhibit booths. The vFairs platform facilitated the client in setting up live and recorded webinars that were attended by thousands and 100% of the event attendees watched and learned from the webinars. 

The Challenge 

A digital marketing agency called Smart Simple Marketing approached vFairs to host a B2B marketing event. The event would let SME entrepreneurs and start-up CEOs share information, services, and prospective client needs assessments. They wanted to encourage sales, improve KPIs, and discuss the latest strategies surfacing in the marketing industry. 

Key attractions included guest speakers, networking opportunities and knowledge sharing. Email Marketing Simplified 2015 focused on maximizing attendance, minimizing costs, and promoting exhibitor expertise to important leads with high potential of sales conversions. No pressure, right? Well, just a bit.

The Two Options

1. Traditional In-person Formal

The traditional approach available to host this event was adopting the physical venue-based strategy. Halls had to be booked, logistics coordinated, guest speakers flown in, money invested into set up and branding, administrative and staffing arrangements, printing, printing distribution materials, and of course the uncertainty of the volume of attendees to be expected had to be faced. 

With a target audience from around the world, there is no precise way to be sure of a headcount. So, as a host you have to be equally ready to accommodate fifty guests, or an entire stampede of marketing enthusiasts that may appear out of thin air. There’s never a confirmed answer to the mystery. 

1. Tech-forward Virtual Event

The second option for the host was to take the virtual route. With evolving technological capabilities, increasingly busy work schedules of the targeted business clients, and the need to organize this event over a three-day span to not overwhelm attendees with knowledge. 

Virtual events provided a very flexible and dynamic environment to promote the brand and gain access to prospective/existing clients. This removed the need to allocate budgets to a physical venue and set up expenses. Instead, allowing more focused spending to ensure the ROI was worth every dollar spent.

Guest speakers could communicate with guests through webinars, answer queries in live Q&A sessions, and in fact secure audience engagement in a more personalized way. Thus, pursuing this option was a more liberating strategy to adopt considering the budget limitations, requirement to accomplish an extensive geographic outreach, and of course, the need to attract and capture new business.

The Solution

After detailed consultations with the team at vFairs, Email Marketing Simplified 2015 was pursued using the virtual strategy by hosting an online event from the 10th-12th of November. 

Going virtual for the B2B email marketing event was a big decision, but one that had a fruitful result. Features of the vFairs platform allowed a global reach, provided the ability to collect and organize event statistics and data, and offered engaging tools like live webinars with moderated Q&A sessions.

Exhibit Booths

With the message no longer being restricted to a room full of people, the echoes of the right email marketing strategy impact, necessity, and benefits were delivered to the right audience at an impressive scale. 

The Exhibit Hall comprised nine independent booths; content marketing agencies had a live chat schedule that allowed chat contact without need to stand in lines, or suffer from the stress of losing leads because of the high volume of attendees. 

Clearly marked tabs for content, service portfolio, and company overviews also made the sharing of information very simple without the staff having to monotonously repeat the details as new clients visited. Moreover, the client’s reach was now boundless. As there were no capacity limitations, thus no need to worry about overcrowded venues and reservation expenses, and definitely no fighting for attention in long lines.

Insightful Webinars 

One of the strongest attractions of this event was webinars from renowned experts from the email marketing domain. Both pre-recorded and live webinars were hosted. A proof of the successful engagement achieved was 100% of the attendees saw the webinars in their entirety.  

The convenience of being able to log in and join the webinar regardless of location or schedule really helped the audience in deriving most value from the event. 

Furthermore, it allowed them to watch replays later online even when the event had ended. Speakers and guests were able to communicate and brainstorm in the moderated chat rooms so all interactions remained focused and provided powerful learning opportunities for all.

Effective Lead Management 

The era of paper based forms is synonymous with the Stone Age and all valuable data is governed by emails, texts and databases now. The host was provided customized registration forms designed to match their exact requirements. This allowed them to generate reports with leads names, contact details, company name, etc. 

All information necessary to cultivate new relationships and pitch marketing solutions was collected and sorted automatically. With 1,002 registrations, you can imagine the number of trees the clients saved by eliminating the need to share printed business cards.

Mobile Compatibility 

Tech-savvy clients nowadays are always on the go, this is why vFairs is a mobile compatible platform. Your target audience can participate and interact through the device of their choice. 

Attendees could engage in learning over their lunch break, or check with the experts regarding any strategy flaws they may have. Everyone had the opportunity to readily participate in the event as long as they had access to an internet connection.

The Result

In conclusion, Email Marketing Simplified 2015 was able to get hundreds of registrations and booth visits, and a seamlessly executed virtual event. It was a great success at connecting the hosts with almost 1000 entrepreneurs, marketing managers, and other interested industry affiliates. 

With 3 days of exciting content, business leads, interactive learning, and never-before like geographic outreach, the analytics made it clear that virtual events are now surfacing as a pivotal piece of the puzzle that can fuel revenue growth for companies if leveraged the correct way.