Promoting your event and working within your available budget is certainly a challenge. We know that it often feels as if the things that will really make an impact are too far out of reach from a budget perspective, or that the promotions you are running for your event are throwing out too wide a net and not necessarily converting into ticket sales.
There are a few things you can do to make the most of your marketing budget, of course.
First up, track your efforts. You might find that you're spending on avenues that aren’t yielding the right results. Rather nip them in the bud before you throw more funds down the drain. But be sure to try different things and test, though. Trying something once and saying it doesn’t work won’t do much good. Rather try something in different ways, with differing marketing messages, etc. This will give you a clearer idea of what works over time.
Want to know which metrics are the most important to pay attention to? Read this.
Look to diversify. Never (and we do mean Never) focus your efforts on just one channel. Of course, there’s no use in marketing through channels that you’ve thoroughly tried, tested and tracked and know will have no impact for your event specifically.
Make use of existing networks. We’re not saying don’t do any wide-net marketing. You should absolutely still do this (remember the thing we just mentioned about diversifying? Yeah, that.) But you should ensure you make the most of groups, channels and networks that you already have in place.
Chances are there are a bunch of people involved in the running of your event that are as invested in its success as you are. As well as friends and family who will support you to no end and only want you to succeed. In addition, there are always endless amounts of people willing to help promote an event - well, when given an incentive.
The latest feature on Quicket allows you to do just that - incentivise groups of people to promote your event.
With just the click of a few buttons, you can instantly create what we call Promoter Networks. These allow you to invite anyone to promote your event. In exchange for every ticket sale that they bring in, they earn commission. The percentage of this commission will be set by you and be deducted from your tickets sales on Quicket. So you don’t even have to manage payment to your promoters.
Create multiple promoter networks for a single event, with each network having multiple people in it. That way, you can set different commission amounts for different groups, while tracking the success of each group.
You also have the option to have a specific public promoter network. This will allow anyone, even someone who’s simply buying a ticket from you, to market your event in exchange for a financial incentive. A good base is to have your more targeted and well-known networks offered a higher commission percentage but set them to private and have a second, lower commission, public network available to help extend the reach of your event even further.
For private networks where people are invited to join as a promoter, they receive an email with a link. After clicking through, they simply need to access their Quicket account (or will be prompted to create one if they don’t have one yet, and add their banking details to join). They then need only use their unique link to promote your event - the rest is taken care of by Quicket!
Once people are promoting your event, you’ll be able to keep track of how well they’re doing.
This is specifically useful for influencers that you’ve approached or people you’re offering something to in exchange for their promotion. It allows you to see how they’re actually affecting your ticket sales.
On a network level, you’ll be able to see:
- How many promoters are in each network
- How much traffic they have driven to your ticket sales page
- The value of ticket sales they’ve brought in
- How much commission you’ve paid to your network
- What you’ve made from that network
For more info on how to use promoter networks, check out our knowledgebase article here.
Nina is the Marketing Manager for Quicket and is passionate about growing a community of event organisers into one that is empowered to create incredible experiences. An event organiser herself, she’s also worked across brand marketing, social media, and in the non-profit world. She’s a burner (AfrikaBurn) at heart, an avid baker, loves a good hug, and cooking dinner for friends over a glass of good wine.