2017 Event Marketing: Social, Visual, Data-Focused

Event professionals can look forward to some exciting new marketing trends in 2017--especially in the social, digital and data arenas--as recently highlighted in both an EventManagerBlog survey and a post by MarketingTango, the marketing blog for brands like PIP and Sir Speedy. Data, with a social twist, remains key, with many event professionals reporting to EventMB that they saw an increase in the amount and quality of data available through social media in 2016--data that can be used to improve retargeting and create better multi-channel campaigns in 2017. MarketingTango points out that tighter targeting of the right VIPs and digital influencers will allow marketers to ride their social media coattails to higher Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram traffic and maximize social data ROI. Underlying social media's growth as an event tool is its ability to boost engagement and professional connectivity. Certainly, per EventMB's survey, using contests and giveaways for posting or tagging in social media is a big trend with exhibitors, who not only reap booth traffic but free marketing buzz as people tag and share. MarketingTango likewise notes the growing use of a "digital social wall" to engage attendees in real-time and harness the power of hashtags to own conversations. Social media also offers more ways to connect, and EventMB's surveyed event pros reported increased use of Snapchat and Snapchat geolocation filters to meet and connect as well as use of guest-generated pop-up events such as Twitter meetups. Event marketers further stressed that today's attendees want websites and landing pages that are easy-to-use, faster and more concise, preferring bullets and visuals over wordy pages. Image-based platforms are winning more followers, and many event pros forecast growing popularity for video in event invitations and advertisements, virtual reality experiences to sell venues, etc. For more, go to http://www.acculistusa.com/2017-event-marketing-social-visual-data-focused/

Marketers Miss Personalization Edge of Social Data

Marketers are missing out on key opportunities to use social media data for multichannel personalization, reports Adweek magazine's SocialTimes blog, citing the "2016 Yesmail Channel Report." This is despite the fact that personalization has proven its value in response and conversion across channels. For example, marketers often fail to gather e-mail addresses, one of the most basic contact points, through social media. According to the report, 45% of marketers don't collect e-mail addresses on social media, and 70% don't collect e-mail from their own mobile apps. (Of course, an amazing 17% don't even collect e-mail via their own websites!) Even companies who build e-mail databases fail to then use freely collected social data points, such as demographic and location information, to effectively personalize e-mail communications. In fact, only 42% say they customize e-mail campaigns with the recipient's name, so it's no surprise that only 36% modify copy and just 34% alter images to personalize e-mail content. The problem stretches across channels: Only 50% say they modify any marketing materials based on easily collected demographic data from social channels, and just 36% use social media data, such as brand page likes, for personalized targeting. See the full article at http://www.adweek.com/socialtimes/report-retailers-missing-cross-channel-personalization-opportunity/632710