How to promote your world-stage experiential event

Published: September 2022

Success equals effort

With the amount of effort and investment going into World Stage Events, from the back office to arranging food vendors, to booking acts that are representative of the region’s culture, it’s important to make sure the public really knows about it.

Whether it’s a small artisan food market for local suppliers, or a multi-faceted showcase for thousands of people on Trafalgar Square, letting as many people know about your event, campaign, activation or experience is paramount to its success.

We've compiled some tips for you about available methods to help promote your experience and it can really pay to think outside the box.

1. Encourage your performers and vendors to promote the experience

Your vendors and performers will likely already have their own followings, with no doubt many of them already active on social media. This is a good tool to leverage for your event, so encourage them to push their presence through their channels.

Your vendors all want the event to be a success, so maybe present an incentive for them to post to their followers, such as a small prize to the store that gets the most social ‘shares’ for example. You’ll be surprised at how powerful this can be.

You can make things easier by providing them with the creatives, essentially taking the thinking process off their shoulders. This way you can maintain some control over the branding too. Try composing some pre-written social posts such as tweets, creating images that can be easily shared by them on their own social pages and quotes for them to post.

The whole experience is a partnership between you as the organisers and your vendors, so work as a team and you can achieve great things.

2. Do the same - but with your attendees

There are no better advocates for an experiential event than those that are there already enjoying it. By integrating incentives for your attendees to promote your event, you can be tapping into the powers of the crowds to great effect.

A great example of how this can be done is to run a competition for attendees, where to enter they must share something from the event on social media. This is a double-win, as you’re getting people to interact and also promote it for you.

You might be surprised at how many followers some of your attendees have and you never know what celebrities might come through those gates.

3. Behind-the-scenes and live content

Behind the scenes, content is growing in popularity with online audiences as it gives a glimpse into the event beyond what is available to the public eye.

With the introduction of Facebook Live and Instagram stories, live content can be in the hands of potential customers instantly. This is extremely powerful for those at the event as it builds affinity, but importantly this plays on the FOMO of those who aren’t there yet.

Behind-the-scenes content can include interviews with vendors, shots of backstage and activities in preparation just to name a few. This sort of coverage makes people feel part of the action beyond what is available to those that aren’t in the know, which can be very powerful in getting them to come along to the event. Try it.

4. Find a PR-worthy angle

What is it about your event that is unique or that a journalist might want to cover? If something doesn’t come to mind straight away, speak with your vendors to see if they have any ideas for things they’ve been wanting to try.

If you can help them make it happen at your event, then the press will want to know about it and you are more likely to get coverage. For example, the world’s largest pancake, world record chilli-eating competition, London’s highest poppadom tower… you get the idea.

5. Connect with influencers

Influencer marketing is hot on the lips of most online marketers at the moment, and for good reason. Influencers have built up followings based on their niche and in many cases, can provide an unrivalled link between your brand and your potential customer base.

Events work exactly the same, with influencers’ followers looking for inspiration on what to do and where to go. An influencer can act as a fantastically effective marketing channel for your event.

It can be a time-consuming and costly exercise to bring an influencer with the right target audience on board but it can work wonders for getting your event in front of a certain type of consumer.

Want to go the extra mile? Have a look at our top 7 tips to delivering an awesome event blog, and tie all these little nuggets of advice together.