Marketing intelligence applied to events: a case study
2020 and 2021 will be remembered, among many other things, as revolutionary years for the events industry, since the lockdown situation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic drastically changed people’s consumption habits worldwide, and in-person events practically disappeared.
In this context, COMEX held the event “Generaxión, Hunting Opportunities", a 100% digital convention with several guest analysts who discussed economics, business, and entrepreneurship during the pandemic. In this article, we’ll talk about this success story.
Digital events during the COVID-19 pandemic
Studies have shown that events are one of the most successful tactics in sales and in the marketing mix, since among other things:
They provide a platform for building brand awareness
They serve to launch new products
They generate sales opportunities
They create engagement among existing customers
The pandemic forced work teams to migrate to digital, and in this environment, physical and virtual behavioral data combine to deliver personalized content and create good user experiences. Within the digital environment, there are also disruptive marketing strategies, but events provide a captive setting and audience: people have already invested their time and money to receive content of interest and to have networking opportunities..
Unlike an in-person event, other possible contingencies must be considered, such as ensuring that:
The event platform’s Customer Experience must be optimal and allow attendees to navigate the event portal with ease.
The server hosting the event must support the number of users connecting and be flexible enough to scale if it suddenly receives more traffic than expected, since it is possible to reach an audience 4 to 6 times larger than in a physical setting.
The registration process must be clear and error-free, with automated confirmation messages.
It is necessary to evaluate how attendees consumed the content. To measure the success of the event, the focus should be on the conversions obtained.
In the digital environment, it is both more important and easier to measure the success and ROI of an event, as will be seen later in the example of how COMEX achieved it.
COMEX Event: “Generaxión, Hunting Opportunities”
The event organized by COMEX took place in February 2021. Among the analysts were Macario Schettino, economist and columnist for El Universal; Arturo Elías Ayub, Director of Strategic Alliances and Content at América Móvil; and Marc Randolph, former CEO and founder of Netflix. Several members of PPG Comex’s executive team also participated, sharing the company’s plans and objectives.
COMEX’s goal was to continue bringing and promoting its products to more people through hybrid activation experiences, using a digital portal developed by Mints Cloud and running on the California Framework.
For the event, a Marketing Intelligence strategy was created for each crucial stage of development, starting with the registration process and ending with measuring the event’s ROI through the data generated.
Since today’s consumers have a digital expectation shaped by their experiences with other digital tools such as their smartphone, tablet, or computer, the goal was to create a good digital experience for the user at every interaction, using empathy tools and a customer-first approach. Some examples of how we maximized value for attendees include:
01. The portal was built with a strong focus on information security, since the event’s content was private. However, we ensured that the attendance confirmation and registration experience was simple and secure.
02. Real-time interactions with the audience were included throughout the conferences, ensuring their engagement from beginning to end.
03. We automated reminders of important schedules through notifications and personalized emails that always included a “virtual badge”—a secure one-click access link to the portal.
04. Customer autonomy was facilitated, meaning we allowed users to interact on their own terms. We enabled self-service resources and capabilities that identified customers and instantly recognized their interests, resulting in a personalized experience.
05. The event was extended into three phases: before the event, we built anticipation by publishing speaker bios and generating interest; during the event, in addition to the valuable content produced in the TV Azteca forums by the Comex team, real-time interactions were carried out; and after the event, On-Demand access was enabled, automated surveys were sent, and key data intelligence was obtained to determine the event’s ROI.
Data Collection and Analysis of the Event
The success of an event cannot be determined solely by the fact that it took place without setbacks (that should be a given). Only by analyzing the historical data from one or several events can we obtain clear references and information that allow us to find opportunities and facilitate decision-making.
To implement a data strategy, it is essential to follow these five steps:
1. Establish the foundations of data governance, addressing questions such as:
2. Define criteria for measuring engagement. This refers to understanding the type of activity, context, and level of interaction with which someone has participated. Measurement criteria can be optimized or modified year after year.
3. Define value. Understand what each type of attendee values—for example, attendees may value content quality more, while speakers may value audience impact; stakeholders will appreciate the growth of the event, and exhibitors will value new business prospects. These values are crossed with engagement. For instance, event growth is related to registrations, content quality can be measured through satisfaction surveys or attendee participation, etc.
4. Create a connection between platforms, systems, and technologies that work in parallel to provide the best possible experience. It is important to know where the information comes from to improve the Customer Journey.
5. Optimize future events. By implementing a data strategy in your event, you can maximize its impact with each iteration of the same event, or apply the learnings to similar events.
In conclusion...
Through Marketing Intelligence, events become more successful—not only because they take place as planned, but because we can progressively obtain a more complete customer profile through the capture, storage, and analysis of the characteristics and learnings from each interaction in their journey.
This information allows us to generate personalized experiences, building close and lasting relationships, just as COMEX achieved with its digital event. If you want to hold a successful event like they did, don’t hesitate to follow their strategic example.