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Lisa Shepherd

appropriate image of your company (I once attended a seminar
for an accounting firm in a log cabin, it was bizarre). They can
also be held at the site of your clients, prospects, or influencers.
They’re particularly popular at consulting engineering firms.

Host on a Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday morning. July,
August, and December are usually bad times because people
are on holidays. January and February may present difficult
weather depending on your region. Conversely, March through
April and September through November can be very busy with
trade shows and other events.

Create a microsite to promote the event. Do this if your
event is open. If the event is closed (i.e. for employees of
just one company, such as a lunch and learn at a consulting
engineering firm) you do not need a microsite. A microsite
allows you to easily promote the event through all outgoing
communications (email signatures, newsletters, email
campaigns, etc).

Promote the event. For open events, post the event on your
homepage, send out invitations to your current customers and
full prospects database, hand out invitations at events up to
a month ahead of time, tweet about it, include it in your email
signature, distribute a press release to editors of relevant
publications, and post it to online sites (such as Chambers of
Commerce). Be creative in spreading the word.

Make registration easy. Use a service like EventBrite (www.
eventbrite.com) to make registering for the event hassle free.

If you’re using the event as a lead generation tool and are
hosting it independently, don’t charge a fee. Only 50% of your
registrants will show up on the day of the event, but if you’re
hoping to attract potential customers, you’ll do better in the
end if you don’t charge people to attend.

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© 2012 Lisa Shepherd