Your guide to profitable client events
Your guide to profitable client events
Sara Iannacone · 2/20/2023
Client events are used to create valuable in person interaction between your staff and customers through conferences, networking dinners, and other experiences. If you aren’t leveraging client events as part of your sales and marketing strategy, you may be forfeiting valuable relationship building and revenue opportunities.
Events, at their core, are about creating connections. Connections that span beyond the walls of your office or the Zoom screen. For that reason, 97% of marketers think in person events are critical to their strategy, with 41% classifying them as their most important tool. So, we’re not surprised that recently our clients have been planning events for not only their teams but their clients too.
Client events can be an incredible opportunity to let your customers know that you appreciate them, cultivate stronger relationships at every stage of the sales process, and even a great way to add another revenue generator as a whole. The demand for events doesn’t seem to be slowing in the wake of COVID-19 restrictions easing, with the industry expected to reach $1,552.9 Billion by 2028.
For many companies who haven’t planned a client event for sales or marketing purposes before, it can feel a bit like you’re navigating stormy seas on a cloudy day—rocky, overwhelming, and almost impossible to do alone. So today, we’re giving you the guidance you need to master your strategy for sales events and marketing events you can produce to drive impact for your company.
Common types of client events
The first thing to understand about profitable customer events is what types of events you can actually produce. While the only limit is your own creativity, these are some of the most popular types of client events for revenue-generating functions:
Conferences
You’ve probably heard of Dreamforce, Salesforce’s annual conference that every client pines to attend. This is a perfect example of a viral sales and marketing event.
You can invite your entire client base or offer an exclusive micro-conference for just your VIP buyers. This type of event lends itself to offering all of the following events in one, in reality. Networking, experiential marketing, education, mastermind retreats—they can all play a role in your client conference.
One thing to consider is that client conferences can be offered in a few different formats:
Ticketed, paid
Ticketed, free
Invite-only
Networking events
Networking events are a great way to add events to your sales and marketing strategy. Typically, a networking event should pair an experience or educational factor with the actual networking. Think about it as a built-in icebreaker!
Here are a few ideas our team has helped clients plan:
Wine pairing dinners
Quarterly themed parties
Speed networking events
Cooking or cocktail classes
Lunch and learns
Mastermind groups
Experiential marketing events
Marketing events are all about the likes these days. An experiential marketing event is an event where you create a world of activations that not only engage and excite clients but also have a backdrop perfect for a viral TikTok to be born.
This is an incredible format for a new product launch! Display it in a way that totally immerses your clients and watch as the impact rolls out through engagement and increased revenue.
Client retreats
Client retreats can be a one-day experience or multi-day experiences. Many global corporations will host their top buyers for a getaway that may include activities like high-level business strategy sessions, wining and dining, and relationship-building events.
How to ensure your client events are profitable
When you’re investing in sales events or marketing events, you want to ensure that the money you’re spending is going to produce ROI for your company. Whether that’s in the form of more meaningful connections or more revenue to bolster your bottom line is up to you. The important thing to remember is that profitability could mean a few different things when it comes to client events.
Here are a few examples of what a “profitable client event” could mean:
You literally make money off of the event in the form of sponsorship or ticket sales. The P&L is in the green!
You generate X number of new leads that will ultimately lead to an estimated 25% additional sales for an upcoming quarter.
The sales for your recently launched product are up 110% due to purchase orders placed at your experiential marketing event, where product demos were featured.
A VIP client invited a colleague who you’ve been trying to gain access to, and you had the opportunity to meet with them one-on-one to start building a sales relationship.
Look at your company’s strategic goals for the year. Then, determine which goals could be supported by the addition of customer events.
Conceptualize client/customer event ideas
The first step towards profitability is determining what kind of client event you’ll host. Is the goal relationship-building? Host a retreat. If it’s sales, host a VIP product launch event. Determine how it will fit into your larger sales and marketing strategy.
Create your client event budget
Once you’ve decided on the type of event you’re going to host, it’s time to get serious about the numbers.
This one step right here is your biggest hurdle when you are planning your client event. Before you put anything out into the world, you have to understand your expenses so you can make sure it’ll be profitable.
Fill out our budget template and get a per-person cost for the event. If your goal is event revenue, you’ll then be able to easily distinguish how much your ticket cost should be and what they need to sell for. Or, if your goal is to fuel your funnel for future sales, you’ll be able to ensure that your margin there is solid.
Set KPIs and an ROI strategy
Setting KPIs for client events is similar to internal events. You must examine what you’re looking to achieve before you decide to plan.
A few things you could measure would be:
Lead count
Revenue
Number of client attendees
This should be closely monitored throughout the planning process to ensure that goals are being met throughout! It’s a lot of work. But the reward, if the events are planned effectively, are worth it.
Remember, you don’t have to plan your client events solo
One of the greatest ways to make your company’s client events profitable is to skip the solo planning and hire a professional. Here are just a few of the many reasons why:
Third-party event planners are professional negotiators
Just as you may be the best sales closer in your specific niche and industry, third-party event planners literally spend their days negotiating contracts across the nation. They know where they can shave a few hundred or thousand off your audio-visual bill. There’s no fooling them when it comes to fees and labor minimums. And they are the pros at ensuring that there are clauses in your contracts that protect you in worst-case scenarios.
Third-party event planners understand industry best practices & trends
When you work with a third-party planner, you’re automatically gaining exclusive access to their wealth of knowledge in the events world. They live and breathe event activations, trending activities, the latest and greatest in food and beverage, and they likely have an incredibly creative mind that can help you set trends in your industry, too. Use their expertise to get your clients talking about just how trendy and flawless your event was!
Planners handle logistics so you can maximize your content
If you’re managing speakers, marketing design, and planning the nitty-gritty details, you’re going to get overwhelmed quickly. By hiring a third-party planner, you can take your foot off the gas pedal when it comes to contracts, hiring, timelines, sourcing, etc., to focus on cultivating the most impactful content and event for your clients.
Start planning your first customer event today
Want to start leveraging offsite client events as a part of your sales and marketing strategy? Explore our client event planning services and schedule a call to chat with a client event planning expert.
