Online Events
If you do an online or offline event correctly, you can do a great deal to help to establish a reputation that leads to sales and contacts later.
Online events allow you the opportunity to get a message onto a page in a "virtual plaza" or other place. Such pages are often called "booths".
The best events have other opportunities scheduled, such as conference calls or chat rooms where you get a spotlight, or where your business can be featured in other ways.
Events are a great way to get your face and a quick business message in front of a large number of people at one time. You can reach potentially thousands from a single effort. That is pretty amazing. And every single person who visits your page does so because they are interested in being there - this can lead them to your website, or to items listed directly on the booth page.
Online events are not quite so powerful as offline events for long term exposure, but they still have a lot of ability to put your face, your name, and a message in front of people in a way that associates them together in their minds.
You can gain one of two things from an event:
Sales. Sometimes we go to an event to sell things. We set up a quickie shopping cart, and cash in on impulse buys. This works well for a range of businesses.
Exposure. For service or large item retailers, you rarely make a sale at an event. You make contacts instead. You build relationships and create a presence. It is just as powerful as making sales on the spot, even though you may not see those results for a long time. The full effects of an event for a service business may occur over years.
Be prepared. If you have products, you need to showcase them well. If you have a service business, then you need to make an impression effectively, through demonstrations, information, and interaction.
One of the keys to successful event participation is to give them something to remember you by. For an online event, this can be a download, an article, a little freebie, a discount, or any other thing that they can feel they have taken away with them.
Be friendly and not pushy. Be a real person. Find a way to connect with the people as much as you can - be more concerned with that than with selling if you have a service business. Enjoy the interaction, and people are more likely to respond to you.
Leave them with a good memory if you can, and with something tangible. If you manage that, you'll reap the benefits for years beyond what you think they'll ever remember.
Written by Laura Wheeler
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