5 Ways to Use an Event to Showcase Your Product
One of the biggest benefits brought by increased digitalization is the growth in opportunities allowing firms to go direct to consumers. This increase in tools and consumer options has had a profound impact on businesses and the event industry. No longer do firms need to wait until a trade show or exhibition takes place, they can go directly to their buyers, wherever they are.
Online events are one of the best ways to do this. Online events and virtual experiences are excellent opportunities for firms to develop relationships and build trust with their consumers in a personal way. By producing an online event, you have the chance to showcase your strengths and promote new products, in real-time. For many companies, developing online events and experiences for their customers has become an integral component to their marketing outreach. Creating an online event or experience doesn’t need to be a headache or overly complicated. Here are five examples of online experiences you can build to help convey your authenticity as a brand and reach your customers wherever they are.
1- Online trade show booth
The first example involves simply building an experience for an online trade show. Many exhibitions and fairs are moving forward as hybrid concepts. But you can create an online trade show booth to accompany your in-person appearance, no matter if the show has a digital component. Even if you will be joining in person, it’s important to not neglect your brand’s digital booth. This space should include a well-curated collection of rich, visual and personal media that helps personalize your brand and showcase your products in their best light. You can combine several different formats, for example, videos or downloadable worksheets, or fact documents. These should be tailored specifically towards your event attendance goals, so be sure to define these in advance, such as growing leads or sharing information. Working with an agency or on your own, it’s important to create a strong visual experience that captures your audience and holds their attention. These media productions can be used long after the trade show is over, and live on in your social media or website.
2- Webinar
Regular webinars are another great opportunity for you to connect with interested prospective buyers and fans. Here, options are virtually limitless when it comes to what you can produce. Importantly, your productions should be personal, and provide a chance for your viewers to connect directly with your team during the presentation. Webinars are best used to convey information or expertise, but can also serve as a vehicle to introduce new products or features. By including opportunities for engagement, you can begin to connect directly with your audience and answer their questions in real-time. By planning your webinars on a regular schedule, it makes barriers to connecting much lower, and also serves to showcase the personalities and human face of the brand.
3- Live stream demo
One creative way for brands to begin building online experiences for their prospective buyers and fans is to hold a live stream demonstration of their products or services. These livestream presentations are best when they are highly interactive, allowing viewers to ask specific questions about a product’s qualities or features. In a live stream demonstration, the host can tailor the presentation to showcase exactly what the attending viewers are more interested in learning about. By developing a regular schedule of live demonstrations, you can be available when and where your viewers are most interested in learning about your products. After the demonstration, you can share these demos on your website or social media, so that they can live on after the presentation (here’s a good example).
Live Demonstrations with the opportunity to engage in Q&A can be a great way to address prospective buyers’ questions, as well as to learn more about what your intended buyers are looking for in your products. It’s an opportunity to begin building relationships with your community, as well as for learning more about your customer and client needs. These demonstrations can be highly interactive, and provide valuable insight that can help influence future design and product directions.
4- Open house
Virtual open houses are a great way to showcase your brand’s authenticity and transparency. By bringing your audience inside, you help create a special experience that also serves to bring a human face to your product. A virtual “Open House” can provide an insider experience for your brand that helps to build a strong relationship. You can incorporate many different digital elements with your open house experience, from live stream demonstrations to discussions with your product designers and brand leaders. These insider experiences are valuable opportunities to build trust– which in many cases is not possible outside a digital environment. This is where you can use technology to your advantage– to create a special engagement for your brand’s top clients or for those you are wishing to convert.
There are many different ways to facilitate and produce a virtual open house. You can utilize an event platform, or you could make the experience immersive, bringing in live cameras or fully re-creating your facility in a virtual world. The opportunities are endless and allow your team to use their creative flair.
Here’s a great example to get you inspired, and to illustrate how flexible this format is.
5- Landing page with media pieces available on demand
Last but not least, when it comes to virtual experiences, and touchpoints for your customer, don’t forget your website. Your web presence is often your business’s front door to your customer, and here, you can create experiences available on demand– to capture their attention and begin building a relationship right away.
There are many different types of media that you can consider utilizing to build your digital experiences, but they can incorporate some of the elements that I’ve discussed earlier– including product demonstrations, open house concepts, or discussions and interviews. But the opportunities here again are only limited by your creativity. There are examples that include You could create a metaverse showroom as in this example, or build in different gamification elements by using AI chatbots or live videos to personalize the experience for your website visitors. The media that you add to your website should be tailored to fit the goals of your campaign. Identify these in advance, whether it is to build trust, to humanize your product, or to lower barriers when it comes to building relationships to make a sale or to simply inform and educate, your in-demand media should be consistent and coherent, aligned to achieve your overall goals.
In Conclusion
Ready to get started? Creating online experiences is key to connecting with your customer and a growing requirement in today’s digital world… Thankfully, the barriers are lower than ever. You don’t need to start with putting on a huge consumer event of your own that takes days to produce. You can begin small and test out several different concepts to see what resonates with your audience the most. And more importantly, get creative! Don’t look at these digital options as an insurmountable barrier. It’s truly an opportunity to create something that delivers results, like never before.
Written by:
Frederic Bleck
PIRATEx Head of New Business
