The Benefits of Collaborative Marketing
The benefits of collaborative marketing, meeting others face-to-face is one of the best ways to help extend your business and explore new avenues. The thought of planning your own event can be a little daunting, but it doesn’t have to be. With over 13 years of experience in hosting bespoke networking events, we’ve got the know-how to help to take the stress away. Through sponsoring one of our high-calibre networking events, you can reap the advantages of hosting your own without a lot of the hassle and cost.
One main benefit of networking events is that they can undoubtedly useful for growing your business, raising awareness for your brand and improving your career prospects. Not only this but by being the host or sponsor you’ll take the driving seat of expanding your network and strengthening your business relationships all in one. There’s networking event for every occasion, such as guest speakers to endorse your event, product launches, say thanks to clients, showcase of service or a new office opening to name a few.
Hosting a memorable networking event is all down to the details. A good place to start is to have a purpose, ask yourself what it is that you would like to achieve, and then build a strategy around this. Once this is in place, you can apply this to the guest list a mixture of clients and prospects. This is where you’ll need to think about who you want to meet and the benefit this can bring to your business. Having control and exclusivity over the guest list means you can combine client services and business development.
Next on the checklist is the location of the event. This is absolutely essential, as you’ll want it to be easily accessible for attendees, and central locations are absolutely the best fit for this. We find that a professional venue boasting a fantastic networking atmosphere will set the tone of the event and can be a good talking point to break the ice among attendees.
Once you have the location in mind, you can start thinking about the theme, and the logistics of the theme. A great example of this is our most recent event – the “Movers and Shakers” Summertime cocktail tasting event. This evening went down a storm, with mixologists taking centre stage to break the ice, shake up networking and get attendees talking. The location for the event, Hotel Du Vin made the perfect backdrop, with the roof open to let the sunshine in added to the atmosphere.
Once your plans are coming together and bookings are confirmed, it’s time for your guests to be invited. It’s a good idea to take the time to send out personalised invites to your guests, to add a personal touch and build rapport with attendees. With the formalities out the way, this allows them to be comfortable on arrival and get the networking off to a smooth start. We find that providing a friendly point of contact for guests to communicate is a fantastic way of filling up a room that’s just brimming with business potential. After your event it is essential that you follow-up after, to receive feedback of your event and to build on future opportunities.
If you’d like to find out more about sponsoring one of our events, get in touch with one of the team on: 0121 355 8092 or email info@edge-creative.com.
