Events plus telemarketing for sales success

Supercharge your events with a telemarketing campaign

In high value B2B sales, where decisions are complex and trust is paramount, events offer a unique and powerful way to connect with leads, nurture relationships, and showcase value. When combined with a telemarketing campaign they become an even more effective tool to overcome cynicism, scepticism, and competition.

Whether you’re attending, sponsoring, or hosting events, the use of telemarketing can ensure that your event strategy becomes a cornerstone of an effective sales process by maximising reach, fostering engagement, and driving post event conversions.

In this short article we cover the different types of events and explain why hosting your own events can be a game changer for your lead generation.

Industry trade shows and exhibitions

A great place to showcase new products, developments, network with potential clients, spend time with your industry peers, partners and tap into industry trends.

It offers great exposure, that all important face to face opportunity and you can even check out what your competitors are up to. Bringing in a personal touch with the use of telemarketing you can maximise engagement by:

Personally invite target prospects to your stand or presentation.
Follow up post event to continue conversations and cement relationships.
Gather feedback on what resonated with attendees for future improvements.

Webinars and virtual events

These are an easy, low cost way to educate and engage audiences on specific topics while showcasing your expertise. Whilst they are cost effective and scalable, virtual events often miss the personal touch. Telemarketing bridges this gap by:

Personally inviting key prospects, enhancing attendance rates.
Offering 1:1 post event calls to explore how your services can address specific attendee needs.

Networking events

Networking at business events and networking events often come with high hopes of meeting your next big client or securing that ideal partnership. However, it’s essential to manage your expectations. The true value of networking lies in building relationships, not directly selling your product or service. Think connection not conversion. We think networking is so important it has its own article.

Networking thrives on building genuine connections and by picking up the phone you can:

Prequalify attendees and set you up to ensure you meet the right people.
Form part of a structured personalised follow up to nurture the relationships made during the event.

Hosting your own events

While attending or sponsoring events has its merits, hosting your own event provides unparalleled opportunities to control the narrative, engage directly with leads, and create connection with your market.

They are good for brand awareness, generating qualified leads, nurturing existing relationships, or launching a new product/service.

Specific benefits from hosting your own events include:

Hosting your own event allows you to curate the guest list, ensuring you’re engaging with the most relevant prospects.
They give you a platform to demonstrate your knowledge and build credibility with attendees.
In-person events create an environment where trust can flourish through genuine conversations and shared experience.
By hosting, you gain access to invaluable attendee data. This helps refine your understanding of your leads and tailor follow-ups accordingly.
A well executed event leaves a lasting impression and positions your brand as a leader in your niche.
You can ultimately measure event success. Eg, number of registrations, attendance rate, leads captured, or conversions post event.

An integrated telemarketing campaign strengthens the crusade by:

Curating the guest list and ensuring key decision makers attend.
Capturing market intelligence and insights during and after the event for tailored follow ups.
Driving measurable outcomes, such as qualified leads, demos, appointments etc.

Workshops and training sessions

A calendar of regular short workshop/training sessions are a great way to offer value to current clients and new prospects alike through skill building and knowledge sharing activities.

They are a great way to position your company as a trusted advisor.
Allow prospects to come and “try” you out before committing to more indepth 1 :1 interaction.
Deepens relations with current clients and reminds and reassures them as to why they choose you.
Building them into your sales calendar can create a really powerful, scalable and repeatable cycle of activity to bring in new clients and help retain current clients.

To build the personal connection the use of telemarketing in your event campaign will:

Encourage attendance by emphasising the tangible benefits of the session.
Enable personal follow up to discuss attendees’ learning points and next steps with your business.
Build a scalable cycle of engagement that feeds your sales pipeline.

Exclusive roundtables/VIP events

These are perfect to engage key decision makers in high value discussions and build deeper connections. Depending on the services you offer they can be great way for you to act as the go to expert and connect key people in your community.

This high level networking and discussion can be made even more impactful when supported by personal phone outreach

Pre event calls can ensure attendance from key decision-makers.
Post event engagement can nurture these high value connections into long term relationships.

Product launches or demos

Any investment in allowing prospects to trial your product should always be part of the lead generation strategy. They are a great way to create a buzz and drive interest among targeted audiences, showcase new offerings and gain immediate feedback.

Telemarketing adds a personalised edge to launches and demos:

Drive attendance by articulating the unique value of your offering.
Collect immediate feedback during follow-ups to refine and optimise your approach.

Best practices for hosting successful events

With years of event and celebration planning in our team we would love to be your partner and help you build these into your lead generation strategy. But as a guide here are they steps to planning and executing successful events

- Be clear about what you want to achieve, whether it’s generating leads, nurturing existing ones, brand awareness, new launch.
- Make sure the content addresses your attendees’ pain points and positions your business as a solution.
- There are 3 key things your event campaign needs to achieve,
  - Get them to sing up – Use telemarketing to ensure your ideal audience is aware of and excited about the event.
  - Get them to show up – Confirm attendance, send reminders, and address any barriers that might prevent participation.
  - Follow up – A post event telemarketing campaign is a non-negotiable to capitalise on momentum,, capture market intelligence and insights and drive conversion.

- Engage before, during and after the event though a multi channel approach (social media, email, personalised telemarkeeting and even lumpy mail and don’t forget the personalised follow up after the event).
- Use tools for registration, event engagement (e.g live polls or Q&A), and analyse the post event activity.
- Think beyond the agenda. From venue choice to the ambiance, every detail contributes to a memorable experience which links back to your brand and reputation

Events are not stand alone activities but are integral to a broader lead generation strategy. By combining events with proactive telemarketing, your business can create a comprehensive system that builds trust, fosters relationships, and converts leads into loyal clients.

We would love to know what event strategies have worked best for your business? Alteratively we would love to discuss how telemarketing and events together can elevate your lead generation game.