Top 3 tips for boosting international audience attendance at your next event

By Christina Adesina, founder and CEO of The SellFluent Group Audience Development is simple. It’s all about finding new strategies to attract and retain a diverse crowd on a large scale to an event. Successful audience development plans involve a range of marketing tools such as research, publicity, communication and customer relationship management. For conferences and events operating in Asia Pacific, targeting delegates from Europe can be quite challenging, which is why I have mapped out three key ways to you can boost audience attendance at your next event. 1. Make Sure Your Data Stays Current The goal is to make sure you are hitting the right target audience with qualified up to date data. In the B2B world there is constant change and people are more likely to change jobs, be promoted to new positions and transfer industries on a regular basis. Therefore, constant contact and qualifications of leads is still required via telemarketing. Digital marketing on its own is not enough. If you have an opportunity to meet with potential attendees’ face to face and grab their business card make sure you add them to your database immediately. 2. The Programme Content Needs To Be Above Average Your speakers are the ultimate gravitas to your event. Who is headlining? What valuable piece of information can they share? They are your magnets. Get your top speakers booked in advance they can help boost attendees early on in your campaign. B2B conferences can be very boring at times – it is like being in a lecture room with delegates dropping off to sleep one by one around you. TED talks showcase exceptional ways in which to engage and give thought provoking presentations to the audience, just watch their top 20 inspiring talks. 3. Personalisation Help attendees personalise the event to meet their needs. For example, dividing your programme sessions into streams allows attendees to pick and choose which sessions holds the most value for them. The top reason for people attending a B2B conference is the networking. One of the best ways to do this is to take advantage of digital tools and use clever meeting apps. With meeting apps attendees can now organise 1-2-1 meetings at your event with other attendees in advance. This personalise service will set you apart from the competition. There are many more ways to boost audience participation and evolving technology has given B2B marketers the capabilities to interact and reach a larger audience than ever before.