Elevate Your Marketing Plan with Event Sponsorships
Successfully marketing a cannabis business can be challenging. However, there are opportunities for cannabis companies to get their brand out there and gain buzz about their business. One of those marketing opportunities is events and sponsorships.
Although they can be involved, these events may also be highly beneficial for your team. They afford you the chance to connect with your customers face-to-face, gain new leads, and build valuable relationships. In this blog, Cannabis360 offers tips on how you can get the most out of your marketing capabilities by participating in event sponsorships.
Choose the Right Event
Attending sponsorship events will only be useful to your cannabis company provided they attract the appropriate audience. Locating the right kind of event will require some research on your part. You can identify these events by speaking with cannabis interest groups and similar organizations to learn about upcoming activities.
Some marketers mistakenly believe attending any event can be helpful for brand awareness, but this may not always be the case, especially in a sensitive industry like cannabis. Being strategic about the events you participate in may be more beneficial in the long run. We recommend outlining your business goals beforehand and selecting the events most equipped to help you accomplish them.
Monitor Impact in the Beginning
On the flip side, partaking in too many events can exhaust your budget, not to mention your personnel. To avoid this situation, attend a local event as a spectator to get a better feel for how they operate first. This can help you decipher which events are best suited to your objectives.
Once you begin attending events as a featured brand, it is important to measure the impact on your business. Gauge your overall presence, including the number of business cards you handed out, contacts you made, and how many new clients you obtained. As vital as having goals are before participating in sponsorship events, neglecting to have tools to track the benefits of the activity for your marketing needs can result in a significant waste of time, money, and effort.
Think Outside the Booth
While booths allow you to establish a piece of real estate at a sponsorship event, they are not always necessary, especially when you first start attending. Leading up to the sponsorship, think of some creative ways you can get potential customers excited about your business. Having a plan in mind can be the difference between a successful event and one where your brand gets lost in the shuffle.
Invest in Quality Promotional Gear
At event sponsorships, view everything as a representation of your business, including any promotional products. If the items you offer do not align with your offerings or provide attendees some value, they are likely to end up in the trash and leave possibly leave prospects with an adverse image of your business.
For instance, you may be inclined to pass out t-shirts, as this is a common promotional item for events. While they can be advantageous for spreading awareness, something more related to the cannabis industry might be even better, such as rolling papers, grinders, and other accessories with your brand’s name on them. Whatever you do decide to bring, verify that it meets the event’s guidelines and safety measures.
Utilize Social Media
The purpose of attending events is to better connect with customers. Leveraging social media can be a quick way to let your audience know which event you are attending and at what time. Social media also provides you with another tool for measuring your impact at events — the hashtag. Track engagement by posting fun content while at the event or creating a hashtag. If the event already has an established hashtag, consider using it to reach a broader audience.
Effective Marketing Solutions with Cannabis360
Navigating the world of marketing can be tricky for a cannabis company. Fortunately, Cannabis360 specializes in creating strategic solutions to help you make your business known. As a full-service marketing agency, our capabilities allow us to employ a wide range of proven marketing techniques. For more information about our services, please contact us today at Cannabis360.
References
https://www.leafly.com/news/industry/how-to-market-your-cannabis-business-part-5-events-sponsorships
https://altethos.com/how-the-cannabis-industry-is-finding-success-in-experiential-marketing/
