Best Practices for Event Success - Part 2
Classic purple cork relationship-building events
Our tried and true agenda for relationship-building virtual tasting events
With thousands of virtual tasting events under our belt, we’ve seen what works when it comes to planning and executing virtual relationship-building events. Here we share our best practices for event success when your goal is to bring together your go-to-market team with prospects and customers to drive relationships forward.
1. Be clear about your goals
Like any marketing program, it’s important to be clear about your goals. Imagine you host an event and only four prospects show up. Not good, right? Well, it depends on your goal. If your goal is to close one deal within two weeks of the event and a prospect who joined the call signs the next week, the event was a success! Be sure to share your goals with your team so everyone knows how you will measure success.
2. Begin planning at least 3 months in advance
While you might not think that virtual events take a lot of planning, the best events, whether virtual or in-person, are planned well in advance. For virtual events, the most important thing to nail down is your registration list, since you will need to collect physical mailing addresses for your guests.
You will also want to account for shipping time. The good news is that purple cork takes the work out of shipping your wine (or other tasting product) to your guests. We’re experts in getting it there on time and in style.
3. Pick the right tasting experience
There are lots of choices these days for tasting experiences. To decide which experience to select for best results, you can leverage a theme (Super Bowl, March Madness, etc.), a favorite winery, or pick a fun, highly exclusive vineyard like Roy Estate, which has a 2-year waitlist. We’re always happy to make recommendations based on your goals above.
Send two bottles (or tastes) so that you can have two tastings to break up the business content and any networking.
4. Use and handpick breakout rooms
When it comes to relationship-building events, breakout rooms give you an opportunity to get strategic and ensure your prospects are meeting with the best people at your company or from your customer base. Breakout rooms are a powerful way for your executives or sales people to get to know their top accounts, so don’t miss this opportunity—be thoughtful about who you put in each room.
Amanda Marx, VP Marketing at Shift7 Digital, talks all about her breakout room strategy on our Sips podcast, Episode 20.
Conversely, you might keep it random for more informal team building events.
5. Plan your show flow—keep it to one hour
60 (minutes) is the magic number for prospect and customer events. We have tried longer and shorter events. With rare exceptions, your attendance will suffer if you schedule an event for more than an hour. An hour is just the right amount of time for guests to learn something new, enjoy a drink or two and meet your team and their peers.
6. Be respectful—end on time
Related to the previous tip, while conversation might be flowing, it’s important to end your events on time or even a few minutes early. Time is a precious resource these days and people appreciate it when you respect their time and calendar.
In some cases, after the formal closing, you can keep the event link running if it feels right to keep casual chats and networking going for those who want to stay online, “after-party” style.
Over to you!
Ready to start implementing these best practices? We would love to help make your next event low-lift and wildly successful.
