Events deliver excitement-and demonstrate a commitment to serve your customers' interests and needs. That's why bookstores hold readings and book-signings. Kennels present evenings with doggie psychics and groomers.
Manufacturers offer free technical seminars for customers.
And stockbrokers lecture on the do's and don'ts of retirement planning. Yet the big bang these events can generate may also necessitate big bucks, warns event planner Dina Jacobson, owner of Eventech in California's Silicon Valley. So cost it out to know if you've got the necessary budget and if the event is worth the time and money that will be entailed. Once you know your marketing goals for an event, you can set measurable criteria for its success, such as the number of leads or customers it brings you or the volume of sales it generates. Tracking your results and comparing them against costs is the only way to know if you'd have been better off with, for example, a dollar-off coupon.