I recently taught a workshop for marketers about metrics and using them to inform your marketing programs. The topic that seemed to most pique their interest was the section on event metrics. Not a huge surprise, given those events (tradeshows, conferences, customer events, etc.) is typically a huge line item in any brand marketing budget.
There are, however, very few metrics available to measure events. As one attendee said, it’s usually only “How many attendees did we have?” and “Did they have fun?” Hardly solid metrics – especially when these events can add up to hundreds of thousands of dollars for many companies!
Over the years, I’ve developed my own set of metrics to determine the success of each event. I’ve also used these metrics to compare events over the course of a year to determine which ones we should keep and which ones need to axed from next year’s budget. These metrics all hinge on a concept called “Impact” that I will explain in next week’s column.
Jenn