This month, the Digible crew got their hands dirty in data and strategy for Special Event campaigns for the multifamily housing industry. From 2021 and 2022, we evaluated the core platforms and best practices for marketers looking to take strategic action toward the unique audiences event opportunities provide. We dove into the multi-platform campaign data from music concerts, local seasonal festivals, university football games, and hiring events. Before we dive into performance, let’s explore why event marketing is an important and powerful tool.
It is crucial to have authentic, humanizing content to build brand awareness, loyalty, and trust with your audience. Multifamily marketers can incorporate experiential branding events to reach these target audiences. Events provide marketers the unique opportunity to build emotional connections, foster community, and a sense of belonging with their current and future residents, and in turn, resident retention. For this, we must look beyond the reach of standard PPC campaigns.
Boosted Posts For Single Day Events
Facebook Boosted Posts is an impactful strategy for onsite events such as open houses, hiring events, or onsite food truck rallies.
While standard “Boosted” posts have shown to have higher CPMs, “Event” Boosted posts are a different story- even a minimal budget can have a big impact when run in tandem with a standard campaign. In addition to lower CPM, these produce lower Site Visit Rates but receive higher Total Impressions.
These types of posts are great options for limited budgets. This food truck rally campaign received 116 responses for $52.80 in platform spending.
Geofencing for Single Day Events
Geofencing is a strong strategy for larger events with high volume attendance like football games (professional/collegiate) or music concerts. By using ad copy specific to the event, these campaigns effectively engage potential renters. The clever tagline for the campaign in the screenshot to the left establishes an emotional connection with its audience.
This concert campaign reached 428 users with $11.00 in total platform spend and received a 4.44% CTR!! (standard campaign benchmark is 0.4-0.6%).
Additionally, data from a university football game campaign in the fall of 2021 shows a CTR as high as 1.68% during the game.
Multi-Day Events
Similar to one-day events, multi-day events like food and beer festivals or seasonal carnivals present opportunities to reach new audiences receptive to brand messaging.
The creative example to the left was utilized in a 2-week festival campaign, where geofences targeted 3 main event locations in a specific neighborhood over the course of several days. This creative doesn’t include event-specific messaging like the music festival campaign, instead of relying on geotargeting alone.
Catchy phrases weren’t necessary, as you can see from the above-benchmark CTR and high impression count.
The Takeaways
Each campaign exceeded benchmark performance, proving event marketing is an effective strategy for connecting more deeply with audiences. It is clear that geofencing and boosted FB posts make great options for marketers looking to take advantage of any event, whether it be onsite or off.
96 percent of consumers who have a great experience at an event will be more inclined to purchase
Industry research has shown us that 74 percent of attendees perceive a business in a positive light after attending an event.* Even more exciting is the impact this has on purchasing behavior; 96 percent of consumers who have a great experience at an event will be more inclined to purchase. This is because event marketing facilitates renter engagement with your brand in a meaningful and multi-sensory way.
Need support with your special event campaign? Contact your Account Manager for more information.
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Written By: Kayde Pierce
Industry Reference
