The success of your event marketing is usually measured by how many
people register for an event. Even the best marketing campaigns can fail if
people don’t take the critical step of going from your promotional material to
your registration form.
Potential registrants are often left fumbling around looking for an online
registration form that should be right at their fingertips. You are likely
driving people to a registration form from a website, an email or printed
material. Each of these marketing methods has some important considerations to
keep in mind.
Linking From Your Website
Most commonly, you will direct registrants to the online registration form
through links on your website. However, not all links are created equal and some
do a better job of getting potential registrants to your online form.
- Put a link to your registration form near the top of the fist page
people see when they get to your website. Don’t leave potential registrants
hunting around because they have to click through multiple pages before
finding the link or because the link is hidden at the bottom of a page.
- Use an image such as a “Register Now” button with enough white space
surrounding it so that it stands out. If you are linking from text rather
than a button, use a different font colour and a larger font size.
- Use a call to action such as “Register Now” rather than “Click here to
register”.
- If appropriate, link to the registration form from more than one page on
your website and as a bonus include hyperlinks to the form within any body
text that refers to registration.
- Have your links open in a new window so that once registrants have
submitted the registration form they can easily return to your website.
- Check all of your links to make sure that they work, mistakes happen!
Linking From Email
If you are using email to promote your event, there are a few
practices that will help increase traffic to the registration form.
- Always include complete web addresses in your emails. If some of your
recipients use text only email they will not be able to click a text or
image link. If the complete address is provided, then anybody viewing email
in plain text can quickly copy and paste the address into a browser.
- If you are attaching a promotional brochure to your email, it’s a good
idea to still include the address to the registration form or to the event
website within the body of your email. Registrants can then go straight to
the registration form if desired. If your attachment is a pdf, make sure
that all links are clickable.
- Send yourself a test email and check all of the links before sending
your email blast.
Linking From Printed Material
Part of your event marketing may include printed material such as posters and
brochures.
- Keep addresses short so that they are easy to remember and to type into
a browser.
- If you have a website dedicated to an event, consider directing people
to that website rather than directly to the registration form. The address
for the website will likely be shorter than the address to the form.
Setting up effective links to your online registration form is
simple and can have a true impact on your registration volume.
Either express your requirements to your webmaster or contact ePly if you need help and we will be happy to show you how to create
great links or offer you feedback on what you have set up.
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