The other night, I had been invited to a short notice presentation of a rather new cinema as a channel for our marketing messages. As this coincided with a larger project I am working on, I registered my colleague and myself for the presentation and was already considering ways that would be useful to our purposes.
The next day, I received an email confirming the presentation had to be rescheduled to a later date as the chosen date coincided with the Marketing of the Year awards…hm. Nonetheless, we would be able to come and see the place, watch a movie, and ask questions. As the presentation was rescheduled to January (!), we decided to go anyway.
4 people were there, plus 2 from their team. I was able to voice why we had come, hoping to get a bit of personalized attention afterwards (the project went live the next day, and will have it’s first major happening in 3 weeks), but the presentation itself was very short – it basically introduced the eventmanager and her new flyer – and we then were invited to watch the “very good movie: Surrogates”. At the end of the movie however, there was noone left…
So what went well, and what didn’t go so well?
- You do not invite people to a presentation by letter if the presentation is 4 days away
- Before choosing the day, you double-check to make sure it doesn’t just suit you – you make sure it suits the people you’re inviting
- If you invite people, make sure to get the most out of it, don’t expect people to voice why they’re interested (I was the only one that did), make sure to help your potentials find a reason to care about you
- If you invite people to stay longer, make sure you stay even longer!
- If you want new customers for your communication channels, tell them what they are!
- Follow-up the next day, show you care, don’t just cancel the event out..
However:
- I was able to “experience the experience”, and I enjoyed it
- I was able to have a look at existing channels within the place, in a as neutral way as possible
- All in all, it was actually a light and enjoyable work experience for me, and I will this week follow up on it…
So I guess it did work out for them, and I have not yet been able to conclude whether or not it could have tended more severely to any other directio
