The annual Entrepreneurship Fest of BITS Pilani KK Birla Goa Campus, Coalescence, has concluded its 2024 edition, leaving attendees buzzing with inspiration and fresh ideas. This year’s event brought together an impressive array of distinguished speakers, including Ankur Warikoo, visionary startup founders like Rajesh Dembla, and leading industry sponsors like Red Bull, creating a dynamic atmosphere for networking and collaboration. Participants engaged in thought-provoking discussions, shared innovative ideas, and gained invaluable insights into the entrepreneurial landscape. Let’s reflect on the highlights and key takeaways from this transformative event.
The fest opened with compelling talks from Ankur Warikoo and Aakash Anand, setting a high-energy tone. Warikoo shared his entrepreneurial mindset, emphasizing resilience and adaptability. His personal anecdotes about turning failures into lessons resonated deeply with the audience. Anand followed with his candid reflections on his journey in the beauty industry, offering motivational insights on authenticity in business.
As participants continue to apply the lessons learned from these sessions, the Coalescence Fest remains a pivotal platform for aspiring entrepreneurs, fostering connections and igniting innovative ideas in the community.
Day 2 began with a representative from the Unit Trust of India, who shed light on the world of mutual funds and shared effective strategies for improving personal finance. A standout moment from Day 2 was the panel discussion, where Prasanna Subramaniam, CTO of Fly91; Saurabh Bothra, founder of Habuild; and Mohit Bhandari, The founder and CEO of Stratzy shared their personal journeys of building startups. The audience’s questions fueled a lively discussion about emerging market trends and future opportunities.
Keynote speakers Rajesh Dembla and Vijender Chauhan rounded out the day with thought-provoking presentations. Dembla shared the philosophy behind his brand, Zoozle, emphasizing the importance of authenticity and purpose in business. Meanwhile, Chauhan delved into the implications of social media and AI on our decision-making processes, offering practical tips on how to navigate these digital influences.
The day concluded with a vibrant networking night, where attendees forged connections and explored potential partnerships, leaving a lasting impression.
On the final day, participants delved deeper into personal finance with a representative from the Unit Trust of India and engaged in competitive events, including a business case study competition, a stock pitching contest and a venture capitalist simulation. These activities fostered collaboration and strategic thinking.
As the day wrapped up, the campus came alive with a lively jamming session, where students showcased their musical talents in an atmosphere of camaraderie. This celebration of connections made throughout the fest blended learning and creativity, leaving everyone with lasting memories and new found inspiration.
As the Coalescence Entrepreneurship Fest concluded, it significantly impacted all attendees. Over three dynamic days, participants engaged with industry leaders, honed their skills through competitions, and forged valuable connections, fostering a vibrant community of aspiring entrepreneurs. The festival ignited innovative ideas and empowered attendees to confidently embrace their journeys, ensuring the spirit of collaboration and entrepreneurship thrives within the BITS Pilani community.
It’s difficult to dismiss the value of sales events, no matter what sector you’re in or what niche you’re in. Knowing how to manage a sales event benefits businesses in various ways, including brand expansion, increased consumer numbers, and more sales.
Running a successful sales event, on the other hand, isn’t as easy as putting on a discount and calling it a day. There are numerous ways to execute a successful sales event—and even more ways to fail.
Things to Remember Before You Market Your Sales Event
Not every sale necessitates the addition of frills. You don’t need an international holiday as a reason to provide customers discounts, gifts, or other tempting incentives. Consider the tactics we mentioned with the year’s greatest sales and ask yourself, “Why to limit these to a one-time thing?”
You can take elements of sales and promotions and apply them to your daily operations.
You can’t just give discounts every day, of course. Not sales-worthy ones, at least, because discounts have benefits and drawbacks. However, there are several big-event strategies worth adopting on a more regular basis.
As you create your event marketing approach, keep the following three points in mind:
Hooks: Your hook must attract your audience’s attention. A good hook should be short, captivating, and emotional.
Use a Catchy Title as a Hook
Offers: Once you’ve sparked a customer’s attention, make an attractive offer that sets you apart from the competition. If your offer is identical to that of five other dealerships in the region, there’s little reason for a buyer to choose your event.
Unbelievable offers
Call to Action: Finally, a clear call to action should always be included via direct mail or a Google ad. What happens next? It shouldn’t just be about showing up to your event. Set up a landing page for them to sign up for a free, guaranteed appointment at your event. Add a QR code to the mailer to request a rapid RSVP. Make sure the action is simple to comprehend and execute.
How to Run a Succesful Sales Event?
Step 1: Begin Spreading The Word
Whether or not a store runs a promotion, getting the word out is crucial to growing sales. One of the most effective ways is to become more active on social media. It allows you to maintain constant contact with your audience and customers. You can use it to distribute information, advertise items, or build your brand.
Naturally, it includes tools that some clients may find indispensable. For instance, live chat can be used to answer client questions.
Getting prominent people engaged on a large scale is another wonderful method to generate buzz. Working with influencers is one of the most current techniques brands have used. This isn’t just about models posting photos from their vacations; every business has its own set of speciality influencers.
Simply use networks like LinkedIn to seek your niche or sector. See who’s generating a lot of talks or who’s establishing themselves as a well-known and trustworthy voice. Then simply contact them to see if they want to collaborate.
Try to use what major brands do with sales for your marketing efforts. Take, for example, Prime Day. Amazon didn’t need to run discounts because it was far before Prime Day. However, their promotion of Prime Day helped make it an event that customers worldwide anticipate.
Amazon Prime Day Sale
Step 2: More Than Just Your Sales Team Should Be Prepared
You’ll put a lot of emphasis on your sales team when preparing an end-of-year sales event. You’ll want to make sure that everyone on your sales staff is ready to go, from training on how to work the floor on the day of the event to presenting a choice of offers and bargains to clinch a sale.
Unfortunately, this is frequently where the team’s planning ends. To put on an event that will truly inspire long-term loyalty, you’ll need every single team member to be ready to provide the best possible customer service.
Your service department is a wonderful place to start. While an end-of-year sales event may primarily focus on clearing out goods, it is also an excellent time to promote your service centre. Make additional promotional offers to your service personnel, and encourage clients to schedule future services on the day of the event.
Step 3: Highlight Your Brand
Some companies become famous for their sales, but you don’t have to follow in their footsteps. Begin to appreciate what makes your brand unique. Although a sale or campaign may pique your interest in spreading the news about your company, you may maintain your enthusiasm long after the offer has gone.
You can see what your clients are interested in through sales. Discounts and free gifts are nice, but despite the sales components, you’ll be able to tell what’s selling and what isn’t. You won’t just send one email advertising a discount. Therefore the marketing you utilize during the promotions should reflect that.
Check out what your customers are talking about, whether it’s after your huge sale or one from the competition. Take all you can from these sales and use it for your brand outside of savings.
For example, you started using a colourful colour palette and GIF animated features in your marketing campaigns to promote a sales event. Throughout your four email campaigns, you stayed on this topic. You may have noticed that employing interactive components like vibrant CTAs generates a lot more interaction and a higher CTR than typical.
This type of interaction allows you to adjust, change, or double down on your brand. Regardless of discounts or promotions, your brand might be your most powerful instrument.
Step 4: Organize A Memorable Event
The industry standard is to host an end-of-year sales event. But it doesn’t mean your event has to be identical to last year’s or to those of your competitors.
Concentrate on how you can make your event stand out. Because you know your consumers and neighbourhood best, this won’t look the same for every dealership.
Don’t know where to begin? Use these suggestions as a jumping-off point for brainstorming with your team on what will make your event memorable:
Join forces with a local charity. For example, you may hold an adoption event and collect funds for the local Humane Society.
Local food trucks should be invited.
Contact a local driving school to host a young driver safety course.
The possibilities are infinite. The idea is to arrange an event that is more than just a sales event. You want to establish your dealership in the community and develop long-term client loyalty.
Step 5: Planning Techniques That Work
Even with the best promotions, time can pass by too rapidly at times. Don’t lose heart if the rug is pulled from under your feet and you miss a nice window for a sales event; instead, appreciate solid planning.
Create content or social media calendar, even if it seems like extra work on the pile. This will make future promotion initiatives much easier to implement.
Social Media Calendar
They can assist you in avoiding being taken off guard by structuring your efforts before they even start. It’s also worth remembering that promotions and sales events may always be rehashed unless they’re highly time-sensitive.
Step 6: Customer Interaction
Above all else, the most important lesson to learn from any promotion is how to interact with your customers. This includes clear messaging and excellent customer service and knowing what your customers appreciate and respond to.
Observing what your consumers like about your big sales can provide essential insight into how to run your company daily.
For example, a campaign may offer free delivery during a huge sale, and customers respond positively. Previously, clients who placed large orders were not eligible for free shipping.
A store’s sales could skyrocket during a free delivery campaign. This suggests that providing free shipping on large transactions could help prevent concerns such as cart abandonment.
Other large sales, of course, can teach us the same things. Examine what prior Black Friday sales or Prime Day sales did successfully from customers’ perspectives.
Consider what else you can get from them outside deals and discounts that your clients would desire, need, and enjoy.
Step 7: Pre-event Marketing
These are what stores refer to as ‘open secrets’ promotions. The ‘hush, wink wink’ type will be shared with store subscribers and marketing receivers.
They frequently present themselves as the wise choice. They’re the sale before the sale,’ following the adage that “the early bird gets the worm.”
Naturally, there are plenty of worms in the ground before, during, and after these promotions—a fact that the proverbial birds are well aware of.
They do, however, evoke a sensation of anticipation. During sales-heavy seasons like the holidays, they give shoppers the feeling of grabbing up a terrific deal and striking the ground running.
They do, however, evoke a sensation of anticipation. During sales-heavy seasons like the holidays, they give shoppers the feeling of grabbing up a terrific deal and striking the ground running.
Using clever segmentation and targeting your VIP clients is a terrific method to create and cater to this excitement. You can demonstrate to them that you believe they are entitled to see your big sale first.
This is normally a terrific way to start a sale off right, but it’s even better when you give them an incentive to participate.
Step 8: Discount Levels
Discounting is an art, and it requires judicious use of a discount pricing approach. This is especially true when employing tiered discounts.
The cliche “you can never have too much of a good thing” holds with tiered discounts. Tiered discounts can make the savings so good that some things are almost free by delivering larger discounts to larger amounts of purchased products.
For example, a retailer may offer an additional 10% off each product purchased. After purchasing 11, the first product’s full price is reduced with this reduction in mind.
Customers may see it as free while paying a high price to get there. Tiered discounts encourage customers to buy more and spend more by emphasizing the concept of ‘purchasing more saves more.’ Merchants should, of course, experiment with their tiered discounts.
Small reductions after large orders may not be enough to entice customers. Customers are more likely to place large orders when large discounts are offered.
On the other hand, some stores and items operate better with this than others.
Comparative Study of a Sales Event Case Study
Challenge
Every strategy counts in the competitive market for data storage solutions. The field marketing team at this organisation intended to start Q1 with a novel push to fill their sales force’s pipeline from coast to coast.
The Idea
Kapow worked with Nike to produce 35 unique running shoe events for customers and prospects in major cities across the United States and Canada 10 days before the New Year. The hook aimed to appeal to the New Year’s Resolution mindset by encouraging prospects to “start the year off well.” In less than a month, Kapow completed all of the events.
The Event
The event was made possible thanks to Kapow’s collaborations with national retailers like Nike and Road Runner. The data storage company was able to focus on the advertising, driving event attendance, and connecting with their guests by having a single point of contact to handle estimates, availability, and other logistical issues.
Participants were given a gift card to spend on a pair of running shoes. The shoes, Christmas party food, and New Year’s resolutions all served as excellent icebreakers for guests and hosts alike.
The Results
Despite the short notice, the Multi-Event event proved to be one of the most well-attended and well-received events in the company’s history.
Conclusion
Organizing a successful sales event is not a cakewalk. It takes a lot of planning, arrangements, smart decisions, and careful observation of your client base. But it is also an excellent way of marketing and garnering more loyal customers under your belt. Keep the above tips in mind, and your next sales event is sure to be successful.
FAQs
What is the best way to earn more sales in an event?
Organize the event such that it becomes memorable, market your event on social media, be unique, and research before hosting the event.
How do I prepare for a sales event?
Plan the event in advance, Take inspiration from big companies, prepare your sales team, and do a test run before the actual event.
What is a sales event?
A sales event is an event where companies sell their products at lower prices than usual.
Event planning is a cool job to have but hard to execute and make a living out of it. The event planning business is a grey area that only a limited number of experts know in and out. There are five basic skills you need as an event planner. You don’t have to go to a specific school, follow a specific course or education on event planning. One gains event planning education through experience and actual projects. Planning can be quite needy and hard at times, and that’s where real-life experiences help.
An event planner who makes money out of selling events is no less than an entrepreneur. It’s different and a bit harder than working as an event planner on the payroll for a company that pays a set salary every month. Either way, you need to gain experience and basic knowledge. Networking is the most effective strategy for event planners to find new clients with a significant share attained through social media.
You need to know about planning. Though it’s obvious by the name, several event planners are not able to plan. As an event planner, you have strict deadlines and you should hit those deadlines earlier rather than later. A lot of event planners think they can delay a bit but that’s equal to inviting the client’s wrath. Those event planners who tend to procrastinate should know that their procrastination will lead to difficulties. So, you need to plan well not just for yourself but also for your team and clients.
Listen to Your Clients
A lot of people go into the event planning business with their perception of what a good party or event looks like. You should bring in your ideas but in the end, your client needs to be happy with your services while you cater to their needs. If your client comes to you and says, “Oh, I want a balloon themed party, ‘ and you bluntly disagree with the idea, it means you are not listening to the client. A client’s requirement has to be met; after all, you’re being paid for meeting certain expectations. Add your creativity while adhering to the customer’s core requirements, and listen to your clients. The event is meant for the customer and he or she needs to be happy.
Manage Your Finances
You need to be good with finances. A lot of event planners don’t know about managing money. As an event planner, you work with a tight budget. It’s good to be cool and awesome while planning the event but don’t go overboard with the budget. You always need to have an emergency fund to bank on if things go awry.
For example, if you order a cake and the baker doesn’t show up, you need to have some extra money to order an alternative. If you do not have basic financial skills, work on them immediately. Your clients will be not fond of your service if they are forced to spend more than their budget.
Be Prepared for Everything
Creativity is the secret sauce. Through creativity, event planners can find solutions on the spot when everyone else is flipping out. As an event planner, you often troubleshoot when least expected, even though you assume everything is planned well. Your clients can turn the course of the entire event in five minutes before and you have to be creative to solve such issues.
What if the caterer turns up late? You arrange for quick bites. If there are electricity problems, the generator you had as backup comes to the rescue. The scenarios are innumerable, you may not be able to prepare for all of them. However, even a small attempt at mitigating the effects goes a long way.
Learn to Handle Criticism
One of the most important skills you need is having nerves of steel. As an event planner, you organize the entire event and also lead the way for others. You need to be strong enough to handle client criticism.
You need to be disciplined to ensure your team does what is to be done and they are not slacking off. If something goes wrong, you bear the brunt as the lead. You need to have nerves of steel to tackle situations when you or your team members get stressed out due to unforeseen circumstances.
A lot of event planners start to buckle under stress. That’s when events go wrong, learn to handle criticism. Learn to keep calm in the midst of the storm because everyone looks up to you to make the event a success.
Research About Event Planning
Now on to the business side of being an event planner. So go and research how many planners are in your area, what do they work on, and the potential clients in the area. If you live in an area people don’t have money to hire an event planner, you will only sit at home and be frustrated. After all, people won’t be able to afford your services.
If you want to be a freelance event planner or a workforce member, you need to do your research first. When it comes to finding potential clients. figure out if you want to work b2b so business to business or b2c (business to customer).
Get Experience
Finally, you have all of your event planning skills in your pocket – you know your target group, your market, how many event planners are there in your area, and potential clients. However, it only matters when you have real-time experience. If you don’t have event planning experience, start by organizing small parties and events for friends. Do such events for free or for a small fee and then start using their references for your portfolio. Ensure you get enough footage like pictures and videos of the party you organized because that’s going to build your first portfolio item which you can then show to paying clients.
If you have no event planning experience, start helping out here and there. If you can get an internship, grab it. You can learn a lot from an event planner that’s been in the business for a long time. Sometimes you start two to three months ahead and there is a lot of turning wheels you need to keep an eye on.
Do your homework, make sure your basic event planning and organization skills are up to the mark before you start setting events. Otherwise, bad reviews are inevitable and that’s not good for your business.
Choose Your Specialization
It’s better to specialize in a certain type of event. For instance, you may plan a kids’ party. But if you are not into kids and have an “it’s another job” mindset, it will never be as amazing as planning a press event or a company party that you’re passionate about. You may initially take up all kinds of events in the beginning, but there will be a time when you’ll have to specialize.
To make sure there are enough events for you to sell, it’s a good idea to specialize in a certain type of event. You can be a wedding planner, kids party planner, company event planner, or press event planner. If you have public relations experience, you could easily cross over into PR events. There are so many events like hen parties, and bachelor parties, you can even plan funerals.
Specializing in an event sets you off from the crowd and it will help you sell that event without too much competition. Figure out if there is anyone that is doing the same type of event that you want to specialize in.
Get a Website
You need to get yourself a website, you need to start posting the reviews you get from friends, smaller jobs, or employers. Add photos, videos and other graphics that reflect the assignments you have taken up. People need visuals to rate an event planner.
Documenting every step of the way is a good idea to get your event planning business off the ground. Create a workflow that fits you. Make sure your workflow has your clients face minimal or no stress. The same goes for you. Your workflow needs to be smooth, it should be a template to quick-start planning events.
Conclusion
Planning an event is a very big responsibility, everything depends on you and how you follow all the steps to make the event a success. Those who are venturing into event planning for the first time, need to research and be aware of how to plan properly, through this only one can become a good event planner.
FAQs
Which is the first event management company in India?
Touchwood entertainment is the first listed event management company in India.
What makes a person the best event planner?
An event planner has to be organised, must have a keen eye, and have good observing sense.
How much do event planners make?
An average Event Planner with 4 to 9 years of experience makes INR 4 Lakhs a year.
