Branding a Live Event? 3 Essential Things You Need to Remember!
Do live events form part of your marketing strategy?
Experiential marketing – taking a brand into a live environment like a conference, exhibition or trade show is one of the most powerful communication channels available to your business.
Live events present a unique opportunity to engage with an audience face to face, and establish relationships that are far more personal than those you can develop in digital space. And because live events are memorable experiences that engage all the senses, they’re a great way to generate awareness and build brand recognition.
But when it comes to branding, live events are not without their challenges. While managing branding on ‘static’ marketing collateral like your website, brochures or business cards is relatively straightforward, it’s very different when you take your brand into a live, dynamic, multi-dimensional environment.
It’s an area we have a lot of experience in at Deep, and we’ve learned that there are 3 particularly important things to remember when branding collateral for use at live events.
1. Be consistent
Events can call for a wide range of branded materials including;
- Display stands
- Graphic panels
- Banners & posters
- Signage
- Brochures, leaflets & other literature
- Merchandise & giveaways
- Clothing & uniforms
- Vehicles
This list only scratches the surface, but it illustrates the variation of materials that may be required.
The point is that you’re very likely to need to use a range of specialist suppliers – and all of them will be using different processes to reproduce your branding, introducing the potential for variations in the way your branding appears across different media.
Avoid this possibility by having your designer act as a filter, liaising with suppliers, coordinating all elements, and recommending adjustments where necessary.
2.Retain brand integrity
It’s highly unlikely that your brand guidelines will anticipate every branding opportunity that an event may present. Where for example should your logo go on a staff t-shirt? How should it be reproduced on decorative balloons, or on the tins of mints you’re giving away?
These might sound like minor points, but it will be important to work closely with your designer, who as the guardian of your brand can help advise you and make recommendations.
Live events can also require you to exercise discretion about how and where your brand is displayed. The marketing world is full of unfortunate tales of brands that have associated or aligned themselves with other brands or products that are simply not appropriate. Giveaways, competition prizes, guest speakers – all these things (and plenty more besides) need to be very carefully considered to ensure they are totally compatible with your brand values.
3.Design for your environment
No two events are the same, so all aspects of design need to be tailored exactly to the environment you have to brand.
Getting a handle on scale, and putting yourself in the position of your audience is crucial. A graphic panel, banner or poster may look great on your desktop, or even in your office, but how will it look to someone in the back row of a conference, or across a hall at a busy trade show?
Think also about the background against which your collateral will have to work. Live events are busy, with many distractions; will yours stand out? Images used on graphic panels should be big, bold, and have strongly contrasting colour tones, while any text should be brief, impactful and as large as possible. It’s remarkable how many businesses make the mistake of producing event graphics with text that can only be read close up.
Consider too how graphics are to be illuminated. Does the venue have a powerful lighting system that will ‘wash out’ your graphics rendering them virtually invisible, or are you tucked away in a dark corner where your audience will strain their eyes? Often, the best option will be to have your own lighting solution so that you can control how key areas are lit yourself.
Finally, you need to take account of the fact that reproducing your logo and images in large format will require high quality, high resolution artwork – grainy, pixilated graphics look unprofessional and will reflect badly on your brand. A good designer will make sure that images and artwork are prepared to give the very best quality reproduction at the size they are being used.
Can we help you go live & get closer?
If you really need to make an impression, there’s no more effective way to deliver a message than face to face; but events bring unique challenges, and planning and implementing a flawless live experience requires meticulous attention to detail which can consume valuable time and resources.
We can support you with all aspects of your next experiential event. Whether you’re planning an exhibition, a conference, sales meeting, roadshow, travel incentive, press event, product launch, team building event or a corporate party, we can help you turn a creative concept into an unforgettable live event – and whatever the format or venue, we’ll help make sure your branding stands out and looks exactly as it should!
Contact us now to discuss your project. Call us on 07801 192552 or email us at hello@deep-mc.co.uk.
