Study: Roughly 20% Of B2B Marketers Can Tie Revenue To Live Events

Published: March 8, 2018

Hosting live events are growing in importance for B2B professionals, but according to a new report from Certain and Heinz Marketing, attributing event spend to revenue generation is a difficult task. The report showed that, of the one in four companies that spend 25% to 50% of their marketing budget on hosting events, fewer than 20% can make that direct tie to revenue.

With live events, the two most important objectives for B2B professionals are to increase brand awareness and maximize pipeline, according to the 2018 State of B2B Event Marketing Report. The findings show that as they struggle to tie performance-based metrics to event outcomes, 60% of respondents are confident in their ability to boost brand awareness but less confident in their ability to maximize pipeline creation, the number of event attendees and sales qualified leads.

The report also revealed that marketers struggle to find effective technologies and resources to plan and manage events. When asked to rate the effectiveness, only 25% ranked their mixes of technologies and resources as effective, while a majority ranked them as not effective. It also highlighted the most-used tools identified by B2B marketers for event planning and managing, including:

  • CRM platforms (close to 70%);
  • Marketing automation platforms (slightly over 60%);
  • Event mobile apps (slightly over 30%);
  • Event automation platforms (approximately 25%); and
  • Event management agencies (close to 20%).

While CRM and marketing automation platforms reigned supreme, 70% of B2B professionals found the effectiveness of each tool to be lacking.

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Other key insights from the report include:

  • Close to 90% of respondents highlighted email marketing as the most effective pre-event channel;
  • More than 50% of B2B professionals cited social hashtags are the most effective day-of event marketing tactics, following by personalized emails (~45%); and
  • Just over 80% of respondents noted email marketing as the most effective post-event marketing tactic.

For more information on the state of B2B event marketing, access the report here.  

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