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Ep. 99 The Missing Ingredient to Your Event Success – Event Marketing

by Torie Mathis | Smart AF Show

The Missing Ingredient to Your Event Success – Event Marketing

After 5 years of organizing local events for Miles Through Time Automotive Museum, we’ve dialed in some very successful – yet low cost – event marketing strategies for not only getting a huge buzz but also how to get a great turnout for our events.

In this episode, Torie Mathis and her cohost Sean, go over the missing piece to failed events and some easy-to-implement fixes that will have your next event a huge success.

Don’t waste time and money marketing your event.

Listen or watch the full episode below:

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION –

(transcription is auto-generated)

SAF 99

Torie: [00:00:00] It’s always like the small stuff. It’s these little teeny things that like, oh, if you just made this one little change, then so much more is going to happen. And this is one of those just small things.

Hey guys, what’s up? It’s Torie Mathis and I’m here with the one and only Sean Mathis, founder of Miles Through Time Automotive Museum.

Sean: [00:00:27] What’s going on.

Torie: [00:00:28] And in the last few years, we have done a ton of events for Miles Through Time as a way to get more people to know about the museum and where some have been a lot more successful than others.

I think we have really learned a lot in the last few years about running events for your baby. Yeah, it’s a lot of work. Yeah. So it is a lot of work, but it’s not impossible. And I think that any business could run an event to get more people to know about your business. I know that one of the things that wasn’t really successful was your cars and coffee.

Sean had a cars and coffee. Once a month on a Saturday morning and that one actually didn’t get a lot of people to the museum. However, we’ve had a couple other events, like we had the Tesla’s come out to the museum. A couple of times that was a great event. And then Sean has a really big car show every single year, an annual car show that drives, thousands of people to the museum and gets a lot of buzz going on.

What do you think the difference was between like the cars and coffee versus like the car show or Teslas that made one more popular than the other?

Sean: [00:01:39] So the cars and coffee, the very first one we did was super successful. We had a ton of people. They all seem to enjoy it. We wound up getting the coffee sponsored. We had donut. We did the whole shebang. And what happened was, it was it slowly. Died. It went from great as this thing they want to go do. And everybody’s yeah, Cars and coffee. And then it just like it, the next month it got a little bit less and then a little bit less. And within a few months it got down to nobody was there and weather it was not a factor, I think what happened was it was just, it was too free it was on at a time where the alternative might’ve been to go to a real car show. Like it’s appealing. I think for the couple of people, I think that were relatively local. That didn’t really want anything else to go do. But again, the moment there was another option. Then they’re like we were at Miles Through Time last week.

So there was no reason to go there. And the thing is the amount of effort that we had to put into it every month never changed just the outcome changed and it got to the point to where it wasn’t worth doing.

Torie: [00:02:48] I think he found too that it was mostly a lot of local people that were coming in. And so they may have been interested in being out there and just like mingling with each other, but they really weren’t interested in coming into the business.

Sean: [00:03:00] And that’s the other thing is so cars and coffee free event, and free coffee, we on free donuts. And the whole thing was that. If they didn’t come into the museum for the $5 admission charge, like what were we doing it for? And that was the case. We had a few guys they just refuse to go in to the museum.

So now we’re giving them coffee. We’re giving ’em donuts, food, all that kind of stuff, a place to hang out outside, but they never actually visited the museum, like we’re talking, never visited, not like they were in their last month or anything like that. And for those local people, we have season passes.

So it’s not I wanted them to pay the regular admission every single month. If you can be there all the time, just by the pass and you’re good to go, you can go every day of the week that it was open and we’re gonna be golden.

Torie: [00:03:50] It reminds me of is we’ve talked about the punch card. That businesses get if you buy, 10 sandwiches, they’ll give you a free one, but somebody that’s already buying your sandwiches. That’s not like the motivating factor for them to come in because they’re already there. And so getting people to come into an event at your place, like you have to give them a reason, something special to come.

And so I think maybe something small and something that was so frequent, just really wasn’t the answer. So the last cars in coffee, I believe it was like 20. 2017 and 18, I think were your main years of the Carson coffee. So after we realized that really wasn’t a way to build a buzz, you started doing some things that were a little bit more unusual, and I think it’s making it special and having something unique in there that really drives people out because Sean has got some people to drive some miles just to come out for an event.

And I think the is coming out where one of the times that we realized. Like we can get some people to drive two hours, three hours just to come hang out at the museum. So what do you think was successful for that event?

Sean: [00:05:01] They’re like the Tesla ones, so it was pretty neat because we had just gotten the Evie chargers installed at the museum.

And the thing is that where the museum initially was in Toccoa Georgia, there are no electric cars yet alone Teslas. And so from anybody that, that was local and saw that we were doing this, they weren’t going to get it. Like, why are you doing that? These cars aren’t around here. And even before we owned a Tesla ourselves, like I saw the value of adding to the infrastructure of having these cars here.

And ultimately they, they are still cars, which means that they, some of them are still owned by car people that are into cars and really there’s nowhere out there for them to be able to be a part of this kind of thing in this car culture. The town was called Toccoa. So we came up with this clever Tesla was in Tacoma.

And mind you, this is pre the Tesla world record event. This is the, this was the very first time we’d ever done anything associated with Tesla

no, I think it was 18. Yeah. So it was the second year that the museum had been open that wound up getting in all the tests of chargers installed with the for free from Tesla and got all that done, but then took it a step farther to get ahold of the local Tesla shop and got them to bring a model X P 100 D.

So at the time was the fastest production SUV in the world. I believe it still is. So that was neat. So that again already, like whether any anybody else came or not, I knew we were going to have a really neat car that a lot of people had never seen before on display inside of the museum. And the model X is the one with the Falcon doors.

So the doors that like pop up like a DeLorean was just, if you didn’t know anything, you’d go, oh, that’s neat. And so that, that was cool. But to take it a step farther to then. Tesla owners even know that, Hey, this is a place that whether you come specifically for the museum or you’re passing through this is the place you can come stop and get some juice.

And so in introducing the museum to them in that aspect, it was also a, Hey, come, here’s an opportunity for you as an owner to come. And not only hang out with other Tesla owners, but to also talk to people that may have never even seen one of these cars before and believe me, some of these people had never seen these cars.

Torie: [00:07:26] So for me, that was something that I thought was really unique is that it actually did bring local people out. Because if you have a touristy type of business, a lot of times, local people, aren’t your people that are going to come out. And so being the museum like the local people really aren’t the ones that are coming.

It’s getting the people from out of town or the people that are traveling. However, the Teslas were unique. That it really did get people to come in that were local. It was amazing. Like these kids came in, like the kids knew about it and they were like, I just want to see a Tesla because they had never seen one before. It was really cool.

Sean: [00:07:59] And the coolest aspect, whether it was some of these older guys that may have had. No, like no opinion whatsoever or a very jaded opinion on what a Tesla was like electric car, forget that kind of mentality. And when they had the opportunity to actually see these cars in person and talk to the owners of them and get a better understanding of what they’re all about.

It definitely, we changed some opinions, which I thought was pretty neat. I don’t need them to all, all of a sudden love Teslas or electric cars in general. And then that’s the only way the feed. I think that’s not the point of it. It’s to diversify the automotive culture. And that’s, that was what the end goal was.

It was, it’s not all about just old school, hot rods. It’s everybody.

Torie: [00:08:45] And we noticed that with a lot of car shows and even the, a lot of museums. Yeah. The older generation is coming out for them, but then how do you invite new people, younger people. And so I think helping bridge that gap was really an amazing thing that I didn’t really see that it was going to be that successful.

And I think it really was. But Tesla’s and tequila was just the first time that we did a Tesla event. Since then we’ve done a couple of more, there was the Tesla world record that we did offsite, which is a whole nother thing, but we had Tesla’s come back to the new location. And the coolest part of that is that people got to test drive them and talking about like these older guys learning about Tesla. You really got to know about Teslas this time?

Sean: [00:09:27] Yeah, that was pretty neat because they brought out a model. Y so not even a performance model Tesla or anything like that. And it was, this was before we even had the chargers actually hooked up. But what made it unique was that car was there for people to drive.

And they drove it until it was just enough juice so that the guy from Tesla could make it home. Now they’d probably be able to hang out a little bit more and we’d plug it in between test drives. But the thing was constantly getting driven and it was getting driven by people that may never own a Tesla, but, to be able to experience something like that.

That’s pretty neat. Especially in a small town like that, where they don’t really see these cars even getting driven by somebody that owns one on a regular basis. It’s just, it’s not common. I’ll stop at the Wendy’s a lot of times, or almost every time on the way home from leaving the museum on Saturday.

Just to, I usually don’t eat all day long, so I’ll make it a stop to eat on my way home. But. What happens is I pull up to the drive through and they just go googly over this Tesla, like where’s your door handles and the color. And talking to me about this car that they just. If they don’t see them and it’s neat for them.

And so to be able to bring these cars, whether it’s a Tesla or Lamborghini or Vipers, or, Hudsons and model A’s, we’ve had it’s something that the people at least can be come and be a part of it and have something to it.

Torie: [00:10:52] So the marketing aspect of it though, so Tesla did come out and bring vehicles to these, however, they had no part in marketing the events. So though you were able to ride the wave of having the Tesla name attached. You still had to market the events a hundred percent yourself. So how did you, what did you find was the best ways to do.

Sean: [00:11:11] It social media, I just utilizing social media. We created a Facebook event for it, obviously. And yeah, like Tesla specifically does absolutely nothing. So short of them having a representative come bring the car. There was nothing that they were going to do about having, ensuring anybody else actually knows about it. So it came down to. What our capabilities are of spreading the word via social media.

Torie: [00:11:39] So we see a lot of people create events on Facebook, for whatever type of events that they’re having for their business, for their organization. However, there are some huge mistakes that people are making and it’s I’ve talked about before that it’s like really great content. Shitty delivery. And with Facebook events, like it seems to be that same way. Yes, you really do want to make an event on Facebook for your event. However, there are some guidelines that are really going to help you.

And I think that Sean has just dialed these things in for little, events that are in out of town that are small events, but really driving a buzz and driving traffic to get to them. So what are some things that you would tell people for, if you’re going to have it. How to actually do it properly on Facebook.

Sean: [00:12:26] First of all, I see it all the time and it drives me absolutely nuts. And I probably should do it on the opposite side of what I’m about to say. So like I don’t typically create a printable flyer for the car show I should, and I should be able and handing them out in person. Sean has

Torie: [00:12:44] somebody fantastic that could design that for him.

Sean: [00:12:49] Is it, I then have to get them printed and physically hand them out. And it takes a lot more of my time and resources than simply sticking to the digital aspect of it and doing it on social media, which I can more easily manage that being said every once in a while I get somebody that’s Hey, do you have any printed ones?

I’ll hand them out for you. That just happened last week, which was awesome. And if I could do that, if I had a. Yeah, a group of, or at least one person that would do that kind of thing for me, I would totally do it, but because I don’t have it on a normal basis, it’s I don’t really focus my energy on that.

So with that being said, I focus it on the digital aspect of it. And what I see happen are these people that are taking the flyer that they created for print, and taking a picture of it,

Torie: [00:13:39] Taking a picture of it.

Sean: [00:13:41] And sharing it on social media.

Torie: [00:13:43] So I thought they were just showing that they like sharing the same file. I didn’t realize they were taking a picture that

Sean: [00:13:48] They’re taking the flyer printed on paper sitting on the desk and then they’re taking their phone and they’re taking a picture of it and sharing it on social media better than nothing. But there’s a better way. And the biggest thing, and the thing is that they will take that picture and shared into, to various groups, which is great, like car show, event, group.

But it’s not the event, so there’s no way for them, for the people.

Torie: [00:14:20] Okay. Hold on. So don’t that might be confusing for somebody when he says it’s not the event. The post that they’re sharing is not so you can just make a regular post on Facebook. Or you can make an event on Facebook. So when they’re sharing it, they’re just sharing that picture.

They’re not sharing that event. And when somebody creates an event on Facebook, it’s actually creating like a RSVP type of system, which is cool. And it also is letting other people know there’s some sharing type things in there that will be like, so since Sean and I are friends on Facebook, go figure, it’ll tell me, Hey, Sean is going to this event, maybe you want to go to, so you’re losing all of that kind of stuff. If you don’t actually make an event and then share that event. Another thing that they have is that you can send reminders. If you make an update to that event, it’ll actually update everybody that has said that they’re going to go to the event.

Sean: [00:15:14] That the reminders are automated to everybody. So you’re not even having to go,

Torie: [00:15:19] but if you update the event, like if you write like a reminder, like a post to the event, then it’ll sit all that.

Sean: [00:15:23] You actually then post to the event that you created yourself. And again, Facebook then automatically sends those notifications out to people, letting them know. There’s something else for them to see,

Torie: [00:15:33] And they’re gonna get them and be, and see them more likely than if you just created a brand new post, because you’ve already opted in and said, I’m interested in this. Facebook wants to show you stuff that they know that you’re already interested in.

So when you’ve already RSVP it and said you might go, or you will go to an event. When somebody posts something to that event or the reminders for it, it’s more likely to actually reach you rather than, the algorithm is only showing it to a small percentage of people. So when Sean says they’re not sharing the event, like they haven’t even created an event or they’re not sharing the event, they’re just sharing this picture.

Okay. I just wanted to clarify that because I know what you’re talking about, but I just feel like it’s, there’s some little nuances there that will make, it’s always like the small stuff. It’s these little teeny things that like, oh, if you just made this one little change, then so much more is going to happen.

And this is one of those just small things. Okay.

Sean: [00:16:24] But, and nothing happens with that picture, right? If you actually create an event for it not only do you have all of this control on how people see it and to be able to contact a more but it’s also being shown as a potential event for people to do inside the whole world of Facebook events, where people are like, Hey, what is there to do around me today?

Or this weekend next week, next month. If you’ve taken the time to actually create an event for it, then it’s there. And the thing is you don’t even have to get super neat with it. Take that picture that you took with your phone, and stick that as the thumbnail to an event that you officially create.

Because again, somebody can say that they’re interested in eventually that interest goes to going. Yeah. Friends see it. And another good thing is that if you get, if it’s an event where you have sponsors or other businesses involved in whatever capacity, you could tie them all together with it.

Torie: [00:17:20] And it opens up your audience to their audience as well, because you would tag them when the event. And so rather than it just being a part of your audience, it’s opening it up to their audiences, any,

Sean: [00:17:30] and you don’t want multiple events, like some of these. Big events. I’ll see it where they, it’s the one event, but there’s multiple businesses that are part of it and they’ve gone and created their own event version for it.

And all that does is dilute the entire thing. Whereas if they were all just listed as co-hosts Which is essentially just making them all hosts so that it shows up on their page. Like you don’t get caught up on they’re not actually a co-host, don’t worry about that. It just makes it so that they can see it.

But it does, it spreads it out immensely. And then you can keep resharing that event in the groups and on your business page and on your personal page. And there’s so many things you can do with it. The analytics that go with it. Like you can look at it and go, whoa, it looks like 2000 people are interested in going in a 235.

Torie: [00:18:17] And because you’ve done the event every year and because Sean has made an event every year, like I was like, okay, so what were your what was your rate, your conversion rate of people that said they were going to go to how many actually showed up. And so now that Sean has some past data. Now, doing this the fifth year, he can go, oh my conversion rate is your conversion rate for people now you said.

Sean: [00:18:37] It’s around 40%.

Torie: [00:18:38] Okay. So he knows if, X amount of people said they’re going to go or interested in going. He can pretty much figure out now that 40% of those are going to actually convert and actually show up man, that’s data that you’re not going to get that you just don’t have. If you don’t just use the system, how it’s meant to be used, these things are there for you. They are free. That’s one of the greatest things too. So you get all this data. You’re able to reach all these people for free, which you can do an ad for your Facebook event and get it in front of more people. But even if you didn’t do that, The reach is so much more than you could get. If you’re just doing a post or, maybe even if you were just like handing out some flyers, it’s a great way to reach a lot more people. However, one of the things that I’ve seen that I think really is a huge mistake that a lot of people do with these events is that they don’t give it enough time.

Before the event. So any type of buzz can happen. Like people have to plan what they’re going to do. People want to make plans for their weekends on what they want to do. And how many times have we seen car shows or like these types of, little events like this, that they’ll post the event on Facebook the day before.

The day before you guys.

Sean: [00:19:48] I mean that no kudos for doing it, but it literally, isn’t going to do you any good at that point? Especially, it does depend on what type of events you’re planning on doing, but for the most part. People are looking before, the day of, or the day before,

Torie: [00:20:05] especially if it’s the weekend, like people want to plan their weekends and there’s competing things going on. So they have to weigh them. If their kids are doing stuff, you’ve got to give people a little bit

Sean: [00:20:14] Losing all that opportunity for one friend that does see the event to say, they’re interested are going to show it to another person. Sees that, that you’re eliminating all that when it’s waiting to the last minute.

And again, I saw this happen with the local city up in Clarksville that had an event going on. I saw nothing of this thing until a couple of days before. And then all of a sudden they put something out there and I’m like it’s too late. Really. And I see it all the time and the thing is.

I think people will get caught up on how big of an event is. And they’re like I don’t need, I don’t need to go through all that trouble. And I get that. No, no matter what size the event is, we had a father’s day was last Sunday, right? For the last couple of years now the museum has done an event right event for the museum for father’s day.

Okay. We’re not actually doing anything other than the museum is open and it’s father’s day. So I just got a event that says it’s father’s day weekend. Come visit the museum. Bring your dad. Yeah. Cool. That’s awesome.

Torie: [00:21:19] I know we’ve talked about doing that kind of stuff, like makeup and event for whatever it is, make something like hype it up a little bit. Even if it’s something that’s normal, like father’s day when it’s already open. If you make it seem special or if it’s something that people just maybe wouldn’t have connected the thing like, oh, you’re right. Like my dad likes museums. Let’s take them there on father’s day. Like you can always make those.

Sean: [00:21:37] So it’s not technically an event. It’s more of a, an announcement.

Torie: [00:21:42] But you made it like a legit utilizing it as an event.

Sean: [00:21:45] And the thing is again, you can go back into past events and duplicate them and that’s literally what I did. So I’ve done it. I did it last year and all I did was duplicate the event, changed the dates and let it run again this year.

Torie: [00:21:59] So we hear this a lot and you said it, and I wanted to point this out is that people said, oh, it’s a small event. Or what’s this? Oh, it’s whatever their excuses. It’s too much travel. It’s too hard. It doesn’t need to. Once you set it up once, duplicate it. Like these things are not as hard as you may think they are.

And if you did something like this a year, two years, three years ago, like it’s always getting so much easier. Facebook wants it to be easy for you. Facebook wants your business to use their platform to get your events out. So they’re going to keep trying to improve it so that it reaches more people.

So that it’s much easier for you to create this event and to be successful at it. Just because you’ve tried this and it didn’t like work really great for you or you thought it was a little bit give it another go and, take some of these like little tips, like duplicating it event to make it even easier for yourself because these things are not that hard and they’re getting easier.

Sean: [00:22:52] Plus you can measure them against each other, which makes it all these interesting and go. I did it last year and I have this many people say that they’re interested in this many going. You know how many showed up, so you do it again, and then you can base all those numbers and tweak it or share it sooner or anything like that.

But especially stuff. A father’s day, weekend or Memorial day weekend or something like people are going on Facebook and going to the general events area and going, what is there we can go do today or can go do tomorrow. And that’s where this, no matter what size event you got going on is going to really come into play. Is that right? You’re there isn’t is a thing to go do.

Torie: [00:23:30] And sometimes people don’t want to go do like a huge event. Maybe they just want to go to do something.

Sean: [00:23:36] Just want to know you’re open. And that’s the thing is some of these holidays. Places close. So maybe if all it is you’re saying actually we’re open.

This is a place you can come visit then they know that.

Torie: [00:23:47] At the same time, you probably don’t want to post an event like every single day, because I think that there is a sense of doing it like too much. I would even like the cars and coffee, how we talked about it was so often that it wasn’t special.

Looking back there might’ve been something that we could have done to make every single give it some type of theme or I don’t know, dude, like now looking back that time has passed. There’s probably some things that we could have done to make it better. Cause I think about like these places that have trivia, like every single week.

So if they’re always posting trivia, do something to make that special, maybe it’s like we talk about the pizza place or whatever, even though they have Sunday football every Sunday during football season, maybe they theme out every Sunday, a little bit different. Maybe it’s $2 drafts, one time, maybe it’s, dollar wings the next time.

And so that way it doesn’t make it so repetitive that they’re like, oh, they’re doing cars and coffee again. Or, oh, they’re doing Sunday football again, but there’s that something special that maybe catches their eye. So if you have a repetitive event, maybe try to figure out what that little special thing is like

Sean: [00:24:45] Specifically our cars and coffee we had talked about doing the various themes and I think what happened was. Didn’t have the bandwidth, the resources to actually be able to implement it the way that I wanted to. But I see like caffeine and octane is a huge monthly Cruzan and they that’s really what they’re doing. They had they had one month this month in July it’s military vehicles.

So th they, they are doing that as well. And that, and, we know firsthand they’re doing that to differentiate that month versus the last couple months. So even, and I could see that the same people would go, so they’d be like, oh, so they’re trying to appeal to people going to that specific themed caffeine and octane, which is pretty cool.

Torie: [00:25:28] So if people were wanting to do an event for their business to draw new people out, what would be some advice that you would give them.

Sean: [00:25:35] Plan farther out in advance than you think? Typically the big event that we do each year, I will at least start marketing it four months in advance. Which may seem like a long time, but it goes by so quick.

Especially since if you just think of the initial, like getting the word out there, like I’ll put the word out that it basically what it comes down to is the first thing I think of is the date itself would now not anything else planned? The hardest part is just okay, what date are we going to do?

And the minute the data’s chosen, I throw it out there. Everything else comes afterwards. So as far as figuring out DJ and all that other stuff like it, like at that point, I have already announced that this event’s going on and it makes it so that people can see following it. Cause now they’re saying they’re either going to definitely go based on that date or they’re interested.

Yeah. In knowing more. And so as I start to accumulate, the sponsors said no more details. I then share these details, into the event. And then I reshare them into the Facebook page for the business, which I then reshare onto my personal page. And it just keeps it going. So during that four months, it’s not like I created it.

And then. All of a sudden four months later, it’s the show. It’s a constant touching these people and keeping them informed as far as what’s going on.

Torie: [00:27:04] But you’re also doing emails too. So you guys are going out, you’re dripping out little details. So Sean always has a car show shirt that gets designed special. For every single car show. So that was like something that we did this year that we hadn’t done before. Is that rather than just doing like the one we did it on multiple colored shirts and mock them all up and then gave people a chance to vote. So that way everybody it got some engagement and that went pretty well. Didn’t it?

Sean: [00:27:29] Yeah. And that was again, like I have no idea. We typically are typically do a different color each year, just so that it doesn’t look the exact same still staying neutral in tone colors or doing a bright orange and then a yellow and neon green or anything like that. But they’re different.

And this year, like I like we’re like we’ve been doing this five years now. What color are we going to do? Cause at this point, if we’re starting the repurpose some colors, potentially. And so we just picked four random colors and I stuck it out there with the artwork that Torie designed on each one of them mocked up and just let people decide, Hey, if you had a choice, which one would you pick?

Torie: [00:28:08] And things like this it wasn’t very difficult to do that, but it allowed people to be a part of it. And again, it allowed Sean to post different things about the car show. So again, building that buzz and all these little teeny ways, and then giving people some ownership over it. But now when they get the t-shirts, which the t-shirts are already crazy popular already, like they go so fast.

It’s like a first come first serve type thing. It gave people even more interest in the shirts, which, people want to come out and get their free show.

Sean: [00:28:33] Yeah. I had over 200 people answered the question as far as which one they preferred. Yeah. Pretty close they’re initially between two colors and then all of a sudden one started to really pull away.

And then it, it’s definitely the fan favorite and that’s where we went.

Torie: [00:28:48] So when you think about this, like four months, like I’m going to post like, oh, the vents coming. Oh, the event’s coming. No, you got to figure out these little ways of doing it and you can always go and look at Sean’s social media and get a couple ideas on some of the things that they’re doing.

However, you do not need four months for every single event. But don’t post it the day before, because you’re just going to lose all that organic buzz completely. What other tips would you have for people? Anything else?

Sean: [00:29:13] I would say either give them as much information as you can about the event so that there is informed and making that decision on whether or not they want to actually go to it. But it save a little bit to be able to. Add to the discussion of the event. To keep them to tease them a little bit. If there’s things that you know, that are happening or if things can change or whatever the case may be, that you can actually add to that throughout, from the time that you started the event at the time of the event, just a to re-engage them.

I think it’s really important. If all you did was create an event two weeks before, and then you never do anything. And then the event happens and I could definitely missing the boat. If you don’t at least try to contact them one or two times, eh, between that two week period to tell them something and more than just, Hey, the events and a week, tell them what’s going to be there or what they could potentially win or what they’re going to see or experience, give them some sort of tastes, just like to get them excited.

Hey, before we were interested in going, but now based on this, we’re definitely going. And that’s the goal. The even the annual car show for the museum right now, there’s over 2000 people saying they’re interested and like 225 saying they’re going, that’s a massive difference between going and interested.

So if I can convert more people to switch it from interested to going, that’s a win, but the only way to do that, Is to re-engage them because if I don’t, they’re never going to even get the opportunity to switch that over from interested to going. It’s just an always interested and it’s important to be able to, stay engaged and keep them enthused about going.

Cause that’s ultimately. That’s how you’re going to get them. And even after all that, they still might not show up. You want to put the best effort forward into actually doing it.

Torie: [00:31:12] Another thing, a tip from me is yes, you can reach these people on social media, but like we talked about with email marketing, if you can get people’s email address, and then you’re able to reach out to them on their email, which they are much more likely to see.

That’s a really great way for you to contact these people. We talked about the trivia place. Like we have this Italian restaurant that does trivia every week. And I know they do trivia every week and we’ve been to the trivia, but I don’t remember that every week they don’t send emails out.

If they would have grabbed my email and sent something out. So maybe once a month or every other week or whatever, they said, Hey, remember. We’re having trivia and it’s, and then say whatever the little special was, like pizza slices or whatever, at least re-engage me. So that I remember because that’s how you’re going to bring new people in.

If you have a repetitive event like that rather than only focusing on social media because you can always. You can always reach out again because people don’t remember, people get busy, people might want to come back, they just forgot. They just don’t remember, or they have other stuff going on. So rather than leaving them, on Thursday night, eating dinner at home, doing nothing, why not get them out to your trivia vendor?

Whatever your event is. So not just using social media, but using email to his super power.

Sean: [00:32:25] And specifically on the events for Miles Through Time, like I constantly still try to bring it. So I’ve got the exact same event, but with more information, the sponsorship forums and all that kind of stuff, they.

All that is on the website for Miles Through time. So even through the Facebook event, I am still encouraging them to go to the website, to learn more, to see the sponsors to learn more about the whole museum itself, which then also has the pop-up to get their email and all kinds of stuff from there that I can then send out those emails through futures. Send it out in the future,

Torie: [00:33:03] And so have to have all of this stuff perfect right out the gate. Like this is over five years now of like constantly just trying to tweak and do things a little better. So if you had an event before don’t think that you have to do like all of these things to make your event like 10,000 times better, 5% better. What could you do just a little bit better? What one or two things could you do this time? And then maybe one or two things next time. Like it can be like incremental for improving it, it doesn’t have to be all this at once, but just because you don’t have this stuff doesn’t mean that you don’t just go start your event either.

Like it doesn’t have to be perfect to start because it can always get better. And the only way you’re going to get better. Doing it like you can’t figure all this stuff out in your head. It has to be figured out with like actually doing it and actually going through because your business is going to be different than Sean’s business is going to be different than my business is going to be different than the th the, Italian food restaurant.

That’s doing trivia. So you have to figure out what works for you. So don’t be afraid to go in there and try. Don’t be afraid to go in there and mess with Facebook events. Like you’re not gonna ruin anything. You’re not gonna blow anything up. Like nothing bad is going to happen from this. It’s just all like these little learning experiences.

Cause he did get out there and do this stuff, because like I said, it’s a little things that are going to make a huge difference in your business or in your event.

Sean: [00:34:15] Really keep it simple and let it evolve organically. Like the event that we do now is much larger then the very first one. And if I set out to do the event that it’ll be this year like I like as if it was my first it would not only be overwhelming, but it’d be a let down.

Cause it’s just, I wouldn’t know what to do. And the thing is I don’t know what to do until it occurs. So if you’re planning some sort of event, just keep it as simple as possible and, be able to adapt when you need to. Do it again in the future, knowing the, with the new knowledge that you have to make it just that much better and then do it again.

And next thing, after a few events they’ll be pretty efficient. And the thing is, it’s okay if you don’t get a whole lot of people the first time, you are learning. If everyone shows up and this massive event, and you don’t know what you’re doing, it’s going to suck in more ways than one.

And it’ll it. Chances are it’ll make it. So you don’t want to do it again because maybe you embarrassed yourself. Whereas if you just go, like I’m going to give it a go, we’ll see who shows up, learn from that. Give it another, go and keep going that way. Eventually by the time you figure it out, you’ll be pretty good.

And you’ll have a pretty good time.

Torie: [00:35:31] That’s very true. It’s it’s amazing how that works. Like the amount of success comes along with your experience and you need that experience to be able to accept that success in your life.

Sean: [00:35:40] I like the museum right now, like the visitors, just on a daily basis, we get so many more visitors right now that if that many people came in the first year that the museum was opened. I would be screwed. Like I wouldn’t be able to handle them all. I would probably be embarrassed because it was not much of a museum when we first opened so the couple people that traveled in, I was really able to hold their hand and cater them and, express my vision of, I know it’s not what it should be, but this is what I want it to be.

And, was able to walk them through a journal of, or a journey of this is what it’s going to be like, please forgive me that it’s not that great right now. Whereas now you know that many more people coming in, I’m like, yeah, check it out. This is what we accomplished and instill in a short amount of time where I think I’m still envisioning so much more that.

That when that happens, that many more people will actually come in and it’s, it is, it’s a natural progression of an, on an uphill slope of, if it was the opposite and tons of things, you don’t want a thousand people a day from day one. No, not at all. Don’t be discouraged for, how your event turns out.

No, that, it’s a learning process and it, you got nowhere to go, but up when it’s not that great. Learn from any mistakes you make and. Do better next time.

Torie: [00:37:00] Absolutely. Did you know that we have new episodes? Every Tuesday and Thursday? We have new episodes every Tuesday and Thursday. And we talk about things just like this, how you can run your business a little bit smarter, how you can use social media a little bit better.

And so we would love it if you would come and join us on Tuesday and Thursday, because we are always here and we’ll see you on the next one. Thanks.