Event Marketing Works When You Work It
June 15, 2018
Photo Credit: Veuve Cliquot
Liberty State Park is known for its role in ferrying people to nearby Ellis Island, but this month it transported over ten thousand yellow and orange-clad visitors to a luxury brand experience hosted by champagne maker Veuve Cliquot.
As I looked out at the Statue of Liberty hovering above the cheerful, mostly Millennial crowd, the gears in the marketing portion of my brain began to turn.
Ten years ago just 200 people attended the Veuve Cliquot (VC) Polo Classic. Now, here I was amidst thousands of young professionals sporting wild outfits in homage to a brand that pushes boundaries.
It struck me that VC had successfully done what we regularly profess at Oxford Communications – they worked their event. VC curated, crafted and nurtured their brand at highest levels. Annually, they built upon their efforts to fuse their product with a lifestyle archetype of class, beauty and sophistication.
They didn’t just plop an EZ-Up tent in the middle of a field and hand out product samples. VC built a world in their image, populated it with world class Nacho Figueres polo players and welcomed us into it.
The results of this wise, long-term event marketing strategy spoke for themselves – 10,000 mostly millennial attendees, each holding $26 champagne glasses, lined up to buy $275 bottles as well as equally expensive and lavishly packaged VC bags, umbrellas and hats.
Above all, the event’s energy and enthusiasm was infectious – a feeling that no doubt transferred onto VC’s social media and validated some envious FOMO (fear of missing out) in the hearts of the thousands of friends and followers of our fellow attendees.
So to those who say marketing events don’t have ROI, my experience tells me they work when you work them, year after year.
