3 Creative Ways Get Noticed at your Next Event

Are you planning to attend a trade show, expo or other business event this year? Chances are, you are! According to Eventbrite, more than 1.3 million business events are held every year in the UK; it’s an industry worth £42.3 billion that sustains more than 570,000 full-time equivalent jobs. With so many events, and so many booths, how can you make your brand stand out to maximise your exposure and business development opportunities? One simple yet effective strategy is to leverage the perfect event merchandise. In this post, we look at three creative ways that you can use branded bags to get noticed at your next event. 

Plan a Bag Giveaway Campaign

One trend that has stood the test of time at events large and small is freebies. People love them! Our first suggestion is to use branded bags as part of a clever giveaway campaign at your next event. You can plan a campaign that helps you engage your customers – old and new – and inspires them to build a relationship with your brand. While you can plan a giveaway campaign at any point in the calendar year, one good idea is to tie your giveaway to the launch of a new product or service. You can build buzz for your new launch by gifting people with a special, never-before-seen bag that they will use long after the end of the event, extending the reach and impact of your launch.  

Take a note from the publishing company Simon & Schuster, Inc. To promote the release of a new book, Make Trouble, the company ran a giveaway campaign on Instagram, asking people to comment on the post for a chance to win a copy of the book alongside a branded tote bag, bookmark and pin badge. The post drew more than 1,200 likes. Simon & Schuster then drew five winners from the pool. The campaign was a great way to advertise a new product while encouraging followers to engage with the company via social media. 

Remember, events don’t always take place in organised venues. Another creative idea is to take it to the streets; guerilla style! Consider designing a shopper-style bag that you can hand out for free to shoppers on the high street. It’s a great way to get your brand out there. It’s also a great opportunity for your staff to connect directly with customers to tell them more about your product and create a lasting impression with a functional freebie!

At Rocket Bags, shopper bags have become one of our best-selling bags. This Shopping Bag in Pouch is a fun choice; it’s foldable and would be very easy to hand out to busy shoppers! You could take this one step further and tap into the eco-conscious trend by giving out environmentally-friendly bags to shoppers, such as recycled and natural shopper bags, encouraging them to ditch single-use plastic and promote your brand. 

Use Bags Creatively at Events

Our second tip is to create a nice event gift bag for your next trade show or event.  It’s become common practice today to gift attendees with special merchandise they can take home after an event. Not sure what to put in your event bag? In addition to the standard conference materials, consider special coupons or discounts on future events, technology-related devices like branded earbuds, thumb drives or phone chargers and water bottles and drinking glasses. 

Personalising your bag as much as possible is key to making it stand out. One great way to do this is to offer event attendees a choice of bag. If you have the budget, consider creating two or three different styles of bags for your event, in different shapes, sizes and colours.

Does your event take place in a special location? Consider teaming up with a local creative to help design an exclusive event bag that is distinctive and memorable.  At Rocket Bags, we can help turn any design into a beautiful bag; please feel free to bring us in for an early conversation with a potential artist or designer to answer all of your questions about design, cost and the production process. 

Another tip is to choose a bag based on the theme or type of event. For trade shows, consider a tote bag. For a black-tie gala event, consider a luxury custom bag. Is there a sustainability or environmental focus at your conference? Consider an eco-friendly bag that is made from all-natural, environmentally friendly material, like this Jute Bag With A Cotton Front Pocket that has a cotton front pocket and soft padded carry handles. 

Run a Promotion

Our final tip is to run a special promotion around your branded bag. You could include a free bag with the purchase of an item at your event, or you could offer to mail out a promotional bag in exchange for someone’s contact information. With promotions, look for low-cost, high visibility bags that will be used time and time again. 

Perhaps your goal is to entice business executives, decision makers and VIPs to your event. Access to C-suite level professionals is very often a selling point to amplify your event and entice other people to register. One idea is to entice these executives through invitation-only sessions. Sweeten the deal with a special, limited-edition, customised luxury bag. Identify your top targets and send a custom bag and special printed invitation for them to attend your event. Trust us, even CEOs love freebies!

We hope this post gives you some initial ideas about how to use bags to build buzz for your brand. The possibilities are really endless, and we’d love to hear what ideas you have, too. We can help transform your vision into a strategy and product for your best promotion yet. Please get in touch with us today!