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[1/12/2010 SteppersUSA Daily News]
Advertising For Your Market
By Markie Bee
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Today's Steppers Beat column is sponsored by: Steppers West Associates "A Memorial Day Weekend Jam" starting May 28, 2010 through May 31, 2010 at The Plaza Hotel and Casino One Main St., in Las Vegas, NV, 89101. They are offering a 4 Day Package Deal for $80!
As Chicago style stepping moves into the larger national market new challenges are raised for those pushing out the art form to the masses. For most businesses that have done their homework, know their local market as well as the demographics in their city and surrounding areas.
What happens when the market gets big enough to start hosting larger events and they want to attract that percentage of the national audience that may be willing to travel to their city to attend?
In several recent conversations with promoters from cities across the country, it has become abundantly apparent these folks have put a lot of thought into this very question. The majority seemed to believe a realistic expectation of "out of town visitors" to a Chicago style steppers event in a city other than Chicago trends between 15 to 30 percent of the total attendance.
This revealing information comes mostly from experiences from before and during the current national economic down turn. Projecting attendance is always a difficult task because nobody has a crystal ball. (I like to make the comparison to shaking a stick in the air, the end that's farther from your hand creates a greater arc than the part closer to your hand). There are too many variables to make a solid prediction.
When advertising to the national audience it's important

 

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to hit the mark with the audience that will be interested in your event while doing that promotion with the least capital outlay.
One way promoters have gravitated to recently is the use of Facebook and (to a lesser degree Twitter and MySpace) promoting to that percentage of people who are connected using those social media sites.
It provides a cost effective way of connecting with some of the members. For example right now the Chicago style steppers Facebook group has a membership of over 2900 members and I leverage that audience for my advertisers by posting their events in the group.
Of course free listings on SteppersUSA.Com and newsletters like Cynthia Bean's are also widely used as well as a few others with less reach.
What about the paid solutions? Before I get into the paid solutions available, let's take a look at how much should really be budgeted for advertising for a steppers event.
Here's the scenario; your location will handle between 500 and 800 guests. To stay on the conservative side lets set the goal to reach at 500 (Important note I'm just dealing with advertising budgets here. I've already covered acquiring locations in previous articles).
Experienced event planners and promoters set their advertising budget at two to three percent of the projected gross revenue from the event. In this case we are selling tickets for $20 (before any discounting which is discretionary) which means a gross take of $10 thousand.
Using the three percent model that means you have a grand total of $300 for advertising. If you spend $225 for flyers and tickets you're left with $75 budget for all other advertising. That's not a lot of money so how do you get the most "bang for the buck"?
So… you still have $75 left now what? Let's look at those paid advertising solutions on the web.
Continuing with our example we have to decide how many people might visit from other cities (Chicago steppers love to travel) and as I mentioned earlier you can usually count on between 15 to 30 percent of the total attendance. I'll stay right down the middle and use 20 percent with our example. This means you are marketing to around 100 people (thousands will see the ad) from out of town. Using our base equation we found we had $75 left to advertise to the national audience (fact: anything on the web is national/international). The key is to try to spend wisely and try to spread the budget over as many sites you can for maximum exposure without going over budget. This means checking the prices for advertising on sites and newsletters where you know the most people gravitate to when finding steppers events.
Once you’ve found the sites that won't break the budget, hire them. (Shameless plug time… with SteppersUSA you can post your flyer AND get display advertising for a reasonable monthly rate of $35 and get the best steppers market penetration on the web. End of shameless plug). If you stick to your budget you will realize profit from your fifth ticket sale (or 2-/12 tickets per site).
If you control your budget before the event happens you will end up with more money for intangibles your customers will appreciate when you need more seats/tables, decorations, etc., as well as being one step closer to profit and the exposure your event needs to set it apart from all the others.
 

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