Customer buying behavior is changing. Sales cycles are lengthening, and budgets are tight. Now, more than ever, you need to quickly and effectively generate leads to meet your business goals.
Events are one of the shortest and most effective lead generation paths. Here are five reasons events partnerships should be part of your lead generation strategy.
- Events Raise Your Profile
Your brand is the single most important investment you can make in your business.
- Steve Forbes, editor-in-chief, Forbes
When your target audience is looking to purchase tech tools, you need to ensure your business is front of mind. Customers now source their own information before approaching a company to make purchasing decisions. Ensuring your business is part of the conversation around the markets you serve is crucial to making an ICT buyers shortlist.
Events are a good way to introduce and/or position your business to new and existing clients. An event is an opportunity to engage with key decision makers and influencers and demonstrate your expertise in the context of the market. Being part of an industry event gives you a chance to shine as a thought leader and display your authority to your target audience.
- Thought Leadership Influences Buying
It’s not enough to just put out information on your products and services. Tech buyers have rising expectations about the quality of the information they receive. In IDC’s 2023 B2B Tech Survey, vendors ranked thought leadership as one of the top 3 buying influencers. Foundry’s 2023 Customer Engagement Survey found that 71% of IT decision makers may get a negative impression if a vendor does not supply valuable educational content.
Thought leadership is about demonstrating expertise in your market. You should educate prospective buyers not just on the benefits of your products and services but also about the market. This provides value to buyers and increases your authority in your markets.
Industry events enable you to be front and center with your target buyers. An event grants you space to demonstrate your thought leadership to an engaged audience. It allows you to follow up with audience members in person, giving them a chance to ask you questions.
Explore the key points to consider in the IDC eBook,
Empowering Lead Generation: The Quickest and Most Effective Path to Building a Strong Pipeline
- Get in Front of Key IT Decision Makers
IDC’s B2B Tech Buyer Survey revealed that B2B tech buyers expect to buy more through ecommerce and deal less with salespeople over the next three years.
With fewer face-to-face engagements occurring, you need to take advantage of any opportunity to get directly in front of decision makers and influencers. Such exposure allows you to personally engage key personnel on the benefits your business can provide during a digital journey. This omni-channel approach gives you a chance to differentiate yourself from your competitors and build relationships.
- Obtain Customer Insights
People attend events to network with peers and gain insights into the markets in which they operate. They want to understand the trends and drivers that are impacting them. They want to benchmark themselves against the market and competitors.
Directly engaging with decision makers at events offers you a window into their thinking and a view of the factors influencing their buying decisions. These insights and knowledge will help you further define the needs and goals of your target audience and help you position your business in alignment with their priorities.
- Measurable ROI
ROI is a key metric for all your marketing and engagement strategies. It is often said that B2B marketing does not push for the immediate sell but is aimed at positioning your business at the top of mind for when the buyer is ready to purchase. As such, ROI can be a tricky topic for marketers.
Getting budget for activities that do not directly link to ROI can be a struggle. Event partnerships give you the ability to demonstrate measurable return. They enable you to link events to opportunities obtained through networking and meetings with event attendees.
More Important Than Ever: Events Partnerships
To summarize: Events offer you space to demonstrate your thought leadership directly to key decision makers. They provide you opportunities to network, learn market information, and raise your brand awareness by talking directly to customers and prospects. Such contacts can give you insight into customer needs and goals, enabling you to better align your business. And events allow you to show ROI through opportunities gained through these activities.
Explore how IDC | Foundry events can help you get in front of key IT decision makers and build a strong, effective lead generation pipeline that converts. Download the 2025 events portfolio and contact us today.