Salesforce Event Management Tips | Cirrus Insight

Salesforce Event Management: 5 Mistakes You Might Be Making

Planning an event is a major undertaking, whether it’s an annual conference or an industry trade show. Managing logistics, event promotion, and attendees on top of your normal daily activities can lead to major headaches if you don’t have the right technology.

Your Salesforce customer relationship management system (CRM) can relieve some of the stress, but only if you know how to leverage Salesforce effectively for your events. 

Salesforce employs more than 76,000, hosts its Trailblazer Community of more than 20 million, and has thousands of customers—but despite its size, many users aren’t using their CRM to its top potential. For example, an association may be tracking basic attendee data in its Salesforce-native AMS but failing to transform attendance data into actionable insights that drive engagement and retention. 

In this guide, we’ll break down common Salesforce event management mistakes so you can identify any that may be present in your processes and prevent them from impacting your association’s success. 

1. You’re not using a Salesforce-native event tool.

The Problem: Your organization likely uses multiple platforms to manage its daily operations, and there is nothing inherently wrong with this approach. However, if these solutions don’t integrate with one another, you’ll end up with siloed data stored across several platforms. This makes it very challenging to gain a comprehensive view of your data. 

The Solution: Your primary option here is to use a native Salesforce event management solution. As Fonteva’s guide to Salesforce for associations explains, native solutions are built on the Salesforce engine from the ground up, offering seamless integration capabilities between other Salesforce products and apps on the Salesforce AppExchange. 

Some of the top benefits of choosing a native solution include: 

• Expanded functionality. Native event management tools operate as an extension of your CRM, enhancing its feature set with tools that are guaranteed to be compatible with Salesforce. This also makes it much easier for you to leverage other Salesforce tools (e.g., autonomous AI agents that respond to attendees’ questions) to enhance your events.

• Automatic data consolidation. If you’re using third-party software or a web-based event management app, you’ll have to manually transfer data like ticket sales and attendee information to your CRM. With a native app, everything lives in Salesforce, so there is no extra work required.
• Powerful segmentation and personalization capabilities. Because you’ll have access to all of your data and marketing tools in one place, you can segment audiences and target them with tailored messaging to boost registrations. You’ll also be able to leverage the powerful AI tools that Salesforce offers to reach the right attendees even more effectively.
• Cost savings. Integrating two disparate platforms requires effort, expertise, and money. However, using a native app means you won’t have to pay for a third-party connector app or developer to implement the software.

In short, finding a native Salesforce event management application can save you time, money, and effort—and isn’t that what the best software is supposed to help you do?

2. You aren’t using your data effectively.

The Problem: If you’re using a third-party platform to plan your events, it’s difficult to get a comprehensive picture of your efforts. However, attendee data should be at the core of your event strategy. If you don’t have a complete understanding of who your participants are, you won’t be able to plan an event that caters to their unique interests, needs, and goals.

The Solution: Start by ensuring all of your tools are Salesforce-native (or at least fully integrated with your CRM) to avoid creating data silos and boosting overall efficiency. For example, if you use Google Calendar to schedule internal event planning meetings, integrate it with Salesforce to automatically update your records. 

Commit to responsible data management by frequently removing duplicate or outdated information. Set standardized entry guidelines, such as instructions for how to format addresses or phone numbers, to keep your data clean. 

Once you’ve taken the time to ensure your data is accurate and comprehensive, take advantage of it to inform:

• Event types. Whether you’re deciding on a fundraising event idea for your nonprofit or on speakers for your association’s annual conference, your Salesforce data can help you pinpoint what potential guests want to gain from your events.

• Ticket prices. Your CRM can play a major part in helping you pinpoint a ticket price that’s appropriate and profitable. Reference giving histories (if applicable), income levels, and past event attendance to get an idea of how much they’re comfortable paying.

• Marketing strategies. To effectively promote your event, you’ll need to use your target audience’s preferred communication channels. Check your CRM to determine whether individuals prefer to be contacted via phone, email, or text, so your message always reaches them in the most convenient and engaging way.

3. Pricing isn’t tailored to members’ preferences.

The Problem: Many event planning teams only set one general admission price. This can lead to missed opportunities to engage guests with more personalized event experiences.

The Solution: To accommodate a wider range of budgets and interest levels, consider offering tiered pricing or discounts. Here are some tips for tailoring pricing:

• Offer discount codes. Motivate guests to register by offering them deals and discounts. You might send personalized discount codes to specific segments of your guest list, provide a time-sensitive early bird code, or offer lower group rates.

• Create multiple tiers. While general admission (GA) will be all that some guests will want, Funds2Orgs’ event planning guide recommends offering VIP treatment to those attendees who want extra perks. Special seating, added merchandise, or meet and greets with special guests or speakers can persuade registrants to upgrade their ticket.
• Sell à la carte add-ons. Boost revenue and allow attendees to truly shape their experiences by selling special add-ons (such as a post-conference catered dinner). These add-ons should feel exclusive and clearly provide value.

Make sure your event technology can manage these more unique ticketing formats. Again, this is where the flexibility and interoperability of Salesforce really shine.

4. You aren’t considering attendee feedback.

The Problem: There are thousands of ways to measure your event’s success, but many event planning teams overlook the most crucial metric: their guests’ opinions! Neglecting to collect attendees' feedback after the event leads to missed opportunities for improvement. Their input can help you identify and fix problems as well as surface creative ideas that can add value to future events.

The Solution: Most robust event management applications make it easy to gauge guest expectations or enjoyment of your event by enabling you to send out custom surveys. Be sure to craft specific questions about each portion of your event, including entertainment, speakers, venue, registration, and overall experience. 

However, avoid overwhelming attendees with lengthy surveys that they may abandon before completing. Develop a shortlist of the most important questions and enable skip logic so that guests only see relevant queries. Your respondents should have no problem completing the survey in one short sitting.

After collecting feedback, analyze your results in Salesforce. Generate reports that can help you identify and act on trends. For example, maybe you got several comments that your association’s conference didn’t offer enough interactive elements, so you decide to look into new gamification strategies when planning your next event. 

Then, track which pieces of feedback you move forward with and measure the impact of those changes. If your association adds five new interactive opportunities to its next conference, for instance, you’ll need to look for improvements in your association’s member engagement levels.

5. You aren’t leveraging your digital assets.

The Problem: There are countless events taking place all the time, and even more potential attendees who have to choose which ones will win their time and money. Additionally, you’ll have to compete with other advertisers to capture your audience’s attention via digital channels. This is why it’s so important to have a robust digital marketing strategy in place for your event. 

The Solution: The best way to ensure that guests understand what your event is and why they should attend is to design a cohesive multichannel marketing strategy. Here are the most important and effective channels to consider:

• Event microsite or landing page: This is where all other marketing channels will drive traffic to. Think of this as a single source of truth for the event that is highly optimized for conversions. Offer a simple and pleasant user experience, make it easy to find key event details, leverage social proof like impact statistics and testimonials from previous events, and optimize the page for search engines so it appears on search results pages.

• Email: Segment your list of email contacts by demographic, location, interests, etc., and create targeted messages that resonate with each group. With Salesforce, you can even leverage dynamic content blocks that change depending on who the recipient is. Salesforce also automatically tracks key engagement metrics like opens and clicks.

• Social media: Build community excitement and leverage your audience’s networks to reach new potential attendees. Be sure to use branded graphics and short videos in your posts to boost engagement, and always include a quick call to action that directs audiences to your registration page. Ask speakers and event sponsors to share posts to extend your reach.
• Private member communities (if applicable): If your organization has a membership program, you can promote your event to this “captive audience” in creative ways. Consider hosting casual “ask me anything” sessions about the event, teasing fun details, or even giving members a more exclusive look behind the scenes. 

Planning events in Salesforce doesn’t have to be rocket science. In fact, it can help you make the most of your existing assets, save time and money, and offer better, more personalized experiences. With these tips in mind (and a little strategic planning), your event team can be well on its way to planning your best event yet.