If your post-event surveys show that consumers are interested in buying your product great. If your post-event numbers don’t deliver a lift in product sales uh not so great. Fast-tracking consumers from a memorable brand engagement to the point of sale requires more than just a coupon. It demands multi-layered event strategies and a quick mastery of distribution practices sales tactics retail relationships and consumer behaviors. With budgets shrinking and quantifiable deliverables more important than ever before it’s time to turn experiential programs into sales machines.

Colgate-Palmolive has been marketing successfully to elementary schools via its Bright Smiles Bright Futures program for 18 years. The ongoing program has become more and more interactive with an increasing presence at schools nationwide. It currently produces annual plays at schools brings in high-profile celebrities and stations mobile dental vans at schools and other locations to provide children with oral health education free screenings and dental supplies.

Laptops were all the rage that is until cell phones turned into mini personal computers. Now consumers get sports updates the weather email photos and news—you name it—all on a device that fits in the palm of their hands. Through SMS (text messaging) they’re also communicating with each other faster than ever before.

Sometimes the maxim “If it ain’t broke don’t fix it ” just doesn’t apply. To wit event marketers working on the second iteration of a successful pop-up face a unique struggle: finding the balance between creating a unique experience that capitalizes on all the great elements from the first pop-up while introducing enough new stuff to keep the crowds—and the buzz—coming the second time around. How two brands faced—and met—the challenge:

Celebrity appearances are a perennial tactic in the event marketer’s cookbook. But there’s a new winning recipe on the rise: celebrity chefs. Popular Food Network stars like Emeril Lagasse and Rachael Ray have been cooking their way into America’s hearts for years. And cookware brands like All-Clad and Meyer have put these chefs’ signatures all over their products. But it’s not just kitchen brands that are picking up on celebrity chefs’ thunder. Meow Mix threw a celebrity chef into the marketing mix to tout its natural ingredients.