You’ve got a big company event coming up and everyone in-the-know is going to be there. Planning the event is a huge production bringing marketing, execs, clients, and industry leaders all together in one place for a spectacular evening. You know where the event will be held, you’re finalizing the guest list, but the one thing that all brand managers need to consider when planning a company event is, of course, the branding and your overall brand perception.
Branding an event is the icing on the cake. While there is an entire orchestra of logistics behind making your event a success, the branding is what everyone will remember. Your logo in flowers on a living wall or projected on the side of a nearby office building in vivid colour is the kind of spectacle that will stick in the minds of guests for years. Even on a smaller scale, something as delightfully thematic as a dance-floor in the brand colours or a mosaic of coloured cupcakes making a giant logo on the concessions table is the icing on top of all your hard event-planning work.
Today, we’re here to talk about how to make your event branding pop, not just with vivid colours and logo use, but to truly make your event a memorable soiree that guests will be eager to see you repeat as an annual industry tradition. Follow these tips to increase your brand perception!
What Makes a Fantastically Branded Event
- Unique Design
- Meaningful Messaging
- Authentic Brand Personality
- Consistent From Beginning to End
Establish the Branded Theme
1. Know Your Brand By Heart
The first step is to define your brand in the simplest and most vivid possible terms. The more simple, the more likely you are to stand out and therefore have an increased brand perception. Some brands have a clear and profound set of guidelines from the exact hex code of your colour scheme to the language used to talk about the brand. If you work for one of these companies then your branding work is cut out for you. Use your brand’s guidelines as your handbook for defining the brand of your event.
However, if you’re working with a company that has only a loosely defined brand, it’s time to roll up your sleeves and invent a few guidelines, at least for the event itself. Whether you are following a code or inventing one, know your brand by heart including the colour scheme, the logo, the company culture, and the brand personality you’d like to convey.
2. Craft a Custom Sub-Brand for Every Event
Next, remember that the event is not just your brand, it’s also a unique experience created by the brand that might be repeated as an annual tradition. So your next step is to use your original brand as a jumping-off point to design a unique and special theme for the event itself. Consider how the event varies from the brand to design a hand-crafted event sub-brand.
- Is your event targeted to clients, business partners, or to celebrate professional achievement?
- Does the event have a special message you can convey?
- Is there a personality or atmosphere you can create with the event’s sub-brand?
3. Adopt or Design an Event Brand Logo
One of the most important parts of brand perception is your logo. Your business has a logo which should absolutely be incorporated into your event design. But is it the right logo to represent the entire event or does your event warrant a logo of its own?
Consider ways you can reinvent or streamline your brand’s logo to fit the atmosphere and personality of the event itself. It’s better to use a simplified or artistic variation of the company’s logo or a unique brand theme all it’s own because this will translate better in the various decoration styles throughout the event and make branded items more aesthetically appealing.
4. Give Your Event a Brand Message that is Evident Throughout
Create a message or motto for your event that will become the message. Your brand may already have a driving motto like “Taste the Rainbow” or “The Future is Now” that can be used to craft your entire event decor around. Or you can decide on a unique new theme for branded events every year. The purpose is to give yourself a unifying phrase that shapes the design and leaves stuck in the minds of every guest who attends.
Give Your Event that Signature Brand Personality
5. Dedicate Yourself to a Colour Palette
Pick Two to Six colours, or sets of Tow or Three colors, and stick with it. Clean designs with simplified colour palettes are much more powerful than a clutter of vivid colour. Most brands come with a definitive colour palette for you to start with, just make sure to keep your decor clean and bold to make a strong yet elegant impression on guests as they enjoy the event.
Use coloured lights, paint, or huge swaths of fabric to create large visual impressions of your brand palette. Make sure the event is brand-coloured, so that guests never realise they’re in a normal venue with beige walls and a neutral gray carpet. Instead, they’ve walked into an event dimension defined by your brand colours.
6. Create Bold Brand-Logo Features
Now build your logo into major decor features. The bigger the logo, the more impressive and delightful it will be to spot. This will certainly help with your brand perception. Create a feature wall of living plants or impressive LED-lit sculpture featuring the simplified event logo. Project the logo onto the dance-floor or even custom order a dance floor decal just for this event. Drape your event log over the furniture and emboss the logo on every glass, name badge, and staff jackets.
The key is to stay on this side of the “bold vs tacky” line. Bold branding is awe-inspiring and not shy about appearing everywhere.
7. Subtly Hide the Logo In Decor and Design
For your next trick, hide the logo. Turn your event into a delightful scavenger hunt as guests realise that your log isn’t just emblazoned on the wall and embossed onto the floor, it’s also hidden in the menu design. It’s subtly worked into the bar texture. The spinning disco lights have little logo shapes included in the light-cutouts spinning projected over the floor.
Turn your event into a scavenger hunt to find all the clever ways you managed to sneak branding into the design without your guests realizing.
8. Colour-Code Event Areas with Branded Themes
Most events have a few distinct areas. A dance floor, a bar, comfortable seating, a quiet balcony; each of these places can be made visually distinct in a branded way by colour-coding the background palette. Use the coloured lighting or draperies we mentioned earlier to help guests immediately identify the difference between one area and another while still maintaining your branded colour trends.
9. Branded Confections Are the Cherry-on-Top
Last but not least for your branded decor, don’t forget the snack table. There’s nothing more delightful than a mosaic of cupcakes or a candy sculpture that reflects your brand and logo. Everything should be brand coloured or decorated with something that is reminiscent of your event theme. The more creative you get with the catering, the better.
Send Guests Home with Branded Memories
10. Unforgettable Brand-Emblazoned Memories
Not only do you want to create an incredible branded experience for your guests, but you also want to leave them unforgettable memories that are permanently tinted with your brand colours and emblazoned with the event logo. Of course, a brand that is easily remembered will have a better brand perception overall. A great event is the best possible way to associate your brand with wonderful experiences and the idea that guests would love to come back again and again.
11. Super Cool & Functional Swag
One way to send those memories home is to provide each guest with a little branded swag that they can’t help but use. Elegant metal pens, useful USB devices, or something unique to professionals in your industry are all strong choices because they will be carried around in pockets, on desks, and in laptop bags for years after the event.
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Branding your event is the icing on the cake, the one thing about the entire orchestrated event experience that every guest will remember. In fact, it will make your talks, presentations, contests, and dance floor all the more memorable when your event is unforgettably branded in a way that guests adore. For more event planning insights from the pros, contact us today!
Enjoy this article? Have an event in the works that needs expert planning and branding? We are located in Dubai, but help companies worldwide. Book a consultation and our team would be proud to help you refine your brand and plan an event your guests will never forget.
