Conferences are really important occasions to make sure that your logo is seen by EVERYONE. But is it possible to over brand?
Branding is a really important element to get right when organising a conference. Often your marketing department will be falling over themselves to provide branded give-aways and pop ups to help connect the corporate brand with the prestige of organising such an event. Any sponsors will be doing the same.
When you are thinking about amplifying your event it is important to consider how this branding will look to your remote audience. Here are a few observations based on our experience helping event organisers to brand their amplified events:
Good Practice
Video Branding
There are lots of opportunities to add logos and overlay graphics to your live video stream or post-event videos. Make sure you liaise with your event amplifier or video producer to ensure they have high resolution versions of your logo and know how to use them to ensure your video output matches your corporate branding.
Social Media Branding
If you are planning to use existing corporate social media channels to amplify your event, these should already be properly branded. However, if you are planning to set up dedicated conference channels, you will need to consider how best to differentiate these from your normal corporate channels, whilst maintaining consistent branding.
All of your event social media channels should include a link back to your main corporate presence.
Slide Branding
Online slide decks shared via services such as Slideshare are likely to be the most-viewed online resources resulting from your event. It is therefore imperative that you get the branding of these right.
If you are planning to collect your speakers’ slides and upload them to Slideshare from your corporate account, I recommend circulating a conference slide template to all of your speakers well in advance and requesting that they use this when preparing their slides for the event.
If you are designing a conference template for your event, make sure you leave a prominent space on the opening slide for your speaker’s institutional or company logo. Some speakers feel they should use their own corporate slide templates, but space to promote their employer should help address any concerns. I also suggest including a space for speakers to add their Twitter handle and other contact information on the opening slide.
Bad Practice
Pompous Pop-Ups
From a video production perspective, pop-up displays are always a major headache at events. Everyone wants to have their pop up clearly visible in shot, but they NEVER look straight both to the audience in the room and the camera at the same time, and can often make the stage area look cluttered and over branded.
I encourage to clients to provide the video producer with the logo graphics to use as appropriate, and to concentrate on making the stage area look tidy and professional. Sponsors can be offered a space for their to be displayed logo at the end of the video.
I’m not completely against pop-up banners at events, but they do not need to be in shot when filming. You need to allow your videographer to frame the shot to best flatter the speaker, rather than insisting that the pop up or other branding elements be in shot. The final video will always look better.
Neglecting to Link
Pasting your logo everywhere is all very well, but the best way to get an online viewer to engage (and potentially do business) with you is to provide a link.
When posting video footage or slides from conferences online, we always include all the relevant links we can find in the video description to help viewers locate what they need. That includes the organiser’s corporate website link, and links to the speaker’s slides and other materials. This space can also be used for sponsor links.
As the organiser, you need to make sure that whoever is posting your conference content online has all the relevant links and uses them appropriately to draw attention to your brand and your sponsors, without getting in the way of viewers enjoying the content.
Final Thoughts
When you are planning your event amplification strategy it is important to discuss how you want your brand to be presented, and what opportunities exist for promoting yourself and your sponsors online in an appropriate way.
Whatever you do, please don’t get over-zealous with the pop up banners!
Need Help?
If you would like help filming or live video streaming a conference, or any assistance with video post-production, please contact [email protected] to discuss your needs and get a quote.