Natalie Torin is the owner of Curnon Consulting, a boutique agency that promotes luxury brands in the UK. She previously served as Director of Partnerships at Surf Air Europe, and carries with her five years of experience in the private jet industry and broad knowledge of event marketing, management, and corporate partnerships. A well-known marketer and influencer, she has a lot to share about luxury business management.
In this interview, Natalie gives her expert opinion on the importance of event marketing for premium brands, the way to organize a successful event, and typical mistakes to avoid. For instance, have you ever wondered what works best when it comes to organizing events - small gatherings or big ones? How do you choose the right venue, and why is this choice so important? Here are Natalie’s thoughts on these and other questions related to luxury business marketing.
The Importance of Events for a Luxury Business
Luxury brands depend heavily on their reputation, and one of the best ways to enhance a brand’s image is to organize an event for potential customers.
We all long for meaningful relationships. So it is much more engaging for clients to build a relationship with a company on a personal level rather than through email conversations or what they read online. Events also enable brands to draw attention to their products and services in a meaningful and organic way.
How to Organize a Successful Event
Events create memorable real-life experiences, which serve as a remarkable tool for luxury business promotion, increasing brand awareness and gaining customers’ trust. Events are more memorable and engaging than, for instance, digital marketing ads, since they give customers a real feel for a company’s values, vision, and projected lifestyle. Below, Natalie shares her principles on how to organize the perfect event for a luxury brand.
Keep It Small and Meaningful
To Natalie, while there is value in large conferences, she believes that for luxury brands small events work best. Smaller events let you carefully curate the guest list, so you can invite only people that share similar values and interests. It will create a pleasant atmosphere where the guests feel safe, relevant, and understood. They benefit from making new contacts and sharing ideas. On a smaller event, keeping everyone interested and involved is easier as well.
Get to Know Guests on a Deeper Level
Rather than bringing people together to sell them something, use the event as an opportunity to find out what your potential customers want. Speaking with your guests about their life interests and values will show them that you want to know them better and build a relationship, exactly as expected of a luxury brand.
Moreover, you’ll get some valuable insights into the lifestyle of your guests. That can lead you to new ideas on how can you make your products and services to resonate with their lifestyle even better.
Bringing relevant speakers would help guests open up and spark meaningful discussions, as commenting on a speech is an easy way to start a conversation.
Choose the Right Venue
A venue projects an image of who you want to align yourself with as a brand. Think outside the box when you choose a location for your event and find a truly unique place. According to Natalie, Le Bijou properties is an excellent site for hosting such events.
Make Sure You Select an Appropriate Format
As a luxury brand, you have to decide how your event promotes the message you want to be associated with. The people coming to your event will learn about the lifestyle that your brand projects, so choose the event format wisely. For instance, make sure you’re on the same page with the celebrities you invite. Do they represent your brand’s values? Are they supporting the things you’re advocating for? What is their reputation? What will be the “aftertaste”? Only invite the influencers who will enhance your customers’ trust.
Invite Corporate Partners
Potentially, a person who likes one brand in the luxury industry may be interested in another one as well. Through a corporate partnership, you may find companies that would like to cater to a particular audience you are organizing an event for. Including other brands that are aligned with your brand values will only improve the attractiveness and the status of your event.
As an example, Natalie shares how for a private jet company, it makes sense to approach companies that offer luxury accommodation or yachting services, as well as firms that provide other business services associated with the travel industry.
Such collaborations add value for clients and allow the companies to split costs for the event that they organize together. Eventually, it leads to mutual promotion when both brands find ways to promote each other to their clients.
Typical Mistakes You Should Avoid
First and foremost, the biggest mistake you can make is having the wrong balance of clients, corporate partners, and potential clients at your event. Potential clients don’t want to be in a room with people who keep trying to sell them something. At the same time, corporate partners are trying to meet their target audience. So, to make everyone comfortable, manage the number of partners you invite and have a facilitator to handle the flow of the event.
Another common mistake is inviting people to fill the room instead of focusing on the people who are genuinely aligned with your brand values. By being intentional with your guest list, those who come to experience your brand will grow more loyal towards it. As a result, they may become your customers or even committed fans in the future.
The final thing to avoid is a lack of clarity about the purpose of the event. People may like the venue, the entertainment, and the food, but they may have no idea what’s going on at your event. Make sure your event is not just another social gathering, but something that adds value. There is no silver bullet, but you may want to think along the lines of bringing relevant, mindful speakers and inviting guests that would be almost certainly delighted to meet each other.
Final Thoughts
Every interaction with your client is an opportunity to strengthen your relationships and enhance their loyalty towards your brand. Event marketing provides a perfect opportunity to do it. Although organizing a luxury event requires a lot of time and effort, with the right approach it pays off. Consider this powerful tool as a way to take your luxury brand to a new level.