While you might be focusing on your event planning business strategies today, there are important marketing trends to look out for in 2023. We’ve done all the SEO-related heavy lifting for you and assembled what event planning marketers need to know to prepare. Incorporate these insights and methods into your marketing strategy and set your business up for ultimate success, growth, and scaling!
Optimizing for Various Channels
As we head into 2023, marketers should be prepared to embrace new search methods, including a variety of channels. Your target audience isn’t just searching by text. The widespread adoption of voice technology devices and apps allows users to also search by voice command. This means your content, event website, and ads should be aligned with potential voice commands just as much as text keywords. Right now, 41% of adults use voice search every day. Be open to other search options, too, including image searching, which could be a popular method for people searching for event-related ideas.
Mobile-Friendly Is an Absolute Must
Mobile-friendly websites and landing pages have always been important. But if you’re not verifying any new designs before launching, you could be putting out not-so-mobile-friendly messaging. Remember, everyone is using their phones and tablets for quick searches, including to find key event details. Having a mobile-friendly presence with every online touch point is an absolute must in 2023.
The Value of Positive User Experiences
Another SEO priority event planners should focus on in 2023 involves both user intent and user experiences. User intent refers to the goal of your target user that has prompted them to initiate a search. What are they looking for exactly? In your case, someone might be looking for “New York event planners” or “upcoming events.” Knowing how your audience thinks before searching will help you develop messages that respond to those needs.
Secondarily, there is user experience. And this concept involves how your target user “feels” and “thinks” when they encounter your brand, see your ad, or arrive at your event planning website. Designing every touch point through a lens of inspiring positive thoughts and feelings will improve your SEO. If interacting with you is complicated or demanding, your visitors will disengage. So, keep both user intent and user experience in mind when designing your digital asset.
Page Loading Speeds
This may seem like a no-brainer element of SEO. But there’s more to it, especially for online brands going into 2023. Google launched its “Core Web Vitals” ranking feature that gauges the efficiency of online website experiences. And if your event planning website or special event landing pages are bogging down in load speeds, you’ll lose SEO ground. Google’s ranking feature will particularly measure the following:
- How long the largest element on your page takes to load completely
- How many elements move around on the page during loading
- How long the elements on your site or page take to respond when clicked
Keep these metrics in mind with your marketing. Page speeds will matter more than ever in 2023. And it’s generally a best practice to audit all of your pages quarterly.
Content Still Rules the Roost
Event planners like you are great at coming up with creative ways to engage clients and event attendees. Use those same creative juices to develop a robust content strategy for your online presence. Whether it's blogs, social media posts, or LinkedIn thought leadership, content is still king in 2023. Produce valuable content your target audiences NEED to consume. Solve your target prospects’ problems in the opening statement. Provide insights that only you can attest to as a method for positioning yourself as an authoritative voice. Just don’t head into next year’s marketing plan without a carefully thought-out content strategy.
SERPs Are Smarter (Don’t Cheat)
Marketers who claim to specialize in SEO and search engine results pages (SERPs) will sometimes advise certain keyword strategies and content guidelines that aren’t going to be effective in 2023. Google’s algorithms continue to change, and they’re smarter now, especially with the adoption of artificial intelligence. And “outguessing” those algorithms won’t provide sustainable results. Avoid keyword stuffing your blogs, and don’t try to cheat the system. You might get lucky a few times, but in the end, it’s data-driven content, relevant keywords, effective linking, and frequency that will improve SEO in the long run.
Collect and Use Every Piece of Data
Not all event planning marketing plans are created equal. In fact, your strategy will be unique from those of your colleagues and competitors. So, while it’s always a good idea to keep up with SEO trends and recommendations, nothing should substitute a plan you develop from your own analytics. In 2023, the landscape will look different online, and dynamics will routinely change. The only way to make ongoing improvements with your SEO strategy is to rely on your data and metrics. Monitor your mobile tracking. Enable site search bar tracking to see what people do when they arrive on your website. Find which landing pages are generating the most traffic and build similar elements into your other pages. Equally important is identifying what isn’t working, so you can quickly adapt and adjust. Make sure you’re collecting and measuring your data to ensure your strategies get the results you need.
Keep these SEO insights in mind as you develop your marketing strategies for 2023. And don’t forget to bookmark The Event Planner Expo 2023 page and get on the waitlist!
