Another Stupid Marketing Trick… Has This Happened to You?

I have a new entry on my ever-growing list of “Stupid Marketing Tricks That Give Marketers a Bad Name” — Calendar Spam.


It works like this…


Tricky Marketer gets your email address. Maybe you opted in to Tricky’s list. Maybe not.


Tricky schedules a public event — a workshop, webinar, whatever.


Tricky puts that event on their Google (or other) online calendar.


Tricky adds your email to the list of event invitees in their online calendar.


You open your calendar (Google, Apple, whatever) and you notice an entry that you didn’t put there.


You click to open the event on your calendar, and you see a “description” that’s really a sales letter — headlines, bullets, all that stuff — to promote the event…

…that you didn’t register to attend.


Tricky hopes you’ll look past the fact that he spammed your calendar and attend the event.

My response: CUT IT OUT, TRICKY!


I opted in to receive your emails. That doesn’t mean you have the right to plop your event onto my calendar without my permission.


I figure some Goo-Roos are out there teaching this as the latest, greatest tactic du jour to put butts in online event seats.


And maybe it works — in the short run.


But if you have to resort to tricks like this to boost attendance at your events, you probably have other issues with your marketing machine that need attention.


I’ve been doing this for more than 25 years, and I know…

…you don’t need the dirty tricks to make your marketing work.


Here’s the irony in this story:


This calendar invitation tactic is actually a GREAT way to boost attendance at your event IF you use it with people who actually register to attend.


Most marketers rely solely on reminder emails to boost attendance at their events. Someone signs up. You send them a bunch of emails reminding them to attend.


What if you also could send them a calendar invitation — automatically — so your event shows up on their calendar immediately after they register?


I’ve done this for myself and my clients and noticed an immediate boost in event attendance — more than 20% in some cases.


The key is to automate the process so you don’t have to manually enter the email address of every registrant in your calendar software. With the right automation, the event appears on their calendar right when they sign up, and you don’t have to lift a finger.


Want to see how it’s done? I shot a video that walks through it step by step.


Reply to this email with “boost attendance,” and I’ll send you the video.