Performance - Driven
Event Strategy
What We Do
Portfolio Planning
We work with your team to create strategic plans which include the right mix of 3rd-party trade shows and conferences, and proprietary events to build and accelerate your sales pipeline – in-person, virtual, and hybrid.
Event Strategy
We engineer content, creative, and event experiences to meet business objectives; leveraging audience needs and considering environmental factors and industry trends – evolving insights into actions.
Measurement & Optimization
We identify, develop, and analyze event, digital, attendee, and business metrics to understand event performance and optimize your event marketing program – using both qualitative and quantitative measures.
Audience & Attendee Strategy
We build target audience personas, conduct attendee profiling, and create segmentation strategies that ensure your events are relevant and impactful to the people who matter most – creating targeted, personalized experiences.
Brand Experience
We conduct comprehensive brand experience audits, and develop brand experience platforms and experiential marketing approaches that prescribe the right organizational behaviors before, during and after the sale – moving target audiences from awareness through advocacy.
Competitive & Marketplace Analysis
We offer industry trend analysis, peer and competitive audits, landscape studies, brand positioning, content reviews, share of voice analysis, and other services – differentiating your brand and the experiences you create.
Content Development
We create content strategies, message hierarchies, message maps, syndication approaches, and author everything from event themes and anthems, to presentations and sales enablement content; delivering the right information, in the right format to the right audience – ensuring every element of your event is aligned to your strategic objectives.
Marketing & Audience Acquisition
We build attendee acquisition programs, pricing strategies, omni-channel, digital, email, social media, and mobile marketing approaches – maximizing attendance of the right audiences across your event marketing program and building relationships over time.
Sponsorship & Partner Programs
We develop partner integration programs, sponsorship strategies, prospectuses, and subscription models which align and integrate partners organically – adding business value to partners, enhancing the attendee experience, and monetizing your event marketing program.
Additional Services
Have something else in mind? We've also consulted on event and experiential organizational design and talent development, brand / agency relationships, RFI / RFP support, and other programs. Please let us know what you're thinking and we'll work with you to craft the right solution for your needs.
Who We Are
Experiential Executive LLC is a strategic event and experiential marketing consultancy. We support both brands and agencies. We believe Events are significant expenditures and should provide a meaningful Return on Investment (ROI). Everything we do starts and ends here.
Our Founder, Ian McGonnigal is a seasoned event and experiential marketing executive. He started his career on the brand side working for companies like Bose and GE.
On the agency side, he’s developed and led strategy practices for agencies, exhibit houses, and production companies. These have ranged in size from 50 to well over 1000 employees, such as The George P. Johnson Company and Jack Morton Worldwide.
As a true event strategist, Ian has served as trusted advisor for dozens of clients. Industry expertise includes technology, financial services, manufacturing, CPG, and others.
Ian’s perspectives have been featured in Ad Age, Adweek, Inc., Event Marketer, Exhibitor, BizBash, and other industry blogs, podcasts, and publications. He’s spoken at several industry conferences including CEMA, EDPA Access, ExhibitorLive!, IAEE’s Expo! Expo!, The Experiential Marketing Summit, and countless others. His work has garnered numerous awards from Billboard, Event Marketer, Gartner, and more.
Follow him @ExperientialEx.
Strategic Insights. Business Results.
Our approach to strategy
is simple
- Understand business, brand, marketing,
and sales objectives. - Leverage audience needs, attributes (demographics, psychographics, techno-graphics), perceptions,
and behaviors. - Consider current market, competitive, and industry trends.
From these three building blocks, we identify relevant insights and craft the strategy.
Experience
Testimonials
Norman Aamodt
President, Event Strategy Group
"I highly recommend Ian for event strategy and portfolio planning. Ian has a tremendous process of discovery that becomes the underpinning of successful event programs. He has the experience and knowledge to make great programs better and ones needing work great. #hireIan"
Cathy Breden
Executive Vice President & Chief Operating Officer, IAEE
"Ian is an outstanding leader in B2B and B2C exhibitions and events space. IAEE contracted with Ian to work with our FutureScaping Committee in mapping out the forces and trends impacting the exhibitions industry. He is highly strategic in his thinking and a joy to work with. His knowledge and experience in all facets of marketing provided a unique perspective the committee. I look forward to working with him again in the future."
Chris Drury
President/Founder/CCO, Drury Design Dynamics, Inc.
"Ian is an experienced strategist who is smart, focused, and knowledgeable. He possesses a unique skill set that is a combination of deep industry experience and a hunger to continually learn and adapt to changing industry trends and apply those skills to meet new challenges. He has a deep understanding of vertical markets and the roles within those industries. He understands how to attract customers to events and what they are looking to get from those conferences. He is an asset on any team and a pleasure to work with."
Carlos Haddad
VP/GM Sales, Marketing & Business Development, WATTS Water Technologies
"Ian is a highly creative and dependable executive with tremendous experience In integrated marketing campaigns and content development. He balances well the strategic and operational marketing needs of his clients and was fundamental in some of our most creative projects at Watts."
Justin Mounts
Sr. Director, Global Events, Palo Alto Networks
"Ian has an unparalleled talent for developing effective event marketing strategies, and his creativity and attention to detail are unmatched. In my experience working with him, I was most impressed by his keen understanding of how to develop and manage complex event marketing strategies that span from the portfolio to the business unit level. One of the other things that sets Ian apart is his ability to collaborate effectively with stakeholders at all levels of an organization. He is an excellent communicator and always takes the time to listen to the needs of the client and develop solutions that align with their goals. Ian is an exceptional leader, and his expertise and guidance have been instrumental in helping me achieve some of my most ambitious event goals."
Rory Pumilia
Vice President, Corporate Marketing, Optimizely
"Ian has been a fabulous partner to me since we were introduced just over a year ago. He’s experienced beyond, a long term strategic thinker, and always willing to roll up his sleeves and get into the details. Given the breadth of experience Ian has I never shy away from asking him for guidance across the full spectrum of event strategy and execution for businesses of all size and shape. Ian's approach as a partner, consultant and advisor would be so helpful to any strategic business leader!"
Kristina Schnepf
Sr. Leader, Integrated Business Communications & Branding, The Dow Chemical Company
"Ian's ability to discern the needs, understand the internal appetite and capability and ultimately design a practical and implementable program is remarkable. Ian simplifies the complexity of a problem down to the actionable items and then guides and directs those who need to contribute to the result in a clear and practical manner. He can break a problem down into the necessary steps, define a project plan with milestones and timing and then deliver upon those requirements. He listens to what is needed and palatable by the client and inspires possibilities considered previously unattainable. With the launch of the tradeshow measurement program he designed for us, Ian will have solved an historically unsolvable problem for Dow in about 6 months."
Amy Sondrup
President, Access TCA
"We gave Ian a project—to develop a brand statement for us. Trust me: this is not something you want to do by an internal committee. Ian’s work was exceptional. He was prompt, thorough, and smart. He did a fantastic job of interviewing our employees and distilling their responses to articulate our brand and our brand promise. There was amazing consensus when he delivered his work; we were able to implement it easily. Plus, Ian is fun to work with. I cannot recommend him more highly."
Katharine Tischler
Senior Creative Director, InVision Communications
"I would have been lost without you on this one. Your strategy brief was so impressive – it enabled me to craft a story that resonates both for the target audience of the activation, and for the clients who we’re pitching to. The amount of work you did on the strategy, promotional campaign, sponsorship, and measurement is almost half the deck! And while I know the design team are thinking how much they hate designing charts – the insights you provided are what give the creative meaning. Without your work, we’d just be throwing glitter at slides."
Perspectives
How to Create an Impactful
Executive Keynote Presentation
Delivering a compelling executive keynote presentation is a high-stakes endeavor. Whether you’re addressing a roomful of customers, prospects, partners, analysts, shareholders, your own employees, or the press and media, your presentation must captivate, inspire, and Read more…
Choosing the Right Events:
Seven More Ideas on Event Selection
Choosing the right events is critical in building an effective portfolio. With the right number, type, frequency, and cadence of events you can accelerate your pipeline and maximize your ROI. In our last post, we Read more…
How To Evaluate Third-Party Events:
4 Best Practices
If you’re starting your forward planning and need to evaluate third-party events, this is this place to start. Whether you’re looking at trade shows, conferences, partner events, in-person, virtual, or hybrid, these key considerations will Read more…
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