The surprising ROI of live illustration - How it pays for itself again and again!

“Hmm, this isn’t quite within our budget.”
- some people in our inbox over the years

It’s a sentence we’ve heard before, and we wanna debunk it!

Reasons why we might hear this sentence are:

• We’re literally just not within your budget right now, but this doesn’t mean you’re not interested in working with us.

• You don’t have final sign-off on the cost for your event - someone higher up does, and they don’t understand the value, so they tell you to behave yourself.

• You weren’t expecting the quote you received and don’t know how to match the number on the page to the value on the big day (and beyond!), so you slink out of our DMs.

It’s fine! We still love you! 

BUT. If you’ll allow us to tickle your brain with a bit more context about why you should wiggle your business pennies in our favour, behold… 

5 reasons why live illustration is an investment for your business rather than a cost

1. We nail your brand identity so you don’t have to!

SO. You’ve got to pull off an impressive event which wows people from all angles. Perhaps external humans are coming too. Or perhaps the contents of your event need to be presented to even more people afterwards, or shared on social media.

But arrrgh! While you’re an expert in your field and know how to organise the event and talk the talk on the day, do you have the internal resources to make your event look the part too?

*superhero music plays*

What’s that I see on the horizon? A remote live illustrator who has been given your brand guidelines, your exact colour palette and logos and is fully prepped for what is to come?

Yes, I think it is! Oh, and they draw in real time too? And the drawings are ready the moment your event finishes and can be shared immediately?! AND looping us in will barely take any time because all we need is for you to complete a quick questionnaire?

Oh. Oops… didn’t realise it was that easy and that COOL.

2. We can create communities inside of your events!

Raise your hand if you’ve been on a call and someone has used the terrifying words “We’re now going to send you all into breakout rooms.”

Or if you’ve been at an in person meeting and you’ve been hit with the prospect of being "divided into groups to work on something to present back in 10 minutes”.

OH GOD.

But wait! This is where we can be your best pal! We are your instant visual icebreakers of dreams!

For those of you who cower at group work, and also for those of you who want to spice up this element of your events, the live illustrations (which are happening in real time) can be coordinated to be a part of your break-out discussions.

Why not use the visuals we have produced so far as visual prompts to drive your discussion? We can accompany you into your breakout rooms to support what needs doing and our illustrations can present the findings of those discussions for you!

Our drawings can unite the audience and make them feel reeeeal good.

3. Live illustrations boost your brand and enhance your value to sponsors, partners and your online audience

OOF. Is your event sponsored, or are special guests attending? How about we thwack their name or logo on the final piece and give them some extra visual air time? Ooo-ahhh…

Seriously though, when you’ve got things like this subtly integrated into the illustrations, the people, the partners, the sponsors, the staff, and the messages that really need to be shown off are suddenly in every single share, every repost, every internal slide deck or Slack message… the list goes on.

That’s long-term exposure you can actually measure and feel very swanky about.

4. Your event keeps working long after it ends!

Live illustrations are instant content goldmines. They can be sliced into social posts, dropped into newsletters, printed as posters, turned into GIFs, popped onto big screens or repurposed and used as future training content.

Weeks (and often months!) later, your audience is still bumping into your event online and remembering your message.

5. The real-time element of surprise ramps up engagement

In virtual or hybrid events, real time visuals keep people sooo curious about what’s coming next. Whether they missed an important quote and the live illustrations can serve as a reminder, or they’re keen to see how a particular round table talk has been condensed into bite sized pictures, it’s the secret ingredient in terms of keeping people on the ball and constantly wondering.

This can reduce mid-session drop-offs, keep chats buzzing, and keep people’s eyes well and truly peeled! It’s still quite niche seeing a live illustrator at events, so your audience will feel like they are part of something special unfolding in real time and won’t want to miss a beat.

Need a hand convincing someone that live illustration really is the ticket for your next event? Wiggle this blog post under their noses.

Or, you can always just… 

x Illustrated Live