The BBB Foundations’ Torch and Spark Awards celebrate businesses that put trust, integrity, and strong business practices at the center of their work. Reaching the businesses eligible for recognition and encouraging community members to attend the ceremonies requires thoughtful promotion across multiple channels. For BBB Great West + Pacific, the 2026 awards campaign brought together email, social media, and digital advertising to build awareness, encourage applications, and increase registrations to the awards ceremony held on October 29th, 2026. Through targeted event marketing services, the campaign helped connect these awards with the audience most likely to participate.
BBB Great West + Pacific works to build trust in the marketplace and support businesses that make a positive difference in their communities. The Torch Awards recognize established businesses committed to ethical practices, while the Spark Awards celebrate emerging entrepreneurs building their companies around strong values, positive workplace cultures, and community involvement. Promoting the 2026 awards gave BBB an opportunity to connect with businesses across their region and encourage them to apply for recognition.
BBB also wanted to promote the Restoring Trust program, which connects people facing contractor fraud with trustworthy businesses willing to provide help through donated services, materials, and labor.
To help promote these initiatives, BBB Great West + Pacific partnered with Real FiG Advertising + Marketing to reach relevant audiences, increase awareness, and encourage participation. The campaign needed to support different goals, from generating awards applications and ceremony registration to raising awareness of the Restoring Trust program. We developed a coordinated digital strategy using event marketing services to help BBB promote these initiatives across multiple channels and connect with the people who could make a difference.
Promoting the Awards Through Multiple Channels
Reaching potential applicants and event attendees takes a thoughtful approach to communication. By combining several digital marketing tactics, the campaign helped keep the Torch and Spark Awards, and the Restoring Trust program in front of relevant audiences.
The campaign included several key efforts:
- Email Campaigns: Email marketing helped promote awards applications, share ceremony information, and raise awareness of the Restoring Trust program.
- Organic Social Media: Social content across LinkedIn and Meta helped share campaign messaging and keep the awards and programs visible.
- Paid Social Advertising: Paid campaigns expanded the reach of promotional content and helped connect with potential applicants and attendees.
- Paid Search, Display, and Programmatic Advertising: These campaigns created additional opportunities to reach relevant audiences and direct them toward application and registration information.
Using these channels together created multiple opportunities for audiences to learn about the awards and take action. This coordinated approach to event marketing services supported applications, ceremony registrations, and awareness of BBB’s broader initiatives.
Tracking Applications and Event Registrations
Monthly reporting helped our team and BBB monitor campaign performance and track activity related to awards applications and ceremony registrations. Reports provided insight into key performance indicators across the different marketing channels, helping evaluate how well the campaign supported its goals. Some of the key results* include:
- Around an 8% increase in total applications year-over-year
- A 55.97% increase in ceremony registrations year-over-year
- A 5.63% year-over-year increase in email traffic during the Application phase (May 1st – July 12th)
- A 164.18% year-over-year increase in organic social traffic during the application phase (May 1st – July 12th)
*It’s important to note that the traffic by source was only to the pages we were directly influencing (BBB Award pages).
These results provide a clearer picture of how the campaign performed across channels and where marketing efforts helped support participation. Consistent reporting also gave the team information to guide future outreach and campaign planning.
Supporting BBB’s Mission Through Strategic Marketing
Promoting the Torch and Spark awards, as well as the Restoring Trust program, required a coordinated effort across email, social media, and digital advertising. At Real FiG, we develop strategic campaigns that connect organizations with the audiences they want to reach and help them measure progress toward their goals. Our work with BBB shows how our event marketing services can support award applications, increase ceremony registrations, and build awareness of community programs through a strategy tailored to each initiative.
Planning an awards ceremony or community initiative? Contact us to learn how we can help you reach the right audience.
