Social media has emerged as an excessively powerful means for promoting an event. Starting from generating interest to building engagement with keen attendees and finally increasing attendance, social media can help in achieving all the targets. Here are some very simple yet powerful ways to take full advantage of social media in increasing the buzz around and about your event.
1. Move ahead with a plan:
Make a planned schedule of promotional activities for social media. It is very important to have a content calendar in place. A deliberate plan of action on how you intend to generate more buzz about the event is essential to the entire promotional plan. Contact your network of influences(including the customers, friends, bloggers, correspondents as well as business partners) and request their help in gaining momentum for the event. Very importantly, use social media to create buzz and not noise, so do not bombard people with requests.
2. Special landing page on your website:
Create a unique landing page on your website for the event. The unique URL of this landing page will prove to be helpful in creating buzz on social media, ensure that the URL is not very long, precise and easy to remember. On this landing page prominently add social media share buttons but avoid using third party share buttons, as they create clutter. Stick to using share buttons of social media websites that matter, keep this number limited to 3-4.
3. Make a trailer that people can share:
Make a stellar trailer with captivating visuals and sound. This trailer will not only help in promoting the event but also increase the chance of being shared by individuals on social media websites. The trailer content can also include snippets from previous events or even clips of event's speaker delivering a speech. Keep the video brief, to the point and not be longer than two minutes. Upload this video on Youtube and share it on all the main social media channels!
4. Top social media sites:
a) Facebook:
Create a Facebook event and add every possible detail to it. Forward invitations of this event to all the fans and friends in your Facebook profile. Keep the potential attendees engaged by updating the events page on everyday basis. For bigger events, you can even create a special Facebook Page.
b) Twitter:
Using Twitter to promote an event becomes all the more interesting. That is simply because, on Twitter you can create a hashtag unique to the event which will help you keep track of the user tweets. Occasionally reply to other people's tweets along with the hashtag, to increase engagement. Use this hashtag in all your official tweets.
c) LinkedIn
LinkedIn had an Events app, which was shut done in November 2012. Bad move! The only way to promote an events on LinkedIn is to post updates about it on the Company's Page or Profile Page. Not very interesting, but still a good platform to create buzz amongst general public about the event.
d) Google+
The events feature on Google+ is appreciable. On Google+ the events can be divided into three phases -prior to the event
- during the event
- after the event
It is easy to customize the event with video content and invitations to attract more attention of general public. Also, similar to Twitter, Google+ allows the use hashtags, so use the same hashtag that you are using on Twitter to maintain consistency.
5) Live reporting:
Live reporting through blogging and real-time tweeting while the event is still in progress allows those who were interested in the event, but are unable to attend the same, to be a part of the event. This keeps the people engaged and interested in the event even if they are not present at the event. Thus, increasing footfall for the next year's event.
Remember that one you really use social media to its advantage if the online promotion is initiated long before the event. Prepare a detailed strategy that is all inclusive of what social media promotion you plan to do prior to the event, during, and after. Make it very easy to share and forward content or photos associated with the event on social media websites.