Tips On Creating A Successful Event Marketing Campaign
When you’re hosting an event, there are several preliminary steps taken to ensure a successful event is put on. One of those steps is to promote the event, and we’re going to focus on event marketing over social media. We’ll go through the necessary elements of a successful event marketing campaign, starting from before the event occurs, to after the event has happened.
What to do Before the Event…
Create a unique hashtag specifically for the event. This hashtag should be unique to your brand, it should be short enough to fit in most tweets, and it should be memorable.
By implementing a branded hashtag for your event, everyone who attends or has something to say related to the event can funnel their messages and comments into one community of posts. But, the branded hashtag must be short. Having a long hashtag will discourage people from using it. Longer hashtags are more likely to be misspelled, and they are less likely to be used. In addition, a short branded hashtag will have an easier time fitting into the 140 characters of a tweet. But, it’s not enough to have a short and branded hashtag. To take full advantage of your hashtag, it has to be memorable enough that it sticks with people. Be creative, use alliteration, create something that everyone can relate to, not something that’s too clever or difficult for people to understand. The easier it is to remember, the more likely it’ll be used, expanding the reach of the hashtag.
Create a plan to promote the event on various social media channels.
You can begin by categorizing the different social media channels into level of importance. Once you’ve done that, begin scheduling your messages to go out for each social media platform. Be sure to include the specifics of your event in social media posts.
For Facebook, you can create an event on Facebook and invite friends from your Facebook list of friends. Depending on your privacy settings, the event can be promoted to a large audience, or it can be invite-only. You can insert all the necessary event details into the description section and set a date for the event to remind attendees. On Twitter, you can create tweet templates that have the event details already written out, and be sure to use the event hashtag in all your tweets.
Promote event’s social media content offline.
If you use any traditional marketing methods, such as creating posters and flyers, then be sure to use your event hashtag. This way, those who are not associated with your brand through social media can still promote your event using their own social media profiles. Using the hashtag will group their posts with the rest of the posts using the same event hashtag.
Use social media ads that are targeted towards certain people.
You can use Facebook ads to boost the presence of old posts and have them pop up in the news feed of users in a certain location. By doing so, you can get your event’s details out to a larger audience that is close to the actual event.
What to do During the Event…
Engage with event attendees using social media. When doing so, be sure to use the event hashtag.
Your event marketing campaign is a big component of your event promotion, so it’s important to stay active on social media during the event. By using a social media management platform, such as Hootsuite, you can interact with attendees, track event engagement in various ways, and address any complaints or concerns regarding the event.
Promotional campaigns at the event itself can help with engagement and benefit the overall experience of the event.
There are several ways of incorporating a promotional campaign at your event. You can implement a reward system for users who use the event hashtag in their posts. There could be a raffle or a prize given to attendees who submit posts using the event hashtag or who write reviews on your brand’s social channels. These are great ways to entertain your guests, while increasing your social media engagement and promoting your brand.
Have a live feed of social media posts displayed at the event.
This would only work if there were a monitor or large screen that is capable of displaying social media posts. But, attendees would be much more likely to utilize the event hashtag and promote the event and the brand if they saw their posts being highlighted by the company. People love attention, and seeing one of their posts displayed for the whole event to see would generate a lot of attention.
What to do After the Event…
Narrate the event through social media.
By doing so, you can transform the event into a story. This post-event narrative can include photos, videos, posts from attendees, and all the greatest moments from the event. You can use programs and tools like Storify to create the perfect post-event narrative.
It’s important to have attendees give reviews of the event on social media.
By having guests write reviews for your event, your brand will get a lot more attention. People can discuss what they liked and what they didn’t like, so you can plan ahead for your next event.
It’s important to also review your performance on social media. You can see which posts garnered the most attention and what types of posts were most popular among users. This can help you when you’re putting on your next event.
