Much has been written about how to introduce people to a new product or service. But little has been said about how to promote an event. It doesn't matter if it's a conference, webinar, ball, exhibition, concert, or any other type of event, most of the time, there is a lot of work involved. The organizer often devotes a lot of time and money to it. Everyone wants to make sure that the energy spent is not wasted and that as many people as possible come to the event.
Promotion of an event can be tricky though. When promoting a product or service doesn't work out, there's usually an opportunity to try again and do better. But with an event, you don't have the opportunity to make amends. You don't attract potential attendees, the event takes place in a half-empty hall and the organizer can only feel disappointed. How to avoid this is the subject of our article today. We'll talk about promoting your event through the most powerful weapon the modern age has to offer - social media.
What is the power of social media?
In the past, we would use posters or flyers for local events, or print ads, billboards or radio and TV announcements for larger events. Today, with few exceptions, all organizers take advantage of social media. It's not just that they are cost-effective and can reach a large target group, even more importantly, organizers can interact with their participants. Before, during and after the event. This is a great advantage.
Facebook is the most effective tool
Facebook is the one we will be focusing on exclusively. You can also promote an event via Instagram or Twitter, but Facebook is still the most effective tool. It uses both text and images, so it's perfect for getting the word out about an upcoming event. You can set up an "Event" directly there, a page dedicated solely to your event. The best way to do this is to create it from your company or institution profile.
How to do it? Open the main menu on the top right and you will find the "Event" icon. You click on "Create Event" and next you fill in what Facebook will ask you to do. We recommend completing all the steps, including choosing an appropriate profile photo and event description. This should be created by a skilled copywriter so that the description makes it feel like an important event that should definitely not be missed.
What to publish? Guest profiles, organizational information, and catering photos
Don't forget about the copywriter afterward. Once the event is created, the work of promotion doesn't end. Frequent, ideally daily or bi-daily posts should fill the event wall. What content to create here? The gradual unveiling method works well. If you're planning a conference, introduce a new speaker every day. Don't spit out the most interesting names right at the beginning, introduce them gradually. Music festival organizers do this too, sometimes saving the biggest stars for the very end.
But of course, you should also publish the essential organizational information - where the event takes place, what time it starts and ends, how much the entrance fee is, and what the accompanying program is. Don't forget that some people are a bit superficial and posts with photos of your carefully selected speakers won't interest them. However, photos of upcoming catering may make them click. So post those too. These posts generate a response, and that's what you want.
Fake a rush every now and then
In order to spread awareness of your event, you want to get the word out. Facebook's algorithms favor posts that are highly discussed. That's why you can fake a rush every now and then. It's a trick, of course, but it can be effective. You and your colleagues should use your likes to draw attention to particularly relevant posts. And sometimes, one of you can post a comment. If possible, of course, be sophisticated, so that it comes across as natural. "I know these lecture halls, they are beautiful spaces." "I saw this speaker at last year's conference, it was a great presentation."
Hold a contest
A strategy that works great for event marketing is organizing contests. Social media users are competitive people. Experience shows that posts announcing a contest show 10 times more interest from users compared to other posts. As an event organizer, you certainly want as many paying attendees as possible to show up, yet we recommend considering giving away 5 free tickets as part of a contest, for example. Come up with a game that encourages attendees to actively engage under your event posts. Better yet, get them to share awareness of the event on their personal profiles. You may sponsor 5 people to attend the event, but in turn, you get 30 new paying attendees.
PPC campaign
To ensure greater participation in the event, you need to dig into your pocket and pay for PPC ads. With a PPC campaign, you are assured that people within your target audience will hear about the event. Just go to Facebook Ads Manager and start setting up your campaign. Facebook has got it all worked out intuitively. You can set your audience by age, location, gender, educational attainment and hobbies. Whether you're running an event for gamers, doctors, IT specialists, artists or fast car enthusiasts, you can get your campaign up and running in a matter of minutes. It's a good idea to set up your paid posts with someone who has experience. But it's not rocket science and it's possible to learn on your own.
Practical example - how to bring people to a cipher game
The author of this article organized the first edition of the cipher game. It is a niche event that will only attract a specific group of users. In addition, in this case, it was not possible to use PPC campaigns because it was a charity event. Nevertheless, in the first year, the game managed to get almost 200 participants, which was a great success. The reason for this was the successful introduction of the event on Facebook. In the case of this event, it is enough to regularly create playful posts, show photos of the process of making ciphers or directly publish some practice ciphers. Every day about 5 new participants were added to the Facebook event. An organic discussion started at the posts. When creativity is involved, one can get much more than the expected number of participants. And it doesn't have to cost a penny.
So next time you organize an event, make sure you use all the tactics above! And if you want to hand it to the BOOM experts so you can focus on different things, just contact Alfred and choose one of our marketing packages.