How To Market Your Event With Social Media – Tips From The Experts
The series on event marketing with social media continues with a very cool post. Cool because I have the input from some social media super-peeps!
You can easily build a community around your event or take the event and plug it into your already existing community. Sites like Twitter and Facebook are important mediums for pre-event, on-site, and post-event marketing. For instance, by listening to the event community they can help create content for you as an exhibitor – helping you to determine what you should be highlighting at your booth.
I asked a few of the top Social Media experts on Twitter for their best tip or pet peeve when using social media to market an event and have compiled their replies. They only had 140 characters to reply so everyone was forced to be direct…except Mari Smith who sent her reply in 3 separate tweets. Leave it to a woman to think outside the box! 
Expert Tips on Social Media Event Marketing
Jason Falls, One of the most in-demand speakers in the social media space and Author of Social Media Explorer shared,
“Stop thinking about events as a push (awareness) tactic and find ways to let attendees tell the story before, during and after.”
Marketing your event with social media is not really much different than marketing anything else with social media. There is a culture and a code to be followed before you can start shouting from the rooftops. The power of a referral from a friend, the third party story, or an engaging ongoing conversation is much more effective than just y-o-u telling the story. Give your attendees something to talk about with insider info or images, like the stages being set up, exclusive interviews with the Speakers, or even a little post event party pictures that show everyone cutting loose. The point is to get them talking…
John Jantsch, award winning Social Media Publisher and Author of DuctTape Marketing said,
“Find ways to connect online and offline – get everyone at the event to connect on both.”
One of the best things about attending a live event is the face to face networking. It’s fun to put a face to the words and leads to long lasting business relationships and special friendships that will carry over into the online world. While I was at Blogworld I had Twitter friends following the sessions I was in, encouraging me to break through my fear of meeting my mentors, and even trying to do the intros for me! All the attendees used Twitter to follow each other as well…where to meet for lunch, drinks, and which sessions rocked or sucked. Every social network out there was flooded with Blogworld updates. Now, that’s buzz.
Warren Whitlock, Social Media Strategist, Author of Twitter Revolution provided the tip that has rung home with me all week:
“Remember there are always more people who wish they were there at event. Involve them through social media”
Not everyone can make it to your event, especially if it involves travel, but by posting updates live from the event you are involving and educating your community. Giving goes a long way in social media. Sharing live event updates also lets outsiders know the quality of the event, makes them want to be there next time, and a little jealous that they’re not there now. The next time one of your events rolls around those people will make it a goal not to miss it again!
By the way, If you’re still on the fence about the power of social media and the measure of influence it has on the population at large, be sure to watch the video that Warren has posted on his blog! I think you’ll get the drift in a whole new way.
Mike Stelzner, Author of Writing White Papers, Founder of Social Media Examiner, and brainchild behind the Social Media Success Summit has proven his talent in creating unstoppable event buzz around events by using the best ROI (Rate of Influence) from well known names with big followings. Mike’s tip was:
“Partner with firestarters and ask them to help you get out the word.”
In Mike’s interview with Fast Company he elaborated: “If you think about certain people in your industry that have a following, those people are fire starters. They’re the kind of people that can drop a match into the fuel, which is their audience and their followers, and people will pick it up and they will carry it and the fire will burn”.
Mari Smith, Relationship Marketing Specialist and Social Media Business Coach, says
“Ensure promotion is cross-platform: Include your Facebook profile and fan page, Twitter, blog, email list and YouTube… but come from buzz/excitement, get peeps involved and talking about your event. Build a community & talk about WIIFM (What’s In It For Me)…. many tips in one. More like a complete strategy!!“
Mari also writes for the Social Media Examiner and has some very handy tips in her post 10 Tips for Creating Buzz With Facebook Events. One tip Mari suggests is to send a personal message to those registered with the time of the event in their own time zone. As the organizer you should always be the one taking the extra step to make things simple and easy for your guests and speakers.
I’d say these are some pretty insightful tips to get the creative juices flowing for ideas of your own. What do you think? Leave your comments and thoughts below and please share if you found this helpful.
To Your Success,
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Tagged as: Event Marketing · Marketing With Social Media
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Excellent post, Coree!!! There are so many creative ways to let people know about events via social media – I love what Warren says that there will always be more people who wish they could’ve attended, so involve them via social media!!
I find events I attend that don't encourage (or even – gasp – allow) tweeting are just not the same at all. I LOVE to be able to share nuggets and live-tweet a really good keynote to share with my followers so they can attend vicariously! I find it's also a great way to retain the content better because I have to pay super close attention.
Thank you Mari! Means a lot coming from you. I totally agree about the live-tweeting and retaining content. I've also used my tweets as notes to go back to for later content.
I don't understand the concept behind the no-tweet event unless it's some super secret pre-launch event. Maybe there is the thought that if someone didn't pay to attend that they shouldn't be allowed to participate, but with that the event is so limited and will never grow to it's full viral potential.
If I know there is an event going on that I was unable to attend, I will check the hashtag on TweetChat while it's still going on and join in a little. I can usually tell by the tweets going out whether it's an event, speaker, or attendee that I really want to be involved with.
Thanks for stopping by, Mari. I have learned so much from you and appreciate all your work and your ever present smile!
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I've interviewed the people that produce large events I attend and asked how social media affect them.
Those that are embracing it report increase attendance and marketing budget savings. Those holding out wonder why event attendance is off
Lot's a good ideas from some great folks here!
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Wow. Great post and great tips. Thanks for asking me to be a part of it. Gonna bookmark this for future reference. Thanks for putting it together.
I can attest to that, Warren. I've spoken with several event producers and speakers, two in particular, that are really set in their ways about using only traditional marketing for their events and they are struggling with both attendance and interest levels.
What worked 25 years ago is not as effective anymore with this evolution in marketing. Those that don't jump in now are going to miss the boat or be doing some labor intensive catch up later.
I would love to see more of your findings from the interviews you have conducted. Perhaps we might collaborate with each other on some level to produce a new report?
Thanks so much for your input and participating. You are a rockstar!
Thanks Mike…I'm so glad I had the opportunity to get your input!
I attended Social Media Success Summit 09 and your presentation sharing your tactics on creating & promoting the event was spectacular! I was so very impressed with each of the powerful speakers. The education and value I got from SMSS is really what set me on fire to delve into the social media event marketing.
I won my ticket from Charles Bohannan & Chris Garret through a promotion I heard about via social media. There are so many creative ways to promote events by word of mouth…contests being one I am especially fond of!
Thanks so much for the tremendous amount of value you provide!
Thank you for being a part, Jason! Your tip on getting the attendees talking is right on. Hehe..I remember the video that Chad Vader did to promote Blogworld that I saw on Chris Brogan's blog…just goes to show you that we don't always have to be fact & figures to promote events. It's fun to give people something to smile about and send to others without being an in-your-face pitch.
The Tweet Up that you and Chris put together was a big hit too. Without actually promoting Blogworld “the event”, but inviting people to come casually hang out with all the top speakers, was a very effective promotion as well. Very sneaky, Jason. Must be one of the reasons I like you.
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