Before the magic of social media, promoting an event meant shelling out loads of money for traditional advertising and having a dependence on good word of mouth. But the internet and all these new platforms now make promoting events easier and more cost-efficient for you. We said easier, not easy, because, well, all good results take work, right?
So you’ve got an event, and you need some heads to fill up seats. Where do you start? The most important thing to do is to make sure your event is easy to register or buy tickets for. No one wants to find out about an event through Facebook and then have to call in a number to buy tickets. How annoying, right? Luckily, you can use a professional site like eventbrite.com that makes it easy for people to register and purchase tickets for your event.
Draft up some wording for your event. Make it catchy, succinct and appealing, and remember to include all the necessary information (location, times, dates, etc). If you can, design a simple flyer or a graphic with this information that you can use universally across all platforms. This will make it easier for you, and your audience will appreciate graphics versus text.
Now for the fun part. Use your flyers and wording and publicize it all over your social media networks. For Facebook, create an event and invite all of your friends. If your event is recurring, consider creating a separate Facebook fan page for the event so that you can build a fan base for the future. Tweet the Facebook event link out through Twitter, and use hashtags about topics that relate to your event.
And don’t underestimate the power of LinkedIn! Send out messages to all of your LinkedIn contacts about your event. You can mass message up to 50 contacts at a time, but we like to send each message out individually.
There you have it: basics to get you started on publicizing your event through social media. The possibilities are plentiful, and most of these tactics will cost you just your time and dedication. Good luck!
