Promoting an upcoming event using your social media platforms is a great way to increase awareness, build excitement and reach more people.
The key to making social media work for you and your event, is to properly plan out your strategy by using these 6 strategies.
- Create a Facebook event
Think of the event page as a one-stop-shop for anything event related where you can comment and share images just like a regular newsfeed. It also makes you think of all of the important information so nothing gets left out! If you want to know more about creating a Facebook event, read our latest blog!
- Plan out your social media calendar
We suggest you start posting about your upcoming event 6-8 weeks in advance! This gives the audience enough time to plan to attend!
This is when using a social media content calendar comes in handy. You are able to plan out all of your content ahead of time and really focus on what you want to say and how often. Take it a step further and schedule your posts ahead of time. Here are a few suggestions on different tools to use!
We recommend finding a healthy balance between your regular content and information on the event! Let’s say you usually post 5 times per week, then consider adding 1 or 2 posts about the event to your timeline.
- What should I post?
Content is King for helping to spread the word about your event. Your content should be a nice mix of graphics, pictures, and even videos.
Graphics and pictures are a great way to easily give information to your followers.
Videos are a great way to show behind the scenes, talk about what to expect at the event, and even better to capture what is happening during the event! You can even capture testimonials from people who attended the event.
The best part is, you don’t need to be a professional! Just use your phone and show authentic moments during the planning process and the event.
Here are some different ways to use your content:
- Remind them about the time, place, and location. You don’t have to put all three together for each post. Treat each item as a fun piece to a larger puzzle that you can elaborate on. Check out our images below to see what we mean!
- Create posts to highlight exciting parts they can expect at the event, i.e. live music, food, giveaways. This will add more interest if they are reminded of something special they will get to see.
- Create a countdown. This is a great way to get your followers excited about all of the fun things that are coming up.
- Sharing content about your event through the stories feature is a fantastic way to amplify your message. Did you know, you can now add a sticker that serves as a button to the event link?
- Add the hashtag to the image and the copy! When you use a hashtag, it creates an easy way to find all of the information in one place.Expanding Sharing Links in Stories to Everyone | Instagram Blog
- Giveaways
A fantastic way to drum up even more interest in your upcoming event and increase engagement on your social media channels is to create a giveaway opportunity. Everyone loves free stuff, and for some, the chance to win is almost too good to pass up. Then, once they’re at your event, they’ll be sure to stick around so they can *hopefully* claim the prize!
💡Pro-tip: Giveaways are also an easy way to hand out branded items or items from your sponsors!
Picking the item(s) to giveaway is up to you! It can be a branded t-shirt, a gift card to your company or another local company, or even a big ticket item.
Putting the giveaway together is all fun and games, but there are rules to follow with the social media giant, Meta. Make sure you familiarize yourself with them, so you accidentally land your account in Meta “jail.”
- Create a Custom Hashtag!
They are an amazing tool to keep all of your posts and information in one convenient place for you and your followers to look back on. It also encourages your followers to use them as well, adding more people to see your amazing event and company!
Don’t forget to do a little research before you commit to one. Search your hashtag ideas in your Instagram explore page to see if anyone else is already using it.
- Boost Your Event With Paid Advertising
Facebook and Instagram ads are another way to promote your event! Every post you make has to fight the algorithm. Do you have an advertising budget? If so, allocating some of those funds to support your posts can really help cut through the noise.
Your budget is really up to you. Overall, the amount should be dependent upon the size of the event, how big the geographic territory is, how many tickets you need to sell, and so on. A general starting rule of thumb is a minimum of $10 per day for at least a week.
“Good fortune is what happens when opportunity meets with planning” by Thomas Edison.
Create as much content as you can and schedule it to go out over 6-8 weeks before the event. Let it take care of itself, so you can focus on making the event as great as possible.
But if new exciting details come up, then you can always create a post on the spot and let everyone know in real time!
Market Your Events with The Social Ginger
The Social Ginger is here to be your full-service social media marketing partner. Skip the hassle of marketing an event yourself! Our rockstar team of experts are happy to assist with the set-up process. What’s even better? We can also create a full graphics package to help promote your event not only on Facebook, but also across your other social media platforms. Set up a FREE discovery call today.
