Social media is that wonderful tool that we use for everything from sending greetings to our friends to finding a lost and loved pet. Still, wisdom dictates that we use all the tools that we have at our disposal to reach a goal – in this case, to market an upcoming event that is of prime importance to the progress of your company.
Following are some ideas for incorporating social media before, during and after your event to join with prospects, deepen relations with customers, and entice the trade show attendees to your booth.
I – Before
An Event-Specific Page
This page will serve as the base for all that is related to the upcoming event — videos, articles about your company, sign-up opportunities or other special announcements. It is a great place to direct potential client to get all the information they want, and you will gain valuable metrics and potential leads as they sign up for an event or download a PDF or an eBook you offer.
Exposure
Connect with media personnel in your field via Twitter or LinkedIn. Get to know them, share what they are sharing. Comment on their work and the connections that could tie both businesses. Ask them to stop by your booth. Give them some story ideas they could write about around what you are doing and of course, invite them to your event.
Videos
If your company is launching new services or products at the event, or you have an impressive contest you will be hosting? Teaser videos are a terrific way to generate interest and can be shared on any social platform. The sure-fire way is to upload them to YouTube and even create shorter versions for sites like Instagram. Share these videos on Facebook and Twitter along with an event hashtag.
Hashtag
These are digital days; many trade shows and events create a hashtag for the show. Connect with most of the people who are using that hashtag. Mix the hashtag into your tweets to endorse that you will be at the show. Be an active partaker in chats surrounding the hashtag.
Your face
Lastly, as a preparation for your upcoming event put your face and your event hashtags, links, promotions offers, videos, and everything else you have on sites like Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. Invite people to share and visit your link for those offers. Be where everybody is at any given time of the day.
II – During
Pictures
Take pics and videos of the live event. This is not just about the event itself but the speakers present, the show, the trend, and your product details. These are going to be posted on your site where traffic will still be high as a follow-up to the event. All interested audience is going to be waiting for this footage and it is a good marketing step for your work.
Videos
Whether it is a short clip of a guest participating in a challenge, winning a bargain, giving a performance or speaking about the event, seizing and sharing moments from the trade show floor allows people who aren’t attending a way to experience and see an up-to-the-minute footage at the show. This means you will have a complete video as well as snippets for sharing on those social media sites. This facilitates the opportunity to link with people without them being there.
Content
Schedule Tweets and Facebook posts to complement your daily presence activities. It is particularly helpful to tweet out key topics shared by the company, its product, and services. Done right, it is an interesting way for people to know about you and your product even if the ad event is ongoing.
Testimonials
A customer who is a fan of your company can be asked to record a short video testimonial that you can share via social media. A question or two ready for them to answer — keeps them focused and shares their excitement about your company. A one- or two-minute clip is quite enough. It can be shared via sites like YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, as well as your own website.
III – After
Generate viewing
You can generate viewing after the event by blogging about it, writing about the experience will invariably generate traffic and keep interested viewers as the potential for a constant client base. A lot of pictures and notes, anecdotes, and a list of visitors who came – makes quite an impact. Don’t forget to put up pictures and videos on the same sites you used before the event. People like to follow up and again this is a sure way to widen your circle for the future.
Social Media
This is an important step and creates mutual respect between you and your growing followers. This step is that you should send a thank you email to all those who took the trouble to come and attend the event. Even those who had been invited but did not manage to make it should receive an email as a follow-up and maybe the email could contain a link to some of the videos.
Just use all the social media at your disposal even job sites such as LinkedIn, and it will invariably get you into the spaces most visited and accessed by users for the promotion of a present and future event. You might like further reading on this topic at Magic Words to Entice Your Events or a set of articles at our blog specifically; EVENTS
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