Although we all love social media and the Internet, there’s nothing like a live event sometimes to create a buzz and bring people together. However, there’s nothing like social media and the Internet to promote your event, sell tickets, organise the event, create interest during it and continue the conversation afterwards! I am not a professional event organiser but I run an occasional meet up session for businesswomen in Tower Hamlets – Tower Hamlets Businessmums – and have had quite a lot of experience in organising, selling tickets for and promoting these events on Twitter. I’ve also attended many business events where people have either thought about social media and incorporated it into their event, or haven’t bothered at all – and it really makes a difference. Here are my ten top tips for organising a successful live event with social media built in; these are either solutions I’ve tried out myself or ones I’ve witnessed being used successfully at other people’s events. I am talking about live events rather than webinars (virtual conferences arranged online), as that’s more relevant for most businesses, but some of these tips will be applicable to all types of event.
Before the Event
Use Eventbrite
Eventbrite is free to use unless you are selling tickets (then they take a commission) and it is the best way to publicise your event online in my opinion. You can create a page for the event, import email addresses, send email invitations, manage attendees and sell tickets, as well as sharing your event through various social media channels including, of course, Twitter. Eventbrite helps you set up all the tools and organise your event successfully. You can check in attendees and issue name badges using a computer or even an iPhone at an event, if you want to. The above link to Eventbrite is an affiliate link because I recommend Eventbrite frequently and use it all the time!
Set up a Twitter account and/or hashtag for your event
If you run a regular event, you may want to consider setting up a Twitter account solely to promote it. This will make it easy for people to find you on Twitter. If it’s a one off, you can promote it via your own Twitter account. Either way, it makes sense to set up a hashtag for the event as well and start using it well in advance. This means that whenever you tweet about the event, you add a hashtag like this #myeventname and use it as a label for your tweets. Let all your followers know that whenever they tweet about the event, they should use this hashtag, and you will quickly create a buzz around your event name. Cybermummy did this brilliantly, for example – I saw so many tweets with their hashtag in them.
Tweet about your event regularly
Keep tweeting about your event and build the excitement as it gets closer. You can use Hootsuite or a similar application to schedule automated tweets if you find it hard to remember to tweet about your event every day.
Put your speakers Twitter usernames in your tweets, event website or page, publicity material and event handouts
This will boost your speakers’ Twitter following, attract their followers to your event and make the event a more interactive and entertaining experience for everyone. It helps a lot with follow up as well: I’ve followed speakers from events I’ve heard them speak at and asked them questions afterwards.
Create a Twitter list of speakers/attendees
If possible, create a Twitter list of speakers and/or attendees at the event. This means that others on Twitter can quickly follow all your speakers and attendees in one go. Again, this promotes everyone’s Twitter account and creates a permanent record of your event.
During the Event
Have open Internet access at your event if possible
Events where attendees can tweet photos, record videos or make comments on speakers are much more interactive and entertaining. If possible try and make sure your event attendees can have access to the Internet (through a wi-fi hot spot, for example) so they can use their laptops or mobile phones to tweet or blog. Failing this, see if you can get a location with good mobile phone reception, so they can at least use their phones to interact.
Display a Twitter stream at the event
This is another good way to use Twitter’s strengths of interactivity and happening in real time. If you are lucky enough to have a large screen with an Internet connection which you can set to search Twitter for your event hashtag, you can leave it connected to the Internet and stream tweets from visitors during the event. A laptop with a connection to the Internet will do if not! People will be encouraged to tweet to promote themselves at the event. Applications like Tweetchat offer more control here if you want to moderate spam, for example, or try and block trolls (people who post abusive or unsuitable tweets). If you can’t stretch to this, use your mobile phone to tweet during the event, introducing speakers and events for example. Speakers can take questions from Twitter as well as the live audience, for example, or comment on Twitter feedback.
Live Streaming
This is probably something you might see as too complicated or expensive to attempt if you are running a small event but it is possible to stream web content live during an event (like a live television broadcast). Youtube is about to offer live streaming and it’s possible to stream a live event using a Google Hangout on G+, for example. There are applications out there which will help you broadcast your event live on Twitter even if you only have simple equipment such as a laptop with a webcam and an Internet connection – the one I have looked at is Twitcam although I haven’t personally tried it yet!
After the Event
Share your content
If you have recorded the event, you should always upload the content on Youtube or a similar video sharing service (with your speakers’ consent, of course!). Failing video, photos create a great record as do blog entries, web pages summarising the content of the event or uploaded Power point presentations (again, always check copyright restrictions). Whatever form you have used to record your event, make sure you tweet all the content. You may get a far larger audience for your event than was actually there on the day – videos I’ve uploaded of events I’ve organised have had hundreds of viewings. I used a Flip camera to record and upload video but even a mobile phone can do this nowadays.
Stay in touch
Make sure you follow your attendees and speakers on Twitter and thank them for attending – especially if they gave their time and expertise to you for free! Allow people to continue the conversation after the event by continuing to monitor and respond your event’s Twitter hashtag – don’t let all that hard work go to waste, as you may well be organising another event soon and this will help you build up your invitation list and get free publicity next time!
Very informative am always looking to improve my twitter presence and promote events. Thank you.
Hi Dave – great, I’m glad you found the post helpful! Good luck with your event.