Archive for September 2013
Tips to get more attendees for your event.
Getting attendees to an event has always been a tough task. Challenge is to market your event among potential attendees. But if you plan early, and follow right steps, your event shouldn't experience any dearth of them.
I have been talking to many organizers in past few months. And thanks to endless interactions with them, I have gathered following useful tips.
Tip one:
Start early with your marketing & promotional efforts. At-least one month prior to event day.
Tip two:
Setup a registration/ticketing page on sites like +Eventbrite, +Townscript, Splashthat etc.
Tip three:
Share registration page on various listing sites like - Meetup, ZEvents and any other i.e. popular in your geographical location, like PuneTech & PuneOpenCoffeeClub are popular in my city. Don't forget to create a Facebook event as well and to link it up with your registration page.
Tip four:
Select a small and catchy hashtag for your event. Aggressively use this hashtag for posting your event related news & content on twitter, facebook & instagram. Idea is to start creating social media buzz for your event.
Tip five:
Email campaigns. Setup a brief and attractive Email that gives out brief details about your Event and contains link to your registration page. Use free email marketing software like MailChimp to make the email designing & sending task easy. If you already have an email database (of past attendees) with you that would be awesome. Otherwise, a mailing list that includes your friends & colleagues residing in your city would come handy. Also, don't forget to post the email to various mailing lists & groups that are related to Event's topic.
I hope following the above tips would really boost the attendee presence at your Events. If I missed anything here, please mention it out in comments section. Cheers!
4 Blogs Every Event Organizer MUST Follow
Blogs!!!
So many blogs. Some great, some bad. It can be hard to know what to read. I’m here to help you on this fine Friday with a list of event blogs that you really should be reading.
Below I want to share with you the 4 Event blogs that I feel are absolutely essential for you to follow.
#1 Event Manager Blog
Event Manager Blog is one of my favorite blogs. It is considered to be the ultimate blog for event planners. If you are into event industry then you must follow this blog
Twitter: @eventmg
Editor's Twitter: @tojulius
#2 Cvent Blog
Cvent makes event management platforms for event organizers. It is one of the biggest companies in event management platforms. They are considered to be the thought leaders in events. Twitter: @cvent
#3 Event Juice
Event Juice is also one of the blogs that I have been following closely. They don't post frequently but you will find great relevant content on their website. Twitter:@eventjuice
#4 Event Magazine
Last but not the least is the Event Magazine Blog which I recommend to the event organizers. Their magazine is quite popular in event industry.
Twitter:@Eventmagazine
Hope you enjoy ‘em! Feel free to add any to the list via the comments below!
Let's connect on Twitter:@maliksanchit
How to reach your event's potential attendees?
Most of the small event organizers whom I have met face a major problem of reaching their attendees. In my last few meetings, one of which was with a Robotics workshop organizer, I found that only ten people turned up even after putting so much efforts into marketing. I had another meeting with a trek event organizer who also faced the same problem of reaching the trekkers.
The budget of small event organizers is low. They can't invest a lot of money on marketing.
Here are best practices to increase your event's presence which can make your event a big success:
1) Start minimum 3 months before: If you are planning to organize any type of event(workshop, trek etc), you need to start the event planning before 3-4 months, it will help you planning out your marketing strategy.
2) Identify your potential attendee: Who are the ones who will love to attend your event? You must be very clear about your potential attendees. For example if you are planning to organize a trek event then people who have hardcore interest in going for the trek are your potential attendees. Then, you need to prioritize your potential attendees.
3) Find your potential attendee: Once you figure out who can be your potential attendee, finding him can be a tough task but if you crack it, you will crack your problem of market reach. Identify the forums(online and offline both) where your potential attendee can be active. Start engaging on those forums online or offline both.
Taking example of a trek organizer, there are many trek forums on internet where trekkers are active, there a trek organizer can find out potential groups of trekkers.
4)Publicize your event: Now you have listed out your potential attendees, it's time to market for them. Social Media is the best tool for small event organizers. In our previous blog,Effective ways to generate killer social media buzz we had mentioned about the best ways to create the social media buzz of your event. Engage your attendees effectively on your social media pages.
An Expert Tip:If you are an yearly event organizer, always maintain one facebook page. We have observed that some event organizer make a new page every for example summit'11, summit'12 and so on. The problem with that is you will have to start from "0" likes every year. Instead of that have a single page. Similarly try to have a single hashtag on twitter for all the events.
Here are best practices to increase your event's presence which can make your event a big success:
1) Start minimum 3 months before: If you are planning to organize any type of event(workshop, trek etc), you need to start the event planning before 3-4 months, it will help you planning out your marketing strategy.
2) Identify your potential attendee: Who are the ones who will love to attend your event? You must be very clear about your potential attendees. For example if you are planning to organize a trek event then people who have hardcore interest in going for the trek are your potential attendees. Then, you need to prioritize your potential attendees.
3) Find your potential attendee: Once you figure out who can be your potential attendee, finding him can be a tough task but if you crack it, you will crack your problem of market reach. Identify the forums(online and offline both) where your potential attendee can be active. Start engaging on those forums online or offline both.
Taking example of a trek organizer, there are many trek forums on internet where trekkers are active, there a trek organizer can find out potential groups of trekkers.
4)Publicize your event: Now you have listed out your potential attendees, it's time to market for them. Social Media is the best tool for small event organizers. In our previous blog,Effective ways to generate killer social media buzz we had mentioned about the best ways to create the social media buzz of your event. Engage your attendees effectively on your social media pages.
An Expert Tip:If you are an yearly event organizer, always maintain one facebook page. We have observed that some event organizer make a new page every for example summit'11, summit'12 and so on. The problem with that is you will have to start from "0" likes every year. Instead of that have a single page. Similarly try to have a single hashtag on twitter for all the events.
