This is the era of social networking, be it for business advertisement, social networking, or even event organization. Whether conducting a product launch, an online meeting, or a physical one, enhancing the event with the right social media strategy will help your event reach more people.

Organizing an event on SMM involves more than posting several times; it is a careful process that implies strategy, inspiration, and using applications. In this guide, you will learn a step-by-step approach to event planning on social media so that you can create events that are worth attending and sharing.

1. Define Your Event Goals

Before planning a social media event, it is important to determine and establish the objectives of the event. Do you need to get leads or customers, introduce a brand, or attract an audience? Specific goals guide the nature of your messages and images and the kind of event management platform or social media application to be used.

Tips for Defining Goals:

• Set a SMART goal (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound).
• Set goals that may include the number of expected registrations, engagement rate, or post-event feedback you want to have.
• Understand your target market and try to think what would be most interesting to them.

2. Choose the Proper Social Media Site

Different platforms attract different people, so the right platform has to be chosen to ensure maximum coverage. For instance:

• Facebook is quite useful for creating events, sharing detailed information, and participating in groups.
• Instagram is thus suitable for events that involve a lot of visuals, such as a product launch or an art show.
• LinkedIn is ideal for business and business-related occasions, such as seminars or events.
• Twitter can generate interest through timely updates and reach a broader audience in a short span.

Focus on the channels that your target audience uses most actively. Organizing your event through an event management app such as Planzee allows you to schedule your response to your audience across various channels easily.

3. Build a Content Calendar

Time is critical when it comes to advertising events on social media platforms. Developing a content calendar is one of the best practices to ensure that you keep on a steady pace and the right schedule. This makes it easier for you to plan the type of posts that you want to publish and at what time they will be posted so that no post is missed.

Key Calendar Elements:

• Countdown posts: Excitement with “10 days to go,” “One week left,” and so on.
• Engagement posts: Utilize polls, questions, answers, and teaser images to enhance the level of engagement.
• Behind-the-scenes content: Present some concepts, sketches, behind-the-scenes teasers, or trailers.
• Call-to-action posts: Follow-ups to register or respond to an event.

Managing an event through an application with a scheduling feature is very helpful for creating and sharing content on various platforms.

4. Design Eye-Catching Visuals

Social media is all about visuals. Unique designs and interesting videos can attract audiences, so spend your time and money on creating colorful images, banners, and videos that present your event.

Tips for Effective Visuals:

• Make sure to use colors and themes relevant to your brand and the reason behind your event.
• For Instagram and Twitter, it is advisable to keep the text short and full of meaning.
• Try out new and exciting features—reels, stories, live videos, and carousels.
• You may also need to add a new, specific hashtag to create a sense of event identity among your audience.

If you are using design features in your social media application, this can be made simple here or you can use another design application to design your assets and then post them to your social media accounts.

5. Leverage Influencers and Collaborations

Influencers or industry experts can increase your event awareness. If you have special guests, speakers, or partners, let them share the event with their audiences as well. Influencers have a reliability factor; you also tap into audiences you probably could not get direct access to.

Steps to Collaborate with Influencers:

• Don’t work with influencers who are not in touch with your brand values and your targeted audience.
• Give them visuals, tags, and just a couple of promotional posts to help them get started.
• They should set some expectations and make provisions for incentives for their active participation.

Other forms of collaborations are partnerships with other brands or businesses to promote your event or work together on an event. The concept of “event activities near me” can be complemented by cooperation with local businesses during the event.

6. Engage with your Audience

Contrary to what many people believe, social media is not a one-sided process- people have to engage in the event for it to be a success. Engage your audience before, during and after the event and reply to comments, questions or even share photos or videos that the users have posted.

Engagement Strategies:

• Give question-and-answer sessions on Instagram Live or Facebook Live.
• Always reply to comments and messages on the website within a short time.
• Make use of polls, quizzes, and other related content.
• Make up a specific hashtag for people to use when posting their own pictures from the event.

If you reach your audience directly, it is easier to create enthusiasm around the event and make the attendees promote it. Social media tools and event management applications can be useful in managing this process.

7. Offer Incentives to Boost Participation

Free gifts are useful in luring people to register for the event and attend. You may consider offering time-bound offers or early bird tickets, freebies, or even special content to those who have subscribed in advance.

Ideas for Incentives:

• Early bird registration discounts must be incorporated.
• Exclusive content about the event or some sneak peeks at it.
• Contests for sharing event posts or using event hashtags.
• Luxury packages that give customers a better view of the event.

These incentives can make people feel that they are running out of time, which is a common driver of their actions.

8. Scheduling Reminds Before the Event

Organizers must understand that promoting an event is not limited to the first phase of the planning process. As the event draws nearer, people need to be reminded to attend, and there are good ways to do so. Use social media platforms to remind people about the event, and this should be done 24 hours before and one hour before the event.

Reminder Strategies:

• Countdown Stories: Create countdowns in Instagram or Facebook Stories.
• Scheduled Posts: The best social media posting app should be used to set reminders.
• Direct Messages: When the event is not huge, you can use direct messages to remind the attendees.

Most event management mobile apps allow you to schedule these reminders, making it easy to communicate with the attendees.

9. Live Stream or Real-Time Updates

If your event is partially online or you would like those who did not attend it to have a feel of what transpired, consider live streaming it on social media platforms. Live streams give you an outreach to those people who could not attend the event physically and make them feel included.

Tips for Live Streaming:

• A reminder of the live-stream timings before the event to increase physical/face-to-face attendance.
• Decide which audience you want to reach and choose the right option: Instagram Live, Facebook Live, or YouTube.
• Interact with the live audience and respond to questions or even call out people’s names.

The growth of the audience goes hand in hand with the strengthening of relationships with followers because live streaming allows the audience to see behind the scenes of the event.

10. Follow Up Post-Event

The event may be over, but the interaction does not have to be! As a follow-up, sharing a thank-you post, highlights, or a summary will keep the event memory fresh in people’s minds.

Post-Event Ideas:

• Post pictures and videos of the event.
• Share or display some comments or quotes from the attendees.
• Grate your audience, partners, and influencers.
• Develop a survey to get the views.
• Getting feedback is more appropriate to help out on subsequent occasions, and it also keeps the audience informed that you care for their opinions.

Final Thoughts

Organizing an event through social networking sites requires time, energy, and talent investment, but it can be very fulfilling if done correctly. By combining content planning, engagement strategy, and visual presentation, organizers can turn the event into an interesting social media event for the audience.

Also, it is essential to select the most suitable event management apps, such as Planzee, to address your objectives. The major success of an event depends on the minor details and the ability to reach people at each stage.

Therefore, begin strategizing, innovating, and ensuring your next event goes viral on social media!