7 Ways to Use Social Media for Community Events

7 Ways to Use Social Media for Community Events

Author: Sue Reynolds / Source: Business 2 Community Make sure you are all rowing in the same direction when using social media to promote

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Crew Club
Make sure you are all rowing in the same direction when using social media to promote events

Recently a friend asked me for suggestions for using social media for community events, specifically a local, community-based rowing crew club in which she and her children are involved. Her goals: more exposure, promote programs, increase interest in membership. Her audience, junior high and high school students and their parents. They were using Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. A quick review of their website and accounts produced the following recommendations.

Include Links to your Social Profiles on your Website

When using social media at events remember this, if people don’t know you have social media profiles, they aren’t going to follow you there. All social media platforms provide users with brand guidelines and downloadable icons for free. Take advantage of this.

If you’re using WordPress for your website there are loads of plug-ins and widgets that make including them simple. Please don’t go out and steal icons from Google image search, they will not be scalable, the most recent or legal. That’s true for any image you use! Here are some handy links to social media brand resources for you.

Content is King

Make sure the content on your platforms is something that will interest your audience. In this example, I encouraged them to use their Facebook page as a method of communication regarding events, cancellations, fundraisers etc. while also posting content that is interesting to the larger, potential rowing community. Of course, also use your email list to communicate in case people don’t see these posts, but many people, especially in this demographic, rely on social media as their primary mode of communication. Make sure to include your social media profiles in all your emails too.assume your potential audience understands your lingo.

Also, when crafting your social media posts, don’t assume your potential audience understands your lingo. Remember you are trying to stimulate interest with people who don’t know you. Explain every post clearly and use an image or video to support your content. I hate to see a compelling story or worthwhile community event get lost in translation because people don’t understand your content.

Use Facebook Events Feature

Rather than just posting about your event in a standard post, use the event feature to create an event. Facebook events allow you to add location (connects to your phone’s map app), hours, URLs for tickets, description of events and photos. They also create their own group that allows attendees and the creator of the event to post teasers, additional details and more. These posts will be shared in the timelines of anyone that showed interest in your event. Bonus: attendees can share the events AND invite their friends easily.

Make sure to use your other platforms to cross-promote the event. Each event you create will have its own unique URL which can be shared on Twitter for example.

Here’s an event as an example. Hover over that share button to choose who to invite from your friends’ list.

Facebook event
Facebook events allow users to share and invite anyone in their own friends’ list.

Use Facebook Live Video During your Event

Back to my friend.

She described to me a recent event that sounded exciting! People watching…

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