Each in-house team sure has lots of ideas for their marketing plan for event. However, companies must find the best option available that best suits their resources and helps them gain a competitive position in the market.
Lately, businesses have been utilizing the potential of the Instagram platform. Fast forward, it holds tremendous potential. Let’s get into details!
How Important Is Instagram For A Marketing Plan For Event?
Instagram has released many novelties during the past year, including Reels and more shopping options. No doubt, it was a big year for the platform since it has managed to reaffirm its position within the social media networks market.
To start, over 1 billion people use Instagram each month. It’s the second most downloaded free app in the Apple store. So, developing your marketing plan for event on the platform can help you reach an enormous customer base.
Better yet, according to Instagram for Business:
- 90% of people on Instagram follow a business
- 2 out of 3 people surveyed say Instagram enables interaction with brands
- 50% are more interested in a brand when they see ads for it on Instagram
Now, think of it like this; your event can be this business. You can use Instagram to attract people to your brand. So, the only question left at this point is how you can do so?
Three Ideas For A Marketing Plan For Event On Instagram
Here are a few valuable ideas to implement in your upcoming event marketing strategy.
Events Are All About The Stories
Half a billion users engage with Instagram stories on a daily. More importantly, businesses create one out of three of the most viewed Instagram stories. Due to this, 96% of US marketers will use Instagram stories as part of their event marketing strategy in the upcoming six months, says Social Tables.
Here are several tips to make the most out of Instagram stories within your marketing plan for event:
- Include a “swipe up” CTA (it increases the engagement of your viewers with your brand)
- Mix it up, using both photos and videos to avoid monotony
- Link Instagram stories with other social media platforms, your website blog, etc.
Essentially, you can use the feature to recap all aspects of your event, all big announcements, before, during, and after the event.
Source User-Generated Content (UGC)
Souring user-generated content is yet another not-so-popular yet highly effective tactic. According to Social Media Today, UGC has a 4.5% higher conversion rate than traditional content created by an in-house marketing team.
If you are an event brand with an engaged audience, sourcing UGC will be pretty straightforward. Your visitors will be taking pictures and posting, even without asking. However, if you are a start-up or just entering the event marketing niche, you need to be more creative.
In the second case scenario, you can host a competition to ask your followers to submit the best photo or create the perfect hashtag. Then, you can reward the winner with a free product/service, free tickets, or anything else you see fit within your marketing plan for event.
Essentially, it would help if you matched the reward with your target audience. The right question is, “what do my customers value the most”?
To incentivize UGC, you should focus on two primary points. First, you need to create an experience for your customers. And second, give your followers/visitors an incentive and an easy way to share the content. A great tip at this point is to include a hashtag so that you can link all posts by users. Keep in mind, having a memorable hashtag will make your event even more special.
Now, if you regularly repost the best content from your users in your marketing plan for event, you will further incentivize user-generated content. This way, even if you don’t host a “direct competition,” people will still be motivated to get that reshare. In other words, it will mean they have won the race, having the greatest out of all posts.
Finally, you can create dedicated, unique places at your event. Say you have rented an entire hall. You can design one small section, such as a booth or a dessert table. You can also go for a sparkly background with balloons, a hashtag, and your brand colors. A lovely setting will instantly motivate your visitors to take some nice pictures. Better yet, they will want to share this content across their social media platforms.
The Power Of “Behind The Scenes” Content
There’s no point in retelling the same story across all platforms. Your followers might quickly get bored and skip through your Instagram stories. Instead, it would be best if you tried to add to your story. A tour behind the scenes of your event is the perfect way to do so. The rule of thumb is that the more intriguing your content is, the better the chances of keeping your viewers’ attention.
For instance, you can showcase your team working on the marketing plan for event. At this point, you can also go for “road to” content, showing the set-up process and all people involved. Both strategies humanize your event, which will eventually play to your advantage.
Another great idea is to highlight interesting facts that people may not know about your event. If you have been hosting it for decades, make sure to include this information. It’s a tradition! Also, if you are using some innovative technologies or out-of-the-box processes, it would be great to have them on tour.
Final Thought On Instagram Event Promotion Ideas
As noted, Instagram is among the most popular platforms worldwide. People of all ages spend lots of time on the web. So, it’s a great way to promote your upcoming event or brand in general. Still, keep in mind that you must find a unique way to do so as an organization. You cannot just keep posting or say “spamming” your followers with boring, ineffective content.
Instead, you can go for one of the three strategies for your marketing plan for event, as mentioned before. After all, each has proven effective. So, you cannot go wrong, whichever you choose. Better yet, you can combine all!
