How to create an event page on instagram
How to Promote Events on Instagram and Boost Attendance
Successful event marketing starts with finding out how to reach your target audience. What channel do they spend the most time on, and what are they looking at when they are there?
For most event coordinators, the best place to reach their target audience is Instagram. With an estimated 1 billion active Instagram users every month, chances are you will capture an expansive audience there so long as you invest time in developing outstanding posts.
So that you can take full advantage of the opportunity, the experts here at InitLive have put together several tactics for building out your Instagram event promotion, broken down into a helpful timeline. This article will help you find and attract attendees to your event through Instagram using creative marketing strategies that will ensure your event stands out from the crowd.
Here is a quick list of what will be covered in this article:
- Instagram Event Promotion Before Your Event
- Instagram Event Promotion During Your Event
- Instagram Event Promotion After Your Event
Instagram Event Promotion Before Your Event
Take the opportunity to make your event stand out from your competitors by investing in a well-crafted brand and marketing strategy. What makes your event unique, and what kind can your attendees expect to have? Before you begin marketing your event on Instagram or any other channel, you want to ensure you have a clear understanding of how you want to position your brand.
Once you have your branding and marketing strategy solidified, it is time to promote your event on Instagram.
Create a trendy hashtag.Yes, hashtags still matter on Instagram, and finding a unique and catchy branded hashtag for your event is no easy task. Create a #hashtag that is specific to your event and specific to the volunteers—using these two types of hashtags before the event can do wonders in creating a buzz! Use them for every post related to the event so that people can click it and see the collection of related posts.
If you’ve never come up with your own hashtags, don’t stress. With a little creativity, you can come up with one that’s unique and stands out to attendees. Here are a couple of tips for creating an event hashtag for your Instagram event promotion:
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The more unpopulated, the better. You don’t want to use a hashtag that is already overpopulated. Not only will your content get lost, but your brand may become associated with unsavory posts from other sources.
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Make it short and easy to remember. It can be as simple as using your event name and the year. Whatever you decide on, it should be easy for your attendee to remember so they can easily recall and use your event hashtag in their posts.
Instagram is a visual social media platform that makes investing in high-quality promotional photography an absolute must for promoting your event. Your Instagram post imagery should portray your event’s brand and the experience attendees should expect to have if they attend your upcoming event. This is all about standing out and getting people excited about your event, so make sure your imagery achieves those goals.
Build suspense for the event.Leading up to your event, it is important to build excitement and anticipation to entice people to buy tickets early. Build excitement through your Instagram event promotion by posting teasers about your event line-up, contests, and ticket deals. The goal of these posts should be to create a buzz in online communities and start creating a fear of missing out to further increase your ticket sales.
Here are a few teaser post ideas to get you started:
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Post about your entertainment and speaker lineup. When you book a headliner act, use that as an opportunity to post a sneak preview of your lineup.
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Do a lineup countdown. Generate excitement by creating a series of posts counting down until you announce your event talent lineup.
Leverage your followers on Instagram to make the algorithms work in your favor. There is no better way to do this than through Instagram contests and giveaways. Plan a number of enticing giveaways and contests to run leading up to your event to create more engagement on Instagram that ultimately helps further market your event and sell more tickets.
As you begin planning your contests, it is important to create rules linked to each of your contest or giveaway posts. This will ensure that your contests are watertight to avoid any issues.
There are so many ways to organize contests or giveaways on Instagram. Here are some potential actions your followers can take in order to enter to win:
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Like and share your post.
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Make a related post with your event hashtag.
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Tag friends in a post or comment on one of your posts.
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Follow your Instagram account.
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Tag your account in a story.
Make sure to include your event’s RSVP link or ticket purchasing link in your accounts profile information and post descriptions. These links are vitally important to your bottom line and offer you the opportunity to capture contact information and future market your events through other channels, such as through email, direct mail, or other social media platforms. All the information captured through these links will provide you with insight into how close you are to meeting your goal and what additional steps or investments might be required to do so.
Get volunteers involved.Volunteers are perfect for boosting visibility for your events online! Get them fully involved by having their daily duties include promoting your event on Instagram. Give each volunteer a target number of photos and share the photos with the specific event hashtag. Be sure to use your volunteer management tool to send reminders and provide them with a checklist that details what NOT to forget in their posts.
Instagram Event Promotion During Your Event
Social media has become an integral part of an attendee’s event experience. For many people, part of the joy of attending an event is documenting and sharing that experience on Instagram. Carry that idea over to promoting all the amazing performances, vendors, and activities during your event through your Instagram account. Sharing content can keep your attendees informed on what amazing activities they can participate in and ensure they have an outstanding experience. Plus, they may feel compelled to share your outstanding posts share with their followers and friends too.
Make use of Instagram Stories.There is no better way to promote what is going on each event day than through Instagram Stories. Create stories to highlight keep activities or to get your followers excited about a specific act. An Instagram Story should be about engaging with your attendees during your event to ensure that they can maximize their experience during the event.
An Instagram Story also allows you to ensure your vendors are taken care of by promoting their food, merchandise or any other activities to all your followers. That way, you can ensure your event is a successful venture for them as well.
Share behind-the-scenes exclusives.People enjoy seeing what it takes to make the event a success. Offer really engaging content through your story like exclusive behind-the-scenes interviews with talent or teasers about a surprise performance. Whatever you post it should get your followers excited and happy to share your stories with their network.
Don’t go too crazy with posting.You want to make sure you don’t overdo it when promoting events on Instagram. There is nothing worse than annoying all the followers you worked so hard to get and deterring them from attending.
It is important to invest in quality content over the quantity of content you post on Instagram. Consider investing in a social media management tool that allows you to schedule out your posts to ensure you are in full control of your content strategy.
Instagram Event Promotion After Your EventOnce your event is over, there are still plenty of post-event marketing opportunities to help capture, document, and share the success of your event to followers. Take a little time to review all the content you have captured and that others have shared. Then, consider how you can use it all for your post-event marketing activities. Let’s explore a handful of ways you can do this.
Share attendees’ posts.Give your attendees some recognition by sharing and commenting on their posts. Show your appreciation for their attendance and participation. If you have successfully used and spread the word for your personalized event hashtag, you should be able to find these posts easily!
Share follow-up posts.Once your event wraps up, you shouldn’t stop posting to your Instagram account. Form thank you posts and highlights to collect feedback. There is still a lot of value in harnessing Instagram after your event. Here are a few follow-up posts you should consider making once your event has ended:
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Event Closed & Thanks - It is important to state your event is over and to thank all the people who attended it. Consider doing a highlight reel of some of the best moments during your event to recap the experience for your followers.
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Final Numbers - Share your success with your followers by posting about final attendance numbers and fundraising totals for the event.
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Media Attention - Make sure to share any local media attention received during your event.
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Lessons Learnt- Take the opportunity to review social media posts about your events and note comments or issues. It is important to document and acknowledge both the good and the bad so you can learn from others’ experiences.
There is only one way to create an even better event experience next time, and that is by learning how your event can be improved. Ask your attendees to share their experiences. Chances are, much of this feedback will be positive, which will help create a buzz around the event; any constructive criticism can help you improve.
Create a feedback survey and post it to your Instagram and other marketing channels to ensure the largest survey size possible. Once you have collected the feedback, you can further repurpose some of the positive statistics collected to promote your future fundraising events further. Any feedback can be helpful to you as you continue to plan and promote amazing events.
ConclusionNow that you have a basic understanding of how to successfully market your event using Instagram, it's time to start planning your event. Remember not to overdo the Instagram event promotion—the quality of posts is always more important than the quantity of your posts.
No event can take place without a committed team of event staff and volunteers. As you continue your event planning, here are a few helpful resources for event staff and volunteer management.
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The Smart Nonprofit's Guide to Volunteer Management. Looking to build out your volunteer management plan? Check out this resource, and develop lasting relationships with vital supporters.
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Volunteer Engagement | Strategies for Smart Organizations. Engagement is a defining factor in your volunteer program’s success. Learn some tips and tricks with our complete guide.
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Volunteer Management Software: 12 Apps For Your Nonprofit. Need help pulling together your volunteer management plan for events? Here’s a buyer’s guide that will help you select the most effective tools possible.
Starting an Event Instagram: Go Pro in 5 Simple Steps
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Starting an Event Instagram: Go Pro in 5 Simple Steps
For those who aren’t experts, social media can be daunting. Being selected to create your event organization’s social accounts with no prior knowledge can seem very overwhelming. However, like most things, all it takes is a little bit of guidance and patience. In this article, we will provide you with five simple steps for starting an Event Instagram profile in no time at all.
Learn how EventHub helps to market event partnerships and streamline sponsor/vendor management.
Why Instagram?
Instagram is one of the most popular social networking platforms. As one of the top sites, it boasts some large numbers:
- 1 billion monthly active users
- 500 million daily active users
- Over 90% of user follow a business
With stats like that, it’s hard to ignore how useful Instagram can be for an event. In addition to its massive number of users, Instagram is one of the most simple platforms to engage with audiences on. Instagram allows you to simply interact through photo and story sharing, hashtag discovery, and direct messaging.
1.Create an Account- The TypesInstagram has three types of accounts- personal, creator, and business. For those looking to use Instagram for something other than just fun pictures of your dog and your life then you are going to want to create a business or creator account. If you are planning an event then you will most likely select business. The creator type is mostly for influencers and other creatives. A business account provides you with critical features that will help you grow your account.
These features include the ability to promote posts and auto-post from a third-party. It also gives you access to the ever-important insights section. This provides data such as audience demographics, the reach of posts, and other helpful information. A business account is also the only type of account that allows auto-posting from a third-party. This means you can utilize Facebook Creator Studio or other scheduling programs to plan out posts in advance.
2. What’s in a name?There are two types on names on Instagram, your username and your display name. Your username is what you select first when setting up your profile. It is also what will go at the end of your custom URL. For example www.instagram.com/USERNAME. Be sure to pick something that is representative of your event and not too lengthy.
Pro tip: Display Name is searchable!! Be sure to put keywords there that will help others find your page. For example, if you are a beer festival in Denver and your event name is “Brews and Beats”. Then your username may be @brewsandbeats but be sure to have the “Denver Beer Festival” in your display name so you show up in more search.
3. Starting an Event Instagram with a Compelling BioThis section is very important when it comes to starting an event Instagram profile. If a picture you post shows up in the explore or other section and someone who is not following sees your picture the first thing they will do is click onto your profile. This means they are reading your bio and deciding if they want to follow you. For an event, it’s imperative that you include all basic information like location, dates, type of event, and a website link. While this information is important, it alone is not enough.
Pro tip: Open up the notes app on your phone and use this to create it then copy it over. This will allow you to do multiple lines of text. Utilize emojis or symbols to create a nice clean look to it.
You need to tell people not only who you are but WHY they should follow you. The key to any kind of bio is to be as creative as you can with your words. What edge does your event have? What makes you different? These are questions to ask when thinking of a good “hook” for your bio.
Pro Tip: If you are selling tickets to your event using Eventbrite then you can add a button for audiences to buy tickets to your event directly through Instagram. Within “Edit Profile” select ” Contact Options” then “Add an Action Button”. You can select Eventbrite amongst the partners and paste your event link. Then under your bio, you will see a “Get Tickets” button appear.
4. Event Instagram Profile PictureMake sure that you keep the required dimensions and shape in mind. The minimum resolution for a profile picture is 110 x 110 but photography experts recommend 180 x 180 so that it displays better in a web browser. Even though the dimensions are a perfect square, the picture gets cropped into a circle.
Event Instagram Profile Picture
5. Time to Post!When first starting out it is highly recommended that you have six to nine photos ready to publish right away. Since the photos display three across this will give your profile a nice full look. This will also give potential followers a look into the type of content they can expect from you. If they come across your profile and it’s blank or only has one photo then they may not be as inclined to give you a follow.
When it comes to creating posts on Instagram there are two key things to remember in terms of looks: Quality and Consistency. Every image should be of the maximum quality. Try to avoid blurry or dark images. Utilize a graphic design platform such as Canva to help you create content. Be sure to use your brand’s colors and try to create a consistent them throughout the photos. Planning your post in advance through the help of scheduling apps such as Later or Sked can help you plan the look of your feed in advance.
Event Instagram Example
In addition to quality images, compelling captions are key to successful posts. Longer captions, emojis, and call to actions are the winning formula when it comes to engaging captions. You will also want to add up to 30 relevant hashtags on your post that it gets the maximum exposure. Hashtags are categories or phrases that relate to your niche. You can also create a hashtag specific for your event so that you can track the buzz around it.
Pro Tip: Use the notes app on your phone to create captions in order to have text on multiple lines. Most scheduling apps will do this for you but if you are generating a post on the go then this is a quick and easy solution.
While Instagram may seem like a daunting platform, it is really a simple app once you know the basics. Hopefully, these five steps will get you started on your way to mastery. In no time at all, you can be starting an event Instagram profile.
Amanda is a content creator focused on the live events industry. After spending two years traveling the world as a music festival journalist, she recently settled in Denver, Colorado. She enjoys catching shows at Red Rocks Amphitheater and grabbing a slice of pizza with her friends in her free time.
How to make a meeting and arrange it on VKontakte, Facebook and Instagram
Let's talk about how to make a meeting and arrange it on VKontakte, Facebook* and Instagram**. First of all, meetings are needed in order to “warm up” the audience (that is, increase the motivation to go to the event) and collect feedback. In our experience, working on social networks VKontakte and Facebook* is ideal for this. You should not multiply entities and create an event in Odnoklassniki - this format simply did not take root there. You can create a page on Instagram**, but there is limited functionality. nine0003
People often ask: should I start just a meeting or a separate community for an event? Our answer is this: start a meeting on VKontakte, a meeting and a community on Facebook*, a community on Instagram**. This is explained simply: in VKontakte, a meeting is exactly the same community. It can also be maintained and advertised. On Facebook*, you won't be able to fully advertise if you only start a meeting. Everything is needed there. In Instagram** there is simply nothing but pages. nine0003
There is a set of basic rules that we recommend using
Unfortunately, although the rules are obvious, few people follow them
event locations if the event is offline. The exception is Instagram**. Since this is a mobile network, the text on the avatar will not fit. A simple thematic picture is enough here.
2. Date, time and place must be in the meeting status (under the name) if we are talking about VKontakte.
In the profile description - if it is about Instagram**. There is no status or profile on Facebook*.
3. Date, time, place must be specified in the basic meeting functionality. When you create an event, social networks prompt you to fill in the appropriate fields. This applies only to VKontakte and Facebook*. nine0003
4. In the contacts of the meeting there should be a link to the organizer's account with a phone number or mail. If you are organizing a seminar, master class or training, then in the contacts you need to provide a link to the speaker's personal page. This is relevant only for a meeting on VKontakte. Other networks do not have this capability.
5. On VKontakte, we recommend registering for an event in discussions if the event is educational and only a meeting is used for promotion (in case you didn’t listen to us). nine0014 Registration is required so that you have a database of contacts of potential participants in your hands.
If events take place regularly, this is your additional resource for further promotion. Plus, you will be able to remind the participant about the event in at least four ways .
When registering, users leave their phone numbers or e-mail in the comments to the discussion. You enter this data in a separate file, and then delete contacts, replacing them with the word "Registered". In other social networks, you can experiment and arrange registration in the comments to publications, but, in our experience, this does not work well. nine0003
In the case of entertainment events, registration can be omitted, because sometimes it does not seem quite appropriate, for example, if you are holding a concert, party or a large event that gathers several thousand participants. However, when organizing small concerts and parties, recording is needed. In addition, you can do the following: give a bonus for contacts - a discount on entry or a gift. As practice shows, people treat this normally.
6. If you are hosting an offline event, you can include a map with directions to the meeting photo album. nine0014 You can also post photos from past events - they will be additional social proof. This is true for VKontakte. There are no such photo albums on Instagram** and Facebook*. The maximum that can be done is to post a map or photos from past events in posts.
7. If you are holding an event not for the first time and you have already accumulated feedback, we recommend that you start an appropriate topic in the discussions , where they will be linked. And again, this is relevant for the Russian social network. In Western countries, everything is still laid out in publications. nine0003
8. If an event involves attendance by a thousand or more people, then in the discussions it makes sense to start a topic “Questions to the organizers” . On Facebook* and Instagram**, the idea of having questions in a separate place cannot be implemented.
9. Naturally, the meeting should have a long description . Most often, this is text that has already been posted on the landing page. Highlights can be duplicated on the wall. For example, the price, the main points of the program, information about the speaker, if it is a seminar. nine0003
even more about the design of events can be viewed in this video:
*STOTROST, recognized in Russia as extremist
** STOCET, recognized in Russia by extremist
Author: Dmitry Rumyantsev
Read more in the book Event Marketing. Everything about organizing and promoting events
Read other blog posts
Event promotion on the Internet: website, social networks and services
Eviting VKontakte and Facebook*
Event promotion in communities
Tags: VKontakte, meeting, social networks, Facebook, Instargam, event marketing, SMM
3 We announce an event on Instagram on our own
Instagram is a familiar social network that has been showing a steady growth in active subscribers for several years now. Due to its popularity, Instagram today is an ideal platform for announcing and covering any event, be it a music festival, a business conference or an online webinar. nine0014
The priority of the visual component of Instagram justifies the need to take the time to design messages about the upcoming event. In order for your event not to be left without attention, you need to understand the preferences of users and the interests of the target audience, correctly choose the presentation format, and use behavioral factors to your advantage.
Of course, all this can be done for you by professionals - event agencies or private organizers. However, if you decide to try your hand at announcing and promoting an event on Instagram, then you should enlist useful tips common to everyone that will help you create a message, design it, and contribute to its promotion on a social platform. nine0125
Determine the format of publications on Instagram
According to statistics in 2019, more than 100 million photos and videos are published on Instagram daily. In the case of the announcement of the event, these can be posts - images and posts - videos, as well as an announcement in Instagram Stories. A few words about each.
Image. A static picture with or without text content, the description of which usually follows the picture. Instagram's text add-on is limited to two thousand characters, which is quite enough for a detailed message about the theme of the event, the registration form, useful links and other important information. This is a time-tested format that is easy to create and easy to use. It’s not difficult to make a post in an original way, even on your own, since there are a huge number of simple graphic editors, like https://www.canva.com/ru_ru/shablony/socialnye-seti/instagram-post /, Fotor, Stensil, which will help you create a publication without having the skills of a designer.
An example of a message about the Photo Day of a photographer (35K subscribers)
Video. The dominance of the video format on Instagram is obvious, according to statistics, every 4th ad on the social network is created in the form of a video sequence. Such interest is not surprising, a person perceives video content easier and faster than text content, and his response rate is 40% higher. Therefore, with proper presentation, the video sequence will captivate and subconsciously dispose the user to the broadcast information. This format is more expensive than others to create and, if performed independently, may not be of adequate quality. But if you still decide to create such a video announcement on your own, remember that a large proportion of network users watch videos in silent mode and, perhaps, you should take care of overlaying text information. nine0125
An example of an invitation to the Workshop from another photographer (111K subscribers)
Instagram Stories. In 2016, this format first appeared on Instagram and almost instantly became in demand. The potential of Stories is huge, they are created by both ordinary users and large companies, as an announcement format, Stories are rather an additional option for reminding about the event, since Stories will not be reflected in the user's feed, but will be shown on the top panel, and will remain on the page when saved in Eternals or completely disappear after 24 hours. Stories can be in the format of a set of posts - images, and in the form of a video. nine0125
Experts call the announcement strategy successful, which uses all three formats to reach a larger audience. But depending on the potential of your users and their preferences, you can bet on one of these.
Working with the design
As previously noted, the visual part of the design is important on Instagram. The user's feed is overflowing with visual content, which is a very difficult task to stand out among. A sense of style, originality and understanding of your audience will help here. nine0125
Style. When making an announcement, you should stick to the previously chosen style. If your account has existed for some time, most likely your subscribers have already become accustomed to a certain post design that is associated specifically with your account. For example, using a certain graphic, logo or icon on a post will allow followers to identify your post among the variety of feeds.
Example : Publications of the learning center (73K subscribers) are distinguished by a unicorn icon, as well as a light cold color scheme with mostly minimalistic pictures. nine0125
Originality. Bright individual design will distinguish your announcement from many others. It can be a variety of grids and shapes, unusual photo filters and atypical angles, thematic emojis or gifs.
Example : The account of a psychologist and a coach (121K) is made individually, all publications have the same style and color scheme and are ordered diagonally
Psychology of the audience.
From the analysis of the general psychology of netizens, we can conclude that publications with a face image receive more likes, and blue color dominates over red. Therefore, let's move on to a moment with which many are familiar, to the psychology of color. nine0125
Color is an important factor influencing conversion and interest, calling to action. For example, according to statistics, red calls for action, yellow encourages communication, blue calls for concentration, and white encourages openness of perception. But it is important to keep a balance in the design and combination of colors on the publication. There are many ratios, but the most commonly used breakdown is 60/30/10, where 60% is the main color, 30% is the secondary (it can be a shade of the main one) and 10% is the color accent. nine0003
Depending on the age, gender and type of activity of your target audience, the color solution for your announcement publication will be different. For example, men are more likely to pay attention to pure colors, without impurities, midtones or shades, while women will respond to an unusual shade or complex combination of colors (like orange and purple, green and pink).
Analyzing behavioral patterns
Audience engagement is based not only on the psychology of color, taking into account subscriber behavior statistics online is also an important factor that can serve to promote and interest the audience in an event. nine0125
Undoubtedly, everyone has their own posting strategy, but here are a number of facts worth considering:
- Hashtags help users navigate and find interesting events by keywords; personal brand
- The best time to post on Instagram, according to the total activity of network subscribers in 2018, is lunchtime (11.00-13.00) and evening time (19.00-21.00). nine0221
- The most socially active users are on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday.
These are general statements based on a study of the average statistics of the Instagram network for 2018. As you know, a business account on Instagram gives statistics from the very first post, you should focus mainly on it, trying to analyze the behavior of your target audience.