Event marketing remains one of the most powerful channels to build a lasting connection between businesses and their audiences.
Because of the ongoing epidemic, companies have had to step up their game when it comes to webinars and rethink their online event strategies. With its advanced targeting options, social media is the perfect platform to raise interest in your upcoming webinar.
In this post, we’ll be covering key social media strategies for the successful promotion of your webinar. Here’s how to get the job done.
Paid Ads
Your webinar will be successful only if it makes an impact on a qualified audience. Using highly targeted advertising campaigns for Linkedin, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter is an absolute must.
Researching which social media your audience spends most of their time on will impact how you tailor your ads and promotion plans.
For instance, Instagram and Twitter dominate the use of hashtags, and engaging videos are the cornerstone of Facebook ads.
Social media channels have audience insight tools that can provide invaluable data.
Using micro-targeting metrics such as audience behavior, interests, actions, and demographics, will lead you to your qualified audience.
Handy tools like AdEspresso and AdStage make it easy to track your results.
Keep in mind that your paid ads should also include Facebook retargeting campaigns that aim at:
- the lookalike audience of your past webinar’s attendees
- a custom audience of everyone who has engaged with you in the past.
When done right, paid ads give you a great return on your investment.
Post Clips From Previous Webinars
Videos of past webinars will directly impact whether or not a person considering your webinar will be joining you this year.
Clips from previous webinars aren’t just recaps—they are a testimony to your event’s atmosphere and uniqueness. They also communicate the benefits of joining your webinar to your potential customers and are one of the most important tools in your promotion toolbox.
Posting content is an integral part of pre-event and mid-event communication, and it includes:
- Posting the photos and bios of the speakers
- Using videos to announce the topics that will be covered during the webinar event
- Teasing new exciting projects, products, and agendas
- Providing useful info to your attendees
A strong promotional strategy is a detailed roadmap that covers every step, from webinar planning to event closing. It allows you to always stay on track and be ahead of every task, deadline, and cost.
A well-written strategy will also allow every team member to understand the big picture and their role in achieving it. After a promotional strategy is defined, event planning can take place.
Get Other People to Share Your Content with Contests
Event contests are a creative, inclusive way of engaging with your attendees and maintaining an active community.
Nothing motivates users to share your content like giveaway contests, especially when they’re well-thought-out and fun to participate in.
Each social media platform offers different possibilities for posting, reposting, and sharing content, so you can really be creative with your contest.
These are some of the many contests ideas that you should consider:
- Hashtag contest
- Facebook or Instagram story contest
- Photo sharing
- Tik-Tok contest
Lastly, when attendees get engaged, they become a part of the overall webinar experience. That is a priceless asset to your marketing team.
Your content team can further use that for a recap video and review what ideas the participants loved the most before planning the next webinar or giveaway.
Use Engaging Visuals
Webinars are an immersive multimedia experience that thrives on interaction and engagement. If the content of your webinar is well-thought-out and relevant, but your visuals are flat and lackluster, your attendees will fail to engage.
In addition to the overall visual identity, the 3 key aspects of webinar visuals are:
- The visual value of production
- Presentation infographics
- Background visuals
The visual value of production means maintaining high production levels for your webinar event.
This implies securing a strong Internet connection with absolutely no stream disruptions and a high-definition video image of your webinar speakers and their presentations.
Presentation infographics provide easy-to-scan information that blends text and images. Pairing a relevant visual with the text will help the audience retain information.
You can do so easily with various online infographic makers that are available, most of which come with outstanding free features.
Infographics also make for great social media content, so don’t disregard them.
Background visuals can be a powerful asset for webinars, too. Having an engaging professional in front of a visually appealing, non-generic background will contribute to the uniqueness of the overall atmosphere.
As with infographics, if you want to get creative with webinar green screens, there are several tools at your disposal.
Wrap Up
Event marketing is an important part of successful lead generation. The ongoing epidemic has made webinars its key asset, with fewer production costs compared to a physical event.
When devising a social media strategy, make sure to include paid ads that lead you to a qualified audience, contests to generate engagement and sharing, as well as video clips that showcase your webinar’s atmosphere.
Don’t forget to post unique and engaging visuals both before and during the event.
After your virtual event is finished, make sure you leave plenty of content left for attendees and newcomers to review and rewatch.
Do your best to stay in touch with everyone who’s attended your webinar and establish a lasting connection.
If you stick to these social media promotion strategies, you will see your webinar engagement and attendance grow.
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Michelle Laurey works as a VA for small businesses. She loves talking business and productivity, and share her experience with others. Outside her keyboard, she spends time with her Kindle library or binge-watching Billions. Her superpower? Vinyasa flow! Talk to her on Twitter @michelle_laurey.