June 6, 2021

Effective Ways to Promote Your Virtual Event

Virtual events are the new big thing! No more groaning in traffic or booking venues months in advance. The fact that there is no commute involved in an online event makes it really easy for visitors to attend your event. The cost of organizing these events is much less than physical events, and it allows your audience to experience an engaging environment from the comfort of their couch.

Considering there are no geographic limitations, there can be thousands of people interested in the nature of the event you’re hosting. The challenge lies here: how do you get to them?

Pick Your People

Start with identifying the type of audience you want to appeal to. Their age, location, interests, and backgrounds make a difference in the approach you should take while promoting your virtual event. They could be young children or potential investors for your business.

Identifying your audience can help you decide the mode of marketing to focus on and the best way to capture their attention. This is the right place to begin planning for your promotional campaign.

Speakers and Sponsors

Ask the speakers at your event to spread the word by building hype on their social media. Your speakers play a significant role in attracting your audience and driving traffic to your virtual event. You can also urge all your sponsors to promote the event on their websites.

Utilizing promising social media influencers is another great way to increase awareness about your event. Make sure to choose influencers who are right for your event. For instance, if you are hosting a virtual art exhibition targeted at 20-30 year olds, ensure that your chosen influencer’s audience falls into the same demographic.

Write Right

You can promote your virtual event on well-known media outlets. Find the ones that best match your event and have a good number of quality readers. PR agencies are a great way to reach these media outlets. Make sure to include the names of some speakers, sponsors, and the key benefits of the event.

Whether on another website or your own, use the right keywords to make sure that your article shows up on top of the search results. Keep it informative and add a link to your event’s landing page at the end. Readers are not likely to read through it if they think it is an entirely promotional post. Make a video sample of your event and give them a taste of what they would get to experience in it.

Unique Landing Page

Your landing page should be well designed and preferably have a sneak peek of your event, including catchy phrases that inspire your audience to sign up. Mention what they can expect from attending your digital event and how it adds value. Highlight how your event is different from others and create an event countdown timer to excite attendees.

Once your event agenda is finalized, make sure to include it on your landing page. Nothing attracts potential attendees more than the details! To build registration numbers quickly, you could offer an early bird discount. You can even assign a referral link, which rewards those who get their friends or colleagues to register for your event.

Make It Social

Choose which social media platform would best suit your online event. If it’s a business conference, focus on LinkedIn. Facebook promotion would work well for an event that caters to a specific niche. There are many Facebook groups in several niches that can help pass the message to a lot of genuinely interested people. There are numerous social platforms to choose from, and you don’t have to necessarily stick to one!

Introduce a catchy hashtag and make sure all your speakers and ambassadors use it on their social media profiles. Use captivating templates for your social media posters, which will motivate your audience to share them on their profiles. Make sure that a link to your landing page is included in all your posts.

Use testimonials from previous happy attendees and entice new customers. You can even encourage your attendees to use your hashtag and post their reviews after the event. This drives more traffic to your website and helps in the promotion of future events.

Other Ways to Market

Use email marketing to reach your previous events’ attendees. You can grab their attention by sending short and visually catchy emails, as well as, reminders when the discount period is running out.

You can also use Google Ads to promote your event. Identify the areas where most of your target audience lives and concentrate on those locations.

Keep in mind, that timing is critical when it comes to marketing. You can start building anticipation early on, but keep the major chunk of your promotions right on time. If you’re too early, people could forget about the event. If you’re too late, they might already have plans that they’d rather not move around.

Warm Them Up

Once you have attracted people to register for your event, you have to make sure they attend it. Remind your visitors via occasional emails. Don’t flood their inboxes, it could drive them away.

Keep your emails plain and crisp so that it doesn’t get listed as spam or promotion. The idea is to make sure that they don’t line up anything else for the time of your event, or worse, forget the event entirely!

Ready, Set, Go!

Now that you’ve armed yourself with all the necessary strategies to attract your audience, go ahead and draw up your marketing plan!

If you’re consistent with your promotions and keep your audience in the loop by sending timely reminders, you will have an optimal turnout for your event. Actively ask for feedback, engage your viewers in conversations, and make them want to come back for more.

To learn more about how you can host your virtual event on our 3D virtual events platform, HoloFair, contact us directly.