The line of distinction between real life and social media is being blurred gradually. People are going social by shedding the guise of shame and coming out of shells. Social media has taken us out of the cocooned existence, put voice to protests, acted as a platform for making business, globalized local events and reduced the diameter of the globe in terms of distance. In brief, social media itself is a revolution.
Nowadays, be an event local, national or global, it is also tagged ‘social’. All events like meetings, conferences and parties go online before being held. Promoting an event on social media sites helps make it large in real life. It is the maximum number of visitors that makes an event a great gala. The more footfalls an event receives, the larger is it. Here is how you can maximize the online exposure of an offline event by means of social media marketing:

It is difficult to get noticed, publicize an event and get recognition for talents even in real life without buzz or hype online. So, put in the best efforts to create a buzz about your upcoming event on social media. It takes nothing but marketing creativity and costs nothing but time.
User Engagement on Facebook Event Page
The very first do to promote an event online is setting up a Facebook event page using your personal or business Facebook profile or Facebook fan page. It offers a great advantage to let your friends and followers and fans to connect with the event before, during and after it is held. Once you are done with setting up the Facebook event page, share it with your Facebook contacts and start inviting them. Make sure including in the info section of the event page the details of the event. Don’t forget to respond to the questions or comments posted as walls on the event page. An increasing number of Facebook users joining or liking the event page is not enough. Without engagement, there is no promotion.
EventBrite for Online Event Promotion
EventBrite is one of the online tools to promote events on social media. Create a registration page for the event on EventBrite. It offers unique features to customize the event page in keeping with the objective of the event and share it across social media sites to create buzz. Interested attendees can email the link to or share it with their friends in online social circles.
LinkedIn to Invite Your Professional Contacts
Don’t leave LinkedIn behind thinking that LinkedIn is only a professional network. It helps a lot to get an event searchable in Google and noticed by LinkedIn users. Create a page for the event on LinkedIn by clicking the ‘More’ tab. It opens a list of applications. Create a new event by using the Event application. Make sure to optimize the Keywords section with keywords related to the event. It helps people find the event online through Google. Once the event has been published, invite your LinkedIn connections to attend the event and share the invitation with their LinkedIn contacts.
Unique Twitter Hashtag for Event Promotion
Create a unique Twitter hashtag for your event. A Twitter hashtag consists of a hash sign ‘#’ and a relevant keyword. Choose a singular keyword that better describes your event in tweets or discussions and that is not being used on Twitter by anyone. It helps your Twitter followers and their followers identify the event. Use search.twitter.com to check the availability of your desired hashtag.
Twitpic & Twitter for Online Response to Event
If the event is a more-than-one-day long affair, promote it on social media when it is in progress. Take snaps of the event on the first day and use Twitpic to share the snaps with those who could not attend it on the first day. It makes them realize what they have missed and drives them to turn up at the event the next day. The similar is the purpose of using Flickr for event promotion. It encourages response from the attendees of the event too.
Now is the time to make a social media event promotion plan based on the above-mentioned tips and let the people go gaga over the event.