Social Media Report 2012

Social Media& Events Report 2012How is the event industry using Social Networks? © amiando GmbHevent registration & ticketing amiando.com - July 2012

S ummarySummary ......................................................................................................................................................2 Socio-demographics .............................................................................................................................2Analysis ......................................................................................................................................................3 What importance do social media have as a marketing instrument for event organizers?...................3 What social media channels are being used?........................................................................................4 Which social media platforms would you like to know more about?.....................................................5 Do you plan on modifying your social media activities in the future?....................................................6 How much content do you publish each week on social media platforms?.........................................7 What are your social media goals?........................................................................................................8 For which of your objectives have you already seen improvement?.....................................................9 Which factors are preventing you from harnessing the potential of social media?.............................10 Are you using monitoring tools to observe social media channels and track the success of your activities?.................................................................................................................................11 Which monitoring instruments are you using to observe your social media activities?......................12Key Insights ...................................................................................................................................................13How To: Social media tips for the event industry...........................................................................................14 Overview of the use of social media instruments................................................................................16 Network specific tips............................................................................................................................17 Facebook....................................................................................................................................17 Twitter..........................................................................................................................................19 XING............................................................................................................................................21 Pinterest......................................................................................................................................22 Foursquare..................................................................................................................................24 YouTube......................................................................................................................................25 Google+......................................................................................................................................26Last but not least............................................................................................................................................28The Authors ...................................................................................................................................................29About amiando – event registration & ticketing..............................................................................................29Our Media Partners........................................................................................................................................30

SummaryE ight years after its founding, Facebookboasts 901 million active users each month – Socio-demographicsand more are joining every day. More than 170million tweets are sent out each day. One year The online survey polled approx. 1000 eventafter its founding, Google+ reports 170 million organizers. The respondents were 60%users. Social networks long ago moved out male, with the majority of them between 30of the realm of purely private use. Companies and 50 years old. 60% came from Germany,from all industries are taking advantage of the Austria and Switzerland, 10% from the rest ofsocial web to better reach their customers, Europe, 10% from North and South Americamarket products and generate awareness for and 20% from other countries. 22% of thosetheir brand. surveyed primarily organize conferences and congresses, 22% seminars, training sessions and courses, 13% corporate events; a furtherYet how important are the 11% indicated that they promote primarilynetworks in reality for the event concerts, festivals and nightlife events, while the remaining 32% were spread out amongindustry? other, networking events, private events and trade fairs.Which networks are used? And what are theobjectives for event organizers in using them?amiando, Europe‘s leading tool for onlineevent registration and ticketing, once againthis year took on the challenge of determininghow event organizers use social media asmarketing instruments, identifying the latesttrends and investigating what problems haveemerged. A comparison with the results fromlast year‘s reports is especially interesting, asit highlights several key shifts.This report will also provide you with numeroususeful tips on how you can apply social mediaeven more effectively to marketing your events. Share This Report ! 2event registration & ticketing

AnalysisWhat importance do social media haveas a marketing instrument for eventorganizers? 37 Somewhat important Neutral Somewhat unimportant 18 Not important at all Very important 35 7 3Social media continues to have a highimportance to event organizersTo determine the fundamental attitudes on „not important at all“ as a marketingthe part of event organizers regarding the instrument. This represented little changeimportance of social networks, the question from 2011 — social media continues to remainwas posed to them about how important social highly important.media are as marketing tools.The answers to this question were Summary:unambiguous: 73% of respondents indicated The social networks continue to establishthat social media is „very important“ or themselves as important communication„somewhat important.“ Only 10% saw social channels for event organizers.media as „somewhat unimportant“ or Share This Report! 3event registration & ticketing

What social media channels are being used? Facebook Twitter 31 Youtube Xing LinkedIn Google+ Blogs Flickr Other NoneFacebook and Twitter remain the mostimportant social media channels Tip:Facebook remains the most frequently used Determine where your target audience issocial media channel at 84%, followed by the to be found. You should definitely pursue amicroblogging service Twitter, used by 61% of multiplatform strategy to increase your reachthose polled. XING, YouTube and LinkedIn were even further. Google Analytics for examplealso frequently used, with participation levels offers an effective way to determine the originsbetween 41% and 46%. What‘s remarkable of the visitors to your website. You should searchis the strong interest in Google+, with 36% of for participants, which could be interested inrespondents reportedly active on the relatively your event, in social networks and analyze thenew platform. One sees however that the activity of competitors.network has been unable to date to establishitself as a competitor to Facebook, and is usedas a supplemental network to Facebook, not areplacement.The values did not change significantlysince 2011, excepting that blogs dropped 6percentage points. Share This Report! 4event registration & ticketing

Which social media platforms would you like to know more about? Google+ Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Keine Youtube Blogs Xing Flickr OtherThe greatest interest was in Google+,Facebook and TwitterTo determine which social media platforms Our survey indicates that Facebook andare the source of the greatest interest, the Twitter remain the most important socialquestion was posed as to which network event media channels. This could be a reason whyorganizers are most interested in learning more the majority of event organizers want to learnabout. The survey made clear that the greatest more about Facebook and Twitter.interest is in Google+. This could reflect thefact that the network is among the newest andevent organizers had yet to gather significantexperience with the platform. Share This Report! 5event registration & ticketing

Do you plan on modifying your social media activities in the future? Activity level will be increased Activity level to remain unchanged Activity level will be decreased 78 21 1Activity levels, now as before, arebeing increasedThe continually growing potential for social activity levels in 2011, while 17% had nomedia can be seen in the answers to changes planned. Several of those whoQuestion 3: 78% of respondents plan on wanted to increase their activity levels last yearincreasing their social media activities in the appear to have done so and are now satisfiedfuture. 21% report that the activity levels will with their revised activity level.remain the same; only 1% is planning oncutting their activity levels. Summary: The event industry continues planning onIt is interesting to compare this year’s answers strengthening its social media activity levels.with the one’s of the Social Media & Events This is a clear indicator that event organizersReport 2011: 82% wanted to increase thei continue to see enormous potential in networks Share This Report! 6event registration & ticketing

How much content do you publish each week on social media platforms? 30 10 Up to 10 More than 25 11 None Up to 25 37 Up to 3 12Between one and ten posts per week Tipp:To pursue the desire for greater levels of It must be noted that not just the volume andsocial media activity, the number of times that quantity of the published items are important;content is published must be increased. seeking out strategically advantageous times to post is also crucial, since otherwise the11% of polled event organizers publish no content may reach many fewer users thancontent whatsoever on social media platforms it should. The closer an event grows, theand can thus be classified as inactive. That is more relevant it becomes to participants and3 percentage points less than a year ago. The potential participants, meaning that you shouldmajority of survey participants post between post more content and info about the event.one and ten items per week. Compared witha year ago, the answers up to 25 (12%) andmore than 25 (10%) published items per weekon social media networks remained almostconstant. Share This Report! 7event registration & ticketing

What are your social media goals? Increasing familiarity of the event Increasing the awareness of Creating a new information channel Increasing customer loyalty (to replace email, etc) the brand Opening up a new customer Generation of leads Increasing ticket sales Reducing marketing support channel expenditures OtherIncreasing awareness the mostimportant objective Summary:Social media activity can pursue a variety Increasing awareness is the most importantof different goals. The answers to Question social media objective for event organizers.5 indicated that the objectives for the event You should try to increase your coverage ofindustry primarily reflect an effort to raise the target audience of relevance to you, andawareness about individual events (70%), as not just try to bump your Likes and Followerwell as the brand as a whole (70%), and to counts.increase customer loyalty (65%).What‘s surprising is that only a third of thosepolled were trying to boost ticket sales. Share This Report! 8event registration & ticketing

For which of your objectives have you already seen improvement? Increasing the awareness Increasing familiarity Creating a new information channel (to Increasing customer loyalty of the event of the brand Reducing marketing expenditures replace email, etc) Opening up a new customer Generation of leads Increasing ticket sales support channel Other68% average goal attainment Tip:Some event organizers report having seen Constant performance review is of essentialimprovements in their goal attainment; from importance for social media activities as well.the list of potential answers above, roughly Determine in advance which KPIs (Key40 to 76% of respondents reported initial Performance Indicators) you will be using tosuccesses. measure your progress.The results of the survey show clearly that mostof the participants were able to record at leastinitial success through social media marketing(mean value: 68%). The areas of much greaterlevels of success are interesting here: over70% of those polled reported increasesto awareness levels about their events andbrand. Share This Report! 9event registration & ticketing

Which factors are preventing you from harnessing the potential of social media? Lack of time Content restrictions (risk of legal problems, Inability to measure effectively Lack of personnel Lack of social media budget Lack of know-how such as copyrights, etc) Risk of a social media disaster OtherLack of time is the biggest problem Summary:Why are event organizers in some cases Based on the responses, it is clear thatunable to achieve their stated goals for social event organizers see enormous potential inmedia marketing? social media and are seeking to expand their activities. All the same, they appear not yet toOver 50% indicated that a lack of time is the have allocated the necessary resources formain problem, followed by a lack of personnel this.and problems with clearly measuring theeffectiveness of the measures. Only 12%expressed concern of running into potentialimage disasters as a result of their socialmedia activities. Share This Report! 10event registration & ticketing

Are you using monitoring tools to observe social media channels and track the success of your activities? 39 No Yes Don’t know 50 11Only 39% use monitoring tools Tip:Performance measurement is an essential Create a program for monitoring your socialcomponent of any marketing strategy. For media channel, as this will allow you to measuresocial media marketing, this means the use performance in real time and make it quickerof social media monitoring tools. What‘s more and easier to react. If you are not yet usingsurprising is that 50% of the participants use monitoring tools, start with free tools suchno such tools and a further 11% are uncertain as TweetDeck, as these are often sufficientwhether their company uses any such tools. to allow for performance measurement andOnly 39% (a slim 2% more than a year ago) realtime monitoring.indicate that they use monitoring tools. Share This Report! 11event registration & ticketing

Which monitoring instruments are you using to observe your social media activities? 74 External 14 Paid commercial Free commercial 12The majority of respondents use no-cost monitoring tools Summary:The 39% of participants who indicated that When social media monitoring tools are used,they use monitoring tools, were asked as a it is primarily free tools. The reasons for this arefollow-up question which tools they use. They not difficult to grasp, since professional paidhad the choice between commercial (pay) solutions are tied to significant investments.tools and free tools, with the pay-based toolsthen subdivided into in-house and externalproducts.It can be observed that a solid three-quarters ofthose polled use free tools. What‘s interestingis that unlike last year, some 5% more now usepaid commercial solutions. Share This Report! 12event registration & ticketing

Key Insights“ ” By comparing this year’s answers with the ones of the Social Media & Events Report 2011, many findings can be drawn.ation & ticketing Social media continues to represent an important marketing tool Trust in social media marketing Social media remains a very important The continually growing potential of social marketing tool for event organizers. As media can be seen in the fact that three- already reported in last year‘s report, the quarters of respondents are planning on most frequently used social media channels extending their social media activities in the for event organizers are Facebook, Twitter future. Several of the event organizers who and XING. Facebook remains far and away indicated plans in last year‘s report to expand the social media instrument of choice for the their social media marketing strategy this year marketing of events. appear to have taken steps to do so and appear satisfied with the results. Few expressed the fear of ending up in a social media “disaster”. Key objective: Raising awareness Lack of time and personnel The most important goals for social media The biggest problems are, as already activities are raising awareness for individual indicated in last year‘s report, a lack of time, events and for the brand as a whole. More of personnel and issues related to the difficulty than half of all respondents indicated that of accurately measuring the effectiveness they had achieved these goals through social of social media marketing activities. Due to media activities. the high investment costs involved with paid commercial monitoring tools, most event organizers use free tools. Share This Report! 13 event registration & ticketing

How To:Social media tips for the event industry Share This Report ! 14event registration & ticketing

POSTS based on a strategy and planTo successfully implement a social media blog posts from the industry, it‘s quite likelystrategy, it‘s important to incorporate the time that other companies from the industry withand personnel into your business plans and an overlapping pool of fans will already haveto compose a social media plan that lays out posted a link if you wait too long. Be sure to postwhat will be posted and when over a specific different types of content to stay interesting.period of time. This ensures that new content is Yet a happy medium should also be sought inposted on a regular basis. The plan should be terms of the frequency of posting: always keeporiented toward your other marketing activities the dialog moving, but do not overwhelm withand event planning, but nevertheless retain information. Give your company a face andflexibility: if you discover a current, relevant show your customers how things look ‚behindblog article, you shouldn‘t wait too long before the scenes‘ by posting photos from everydaysharing it with your channel. life in the office. This will give you company character and bring a sense of an open doorDefine clear social media objectives: which policy and make you more sympathetic.target audience are you seeking to address? Kipp Bodnar, a marketing strategist at Hubspot,How do you want to present your company? postulated a “10-4-1 rule. Don‘t just promoteHow do you react to criticism and other your own events, but also those outside yourfeedback? Monitoring tools are recommended company as well as industry-related contentto measure the success of your efforts. Some so that your users find your page interestingare free (such as Socialmention, TweetDeck, and ultimately subscribe. You should link 10Wildfire, Klout) and others are paid commercial times to external content, such as interestingproducts (such as Meltwater Buzz, HootSuite articles from industry bloggers, 4 times toPro, Trackur). Depending on your specific your own content and one time to your ownneeds, it may be worthwhile to invest in a homepage.more full-featured tool with greater options forinvestigating the success of your social media Involve fansstrategy. Your social media strategy will be at its mostPost relevant, topical content effective when you involve as many people as possible with your entries through comments,To keep the attention of your customers ‚Likes‘, ‚Re-tweets‘ and ‚+1‘s. The articles thenfocused on your social media presence for also appear in the newsfeed of friends of yourthe long run, it is crucial that you always have fans, drawing further attention to your brand.current, relevant content posted. This can be You should thus animate your fans as often asinteresting blog posts, industry or company possible to take part: post questions, ask fornews, heads-up about upcoming events, feedback — have visitors to one of your eventphotos from past events, or even infographics share their photos afterward, for example. This— the key thing is that your target audience shows other fans not just the success of thefeels personally addressed. It‘s essential that most recent event, but also awakens interestthe content be kept up to date. Especially in future events.when it involves external content such as Share This Report! 15event registration & ticketing

Overview of the use of social media instruments Network Planning Phase During the Event After the Event Create Facebook page and lo- Plan postings for exact ti- Evaluate results in the cations with Facebook Places ming administrative area and adjust the social media Post impressions during the strategy event Post event videos and Facebook images on Facebook pages Animate participants to tag event photos Create Twitter account and Set up Twitter wall Provision of images, video hashtag for event material Twitter Topics: Communicate hashtag on all Lectures, topics, program Twitter grader communication channels changes, general impressi- Twitter ons Present event on TweetMy- Events Create event Create contacts during event Link XING profiles after event XING and promote networking via XING AdCreator XING Create Google+ Business Creation Collections and Measure success of the Account upload videos event Google+ Video conferences with Google+ „Hangouts“ Create Pinterest account and Publish meaningful images Publish meaningful images set up boards and videos and videos Pinterest Review own homepage for Link images with keyword Link images with keyword image and video quality texts texts Create event and location on Position posters and Delete event Foursquare standees at event to inform Foursquare about check-in possibilities Create YouTube channel Stream videos live from Stream highlights in YouTube event prepared video Share This Report! 16event registration & ticketing

Network specific tips FacebookWith more than 900 million users worldwideand roughly 23.7 million active users inGermany alone, Facebook is the network withthe greatest reach. As such it is not surprisingthat it is also the network most frequently usedamong event promoters. For many companies,Facebook has become a cornerstone of socialmedia marketing strategy; after all, with 3.2billion „Likes“ and 300 million photos uploadedeach day, Facebook represents a tremendouspotential for marketing events.Planning phaseCreate a Facebook page for your event duringthe planning phase. The facelift for Facebook Create a location for your event using thethat went live on March 30, 2012 introduced Places function on Facebook. Visitors tothe Timeline and many other new functions for your event can then ‚check in‘ to the event,the existing pages. indicating to their friends that they are currently at that event.Event promoters now have the option ofcreating a large title image (851x315 pixels) amiando offers you the option of selling ticketsand a profile image (180x180 pixels). Visitors for your event directly via your Facebookto your page then see under the name of their page. It only takes a few steps to setevent how many „Likes“ your page has and up a ticket shop on Facebook.how many users are talking about your event. You can also then create anList all relevant information, such as the date event on amiando and add inyour company was founded, your mission the amiando social ticketingand a brief description of the firm in the upper app to your Facebook fansection. The Timeline then provides your page. The integrated ticketfans with information about the exact dates shop means that Facebookof major events or periods in your corporate can be more than just ahistory. This includes for example Milestone marketing tool; it can serveentries to denote key dates (including with an as a sales channel as well.843x403 pixel photo). Milestone entries can for Experience more about theexample be the day of a major event, winning amiando Facebook app at http://an award or the precise date on which the info.amiando.com/facebook-app.company achieved a certain number of fans.Your Timeline can also be used to hide certainstories and highlight others as especially Experience more about the amiando Facebook app atinteresting, and to sort your activities by year http://info.amiando.com/facebook-app-en.or type. Share This Report! 17event registration & ticketing

During the event If you want to post something on your page during the event but don‘t think you‘ll havethe time for it, you can plan a posting for afuture date. This ensures that all posts will hitthe newsfeed for your fans at exactly the righttime. To use this function you must indicate afounding date in the Timeline. You then create a post as normal, but instead of publishing itimmediately, you click on the Clock symbol on Keep fans up-to-datethe lower left to set a specific day and time for Keep your fans up-to-date about yourthe post to go live. This has the benefit that you events on a regular basis, posting reportscan plan your posts more effectively and don‘t of between 100 and 250 symbolshave to be on Facebook at precisely the right (less than 3 lines of text) at least threemoment to publish something in real time. The times per week.new function provides corporate social mediamanagers with the added benefit of flexibility; Current topicsthey can create posts at convenient times Pick up on topical themes (such as postswithout getting in the way of their other duties. about vacation during the summerThis kind of post might include special ticket months) and link this message to youroffers to your events, for example, as well as events. It‘s easier for your fans touseful information such as the event location remember current topics.or information about speakers. InteractionAfter the event Pose questions within your posts toOnce the event is finished, it‘s time to increase interactivity on your pages.review and analyze performance. The newlyredesigned administration area, found on the upper right side (above the cover photo), is Post at the right timesdesigned for clear and easy use. You can hide Use the administrative area to deter-it by clicking on the ‚Hide‘ function upper edge mine the day and time when you canof the administration area. most effectively reach your fans, and post at those times.The administrative area allows you to quantifyyour performance after the event, including Impressionsexport of the data into an Excel file, to help you Show your fans impressions from yourmore effectively pursue your targeted strategy. side and offer a peek behind the scenesThe data will indicate what your fans are most of your events. Give away tickets to yourinterested in, which topics they feel you should events in thanks for fan loyalty.post more often, and whether the fans reactmore to photos or videos. Your uppermost Sweepstakesgoal should be achieving the greatest possible Sweepstakes are a good way to generatereach with your messages. more traffic to your fan page. Be carefulPost videos and photos from the event and to watch for potential legal issues,move your participants to tag themselves on however.the event photos. Share This Report! 18event registration & ticketing

Twitter During the eventThere are more than 140 million users of Twitter Prior to the event you should tweet all importantworldwide, including four million in Germany. information, always in 140 characters or less,The microblogging serve is growing in such as the event location, the precise timeimportance as a marketing tool for events and and the program. Post documents about theis an established component in an integrated event on Twitter.social media strategy. Twitter can be used inall three phases of event management. During the event, you should create a Twitterwall (such as twitterwallr.com) that shows all thePlanning phase tweets containing your event‘s hashtags inDuring the planning phase ahead of your chronological order. Post during the eventevent, you should create a Twitter account about lectures, topics, program changesand a hashtag (#RelevantPhrase). This is or general impressions of the event. Thosetypically the name of the event. Always check interested in your event then are informedon Twitter to make sure the hashtag isn‘t immediately, even if they haven‘t visited it.already in use elsewhere. Actively publicize Non-visitors can also re-tweet interestingyour event and the hashtag you‘ve created discussions. Create flyers for the eventon your homepage and via other existing informing visitors about the hashtag. The morecommunication channels. Hashtags have the tweets that are posted about your event, thebenefit that they turn up information about better. Stimulate Twitterers to post about yourthe event in a bundled manner, and because event, such as through automatic inclusion ininterested parties and participants can tweet a sweepstakes for those who tweet.about the event using the hashtag themselves.Twitter offers a hashtag button that you can What‘s important is that you as event organizerintegrate onto your event page so that each follow your tweets and respond immediately totweet posted via the button automatically questions and critical commentary. You canincludes your event hashtag. send this on Twitter as direct messages thatTwitter has also announced what will be are not public visible, but the person must beknown as hashtag pages, which will be of following your Twitter account and vice-versa.major interest for events. Hashtag pages arededicated to a specific hashtag and can be After the eventedited and adapted by an admin. The first After the event you can for example makehashtag page is dedicated to #NASCAR. available free interviews, images and videoYou can see it at https://twitter.com/hashtag/ material so that your event stays a topic ofnascar. discussion. The percentage share of Tweets isTwitter behavior is independent from the somewhat higher after the event than beforesize of the event; what‘s important is how the event, due to the provided info materialsmuch information you as the event organizer that your visitors can download (see amiandocan make available on Twitter (see also the study „Twitter for Events“).amiando study on „Twitter for Events“). If youpost a high amount of information, then manyusers can re-tweet that information as well. Share This Report! 19event registration & ticketing

easily and intuitively. If the event includes a fee, amiando handles invoicing and simplifies Twittergrader numerous other processes. Check on Twittergrader how influential your Twitter users are Planning phase (http://tweet.grader.com/) The option is available to create XING events of professional relevance. The most suitable Build relationships candidates for this are conferences, seminars Pay attention to your power users. Power and networking events, since they can achieve users post a great deal of content on large coverage within their relevant target social media platforms such as Twitter audience. If the event is created as a public and Facebook and have a very high event, then the event is automatically shown to number of followers or fans. Establish users for whom the event matches their profile relationships to your power users, since interest as potentially of interest. they can serve as valuable opinion leaders for your events. Beyond these automatically generated recommendations, XING also offers multiple Greater awareness options for actively promoting your event: You Place your event on the social media can share within your network (and on Twitter event marketing platform TweetMyEvents and Facebook), invite your XING contacts (http://www.tweetmyevents.com) and directly and harness viral effects: positive generate greater awareness. responses to events by participants appear in their activity stream, so that the rest of the network learns about it. XINGXING is the social network for professionalcontacts. Over 12 million members use theinternet platform worldwide for business, jobsand career. With 5.5 million specialists andmanagers on XING, it is the largest professionalnetwork in the German-speaking world. Asa professional network, the focus at XING ison the exchange of knowledge on business-related topics, such as event marketing, andthe search for suitable employees and careeradvance, even from an existing employmentsituation. Thanks to the integrated tool fromamiando, members of XING can create events Share This Report! 20event registration & ticketing

After the event A good conversation starter for your new contacts is asking for feedback about the event. Later you can plan projects together, or invite these persons to similar events. Found groups that fit your event and invite your contacts there. In the future you can also deliver info about your events and invite other contacts.Starting in August 2012 — initially for theGerman market only — a new tool will bepublished for marketing events on XING.This the XING AdCreator, a tool that can beused to create ad banners for your event onyour own, as well as selecting the right targetaudience and performance measurement. Theaudience targeting function can be individuallyfiltered for regions, industries and interestsand allows the use of various images and textsfor the campaign to increase its performance.XING offers four packets for invoicing: three Create your event and sell the ticketsof those have a fixed price per placement directly via XING. and a maximum budget; the flex package Post information about your event in yourincludes a price per thousand placements for XING network.an individualized budget. The benefit of this is that only actually placements of the ad are Use XING AdCreator and promote yourpaid. Once booked, your ad is then shown event through ads that reach your targetto the relevant target audience in prominent audience.places on XING. Post information about your event inDuring the event relevant XING groups and increase yourContacts that you make during the event can range in that way.be added as contacts before the event is even over using XING‘s mobile site, establishing the Link contacts to events and network viabasis for long-term relationships. The mobile XING.handshake from XING is perfectly suited forthis. Share This Report! 21event registration & ticketing

PinterestPinterest went online in spring 2010 and is oneof the newest social networks.On Pinterest users can not just upload their ownimages and videos, but also collect imagesfrom the internet to be shared on Facebookand Twitter. The various images can be sortedinto different albums known as boards.Other members can see not just persons,companies and brands, but also follow boardsto see the latest images from albums.Planning phaseYou can only use Pinterest if you‘ve receivedan invitation to the social network or have aFacebook or Twitter account to use as a log in.Fill in the field „About“ as precisely as possible Contemplate which categories your visitorsand use as many keywords as possible, since search through to find an event like yours andthat text is shown in search engines. Use the create boards using those meta-labels; yousame email address for Pinterest that you can only have one board per topic, though.use for your Twitter business account. Checkthat your homepage has meaningful, high-resolution images that can be further pinned.Activate the Pinterest sharing button — ‚pin it‘— to go with other share buttons.If you plan an event with different conferences,you should create a board for each conference.Individual boards can focus on dining, drinking,parties or day trips for your event. Visitors canthus inform themselves in advanced about theevent through attractive photos.If you‘re planning an event that you‘ve alreadyorganized at least once before, use the photosfrom the previous year. Attractive photos helpyou make not just other visitors aware of yourevent, but can also help win potential speakersfor your conference. Share This Report! 22event registration & ticketing

During the eventDuring the event you can publish meaningfulimages and videos that can be furtherpinned and share these on Facebookand Twitter via Pinterest. This providesinterested parties with an impressionof your event, even if they are notat the event itself. Hang postersaround your event to encouragevisitors to follow you on Pinterest.It is not yet clear from a legalstandpoint about whether youmay pin images for which youdo not hold copyrights. Youshould thus be sure to pin onlyimages on your board for whichyou own copyrights or whereyou have received consent fromthe copyright owner.After the eventPin your images and videos afterthe event on your Pinterest page.Create a short description for eachphoto and link the image to yourhomepage. Take care that the imagestext and videos have metatags to ensurethat they can be located by search engines. Share This Report! 23event registration & ticketing

FoursquareThe geolocation network Foursquare allowsyou to market your event through LocationBased Services (LBS) and address yourcustomers directly. Foursquare boasts over20 million users worldwide, checking in todifferent locations using their smartphones.Foursquare users have the opportunity tocreate a profile on the platform (max. 160characters) and inform their friends via mobilecheck-in where they currently are. Users canalso perform a check-in to earn various awardsand collect points. The user decides whetherhis check-ins are shared on social communitieslike Twitter or Facebook. Awareness of anevent can thus spread very quickly via word ofmouth, since the information about a check-in During the eventis shown to the user‘s friends. Those friends Use the „Tip“ function to provide fans with thecan see for each check-in who else also latest updates. Place posters and standeeschecked in at the location and any tips the to inform your event visitors during the eventfriend recorded about the location. that they can check in to the event using Foursquare. With the aid of special offers andPlanning phase coupons you can motivate your visitors toFoursquare is simple to use for the marketing check in to your event and post that they haveof your events and raises awareness of your done so on Facebook or using a #hashtag,event through word-of-mouth propaganda. on Twitter. One potential example of how toTie your mobile marketing to your social media motivate your visitors is to offer anyone whoactivities and create a profile for your event in checks in to the event with four friends andFoursquare during the planning phase. Be sure tweets the #Eventname a coupon for the nextto include your Twitter account and the precise concert that you organize.address where the event should take place.Create specific locations for your event and After the eventgive various tips for different spots. This might After the event you simple delete the eventmean a tip about a coffee cart at your event from Foursquare. Check after the event howwhere users can have a free cup of coffee for many visitors have checked in to your eventchecking in, or recommend a specific drink. and what you can improve for the next event. More event promotion tips for Foursquare can be found on the amiando blog. Share This Report! 24event registration & ticketing

YouTubeWith four billion video views per day, Google‘sYouTube is the world‘s biggest and mostfamous online video portal. Use YouTube tomarket your event.You can address internet users on YouTubebefore, during and after the event:Planning phaseGet started early to create interest amongusers. Publicize the latest updates about yourevent, post a teaser clip, or perhaps conductinterviews with invited speakers or exhibitors.This also makes it possible to collect feedbackand commentary from users about the event.Create a YouTube channel by registering After the eventdirectly with YouTube or link your Google Edit together a video after the eventaccount YouTube. Be certain to always include summarizing the highlights. Post that videothe name of your event in your channel to make on YouTube as well. Visitors to your events areit easier to find. then afforded the chance to look back on theDesign your channel to match the brand event and forward it on to friends. The videosappearance for your other social media profiles also offer a good opportunity to advertise yourand don‘t forget to include as much information next event.as possible about the event. Publicize videos Read on our blog about interesting elementsthat you post on YouTube to all of your other of YouTube and event marketing.channels, such as Facebook and Twitter.Ensure that your channel and videos arealways appended with a sufficient quantity ofappropriately descriptive meta-tags so thatthey can be easily found on YouTube and viasearch machines. You can also advertise yourchannel using AdWords campaigns.During the eventYouTube affords the opportunity to streamyour event live. Note that you must activatethe live streaming function on your YouTubechannel in advance. This allows you to reachusers who are not attending the event. You canalso post short videos about the event to keepinterested users informed on the latest. Share This Report! 25event registration & ticketing

Google +Google+, online since June 2011, is the newest Create a Google+ business pageof the social networks. With approximately Administer your Google+ business page from170 million users, Google+ has not succeeded a Gmail account to which multiple personsin knocking Facebook off its perch as most have access. On Facebook multiple personspopular network, but it has received a great can be given administrator rights to your page,deal of attention and is currently functioning but this is not possible on Google+.as a parallel supplement to Facebook. Theprimary attraction is the Circles functionthat allows the user to divide up his or hercontacts conveniently into groups. This meansthat any given posting can be shared onlywith specific contacts, avoiding sending toomuch information to contacts for whom it isnot relevant. Depending on the type of yourupcoming events, this allows you to targetyour message much more directly.Google+ is especially well suited for You can set up your own business pagedistribution of individual images, such as at https://plus.google.com/pages/create.infographics, photos of events and diagrams. Select „Company, Institution or OrganizaAs with Facebook, images appear in the news tion“ and enter the required information:stream for your contact; but instead of building name of the page, company website andentire albums, individual photos are shared, a category. You can also opt to restrictwith the image featured more prominently than the visibility of your page.on Facebook. The minimalist, clean design of Google+ turns attention strong toward shared content. The „+1“ button makes it easy to rate comments, posts and content. During the next step you can adapt your public profile. Of special importance areGoogle+ also offers the opportunity to the tagline (a brief description of yourparticipate in video conferences (so-called company/event) and a photo„Hangouts“): participants can simple add in (such as your logo).their Gmail addresses. The impact of Google+shouldn‘t be underestimated, since Google Once these two simple steps are completed,takes into account the user-generated content the basic foundation for your site is in place. It‘sfrom its social networks when it personalizes nevertheless recommended that you flesh outits search results. This means that interactions the page with more information and relevantbetween users and their content influences content before starting to promote the site.how prominently those events are featured insearch results. Share This Report! 26event registration & ticketing

Google+ and search engine hitsGoogle indexes information from your Circlesto determine where the interests of yourcontacts lay. It also determines what kindof content you are distributing, whichcontacts are especially importantand which topics are current foryour Circles. This all improves thesearch engine results. The moreGoogle+ followers and +1 votesyour site gathers, the higher yourGoogle ranking. This makes iteasier to find and increasesyour chances of being locatedby potential customers andparticipants of your event.Google+ EventsGoogle+ recently added aseparate event function. Youcan design invitations usingtemplates, share photos takenduring the event with your Circlesdirectly from your smartphone andset up a photo album for guests toupload their own photos. The direct linkto the Google calendar is also helpful. Share This Report! 27event registration & ticketing

Lastbut not leastWe hope that the 2012 Social Media & Events We are always glad to hear your successReport has highlighted the importance of stories, comments and examples of solidsocial media as a marketing instrument for the social media marketing in the event industryevent industry. for inclusion in future reports. Let us knowThe various examples and data from the online what you think: report@amiando.comsurvey were intended to show how best tomarket an event using social media. Share This Report ! 28event registration & ticketing

Authors Sandro Spiess Myriam Schrade Social Media Marketing Manager Social Media Marketing Manager sandro.spiess@amiando.com myriam.schrade@amiando.com Felix Heuss Tara Rensch Marketing Team Support Marketing Team Support felix.heuss@amiando.com tara.rensch@amiando.comAbout amiando – event registration & ticketingamiando is a pioneer in online event registration amiando has been awarded numerous prizesand ticketing. Since its foundation in 2006, for its innovative products, among them theamiando has become a leading software-as-a- “Technology Pioneer of 2010” at the Worldservice platform for professional events. Economic Forum, and the “eco Internet Award” asamiando’s products help event organizers to reach the best business client portal.a professional level of event organization which, amiando has been part of XING AG since Januaryuntil now, was only reserved for large corporations 2011, an operator of the business network XING.and event agencies. All tools are online-based Its headquarters are based in Munich, additionaland immediately available for use, without the offices are located in London, Paris and Hongneed for software installation. Over 180,000 event Kong.organizers worldwide use amiando, includingprestigious names such as Facebook, BMW,UNESCO, and Telefónica O2. Share This Report! 29event registration & ticketing

Our media partnersWe‘d like to take a moment to thank our media partners. Their help was essential in giving the 2012 SocialMedia & Events Report the broad basis needed to make clear statements.CIM – Conference & Incentive ManagementCIM – Conference & Incentive Management is aleading European trade journal for event plannersin companies, associations and agencies.www.cimunity.comCorbin Ball AssociatesCorbin Ball Associates – Meeting and trade fairtechnology, consultations and printed materials.www.corbinball.comESB – Europäische Sponsoring-BörseESB Europäische Sponsoring-Börse is anindependent networking platform for thesponsoring and event business. The ESB partnernetwork currently comprises some 230 professionalagencies, consultants and service providers inthe areas of sport, sponsoring and events. Asorganizers of numerous congresses, includingEurope‘s largest sport business congress (SpoBiSin Dusseldorf), the Swiss Brand Congress (Zurich),Kids & Marke (Cologne), KulturInvest Congress(Berlin) and the ESB member and company forums,ESB offers ideal platforms for making the rightcontacts, deepening expertise and building newbusiness.www.esb-online.comFrenchwebFrenchweb.fr is the french magazine of the frenchinternet market. Its goal is to put on a piedestalFrench internet actors‘ initiatives: Nonstopinformation, experts‘ interviews, useful advise. Itscommunity represents over 19 000 professionnals.Join the Frenchweb Club to know everything aboutB2B internet.www.frenchweb.fr Share This Report! 30event registration & ticketing

HORIZONT – Journal for Marketing, Advertisingand MediaThe weekly journal HORIZONT covers the entirespectrum of modern marketing communication:from marketing concepts for companies to trendsand tendencies in the agency business and on todevelopments in the classic and interactive media.HORIZONT also reports on career opportunities inthe communications field.www.horizont.netICCAICCA, the International Congress and ConventionAssociation, represents the main specialistsin handling, transporting and accommodatinginternational events. ICCA’s network of over 900suppliers to the international meetings industryspans the globe, with members in 87 countries.All companies and organisations which havea strategic commitment to provide top qualityproducts and services for international meetingsshould consider ICCA membership as part of theirlong term plans.www.iccaworld.comTW MediaTW is a leading industry journal for event planners.We furnish these decision-makers in the MICEindustry with current studies, exclusive casestudies and well-researched reports. Our expertisebenefits both customers and suppliers in the areaof online and social web strategies.www.tw-media.comVeranstaltungsplanerAt 650 members, the Vereinigung DeutscherVeranstaltungsorganisatoren (Association ofGerman Event Organizers) is the largest Germaninterest group for event planners. Plannersfrom major corporations registered on theDAX come together here with SME and eventagencies. Beyond networking potential, thefocus is also on exchanging information andcontinuing education. The Vereinigung DeutscherVeranstaltungsorganisatoren is a central networkplatform for decision makers and manager in themeeting industry.www.veranstaltungsplaner.de Share This Report! 31event registration & ticketing

Sources:http://allfacebook.de/category/zahlen_fakten11th June 2012http://www.futurebiz.de/artikel/facebook-beitrage-fur-die-zukunft-planen-jetzt-online/11th June 2012http://ads.ak.facebook.com/ads/FacebookAds/Page_Insights_Guide.pdf13th June 2012http://www.facebook.com/page_guidelines.php#promotionsguidelines18th June 2012http://ezinearticles.com/?How-to-Use-Twitter-for-Successful-Events&id=702860425th June 2012http://www.spiegel.de/thema/twitter/27th June 2012http://www.tweetmyevents.com27th June 2012http://facebooklet.de/2011/10/power-user-haben-facebook-richtung-google-und-twitter-verlassen/28th June 2012http://blog.eveos.de/2012/04/25/pinterest-seminare-meetings-infografik/29th June 2012http://www.slideshare.net/fullscreen/datenonkel/pinterest-fr-unternehmen-der-ultimative-marketing-gui-de/329th June 2012http://www.crossmint.com/web-2.0-branding-2.0/using-foursquare-for-events29th June 2012http://crystalwashington.com/how-to-use-foursquare-for-meetings-events-conferences/27th June 2012http://www.tradeshowinsight.com/2010/03/a-practical-guide-to-creating-foursquare-events/29th June 2012http://support.google.com/youtube/bin/static.py?hl=de&page=guide.cs&guide= 2474025&topic=2474327&answer=252453827th June 2012http://blog.hubspot.com/Portals/249/docs/ebooks/how_to_use_google_plus_for_ business_april.pdf27th June 2012 Share This Report! 32event registration & ticketing

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Social Media Report 2012

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