Ian McGonnigal, Executive Director, Program Strategy for George P. Johnson, joins us in a discussion on the ways social media amplifies event marketing. This is the first in a series of four interviews with Ian. The audio interview is below.
Social media tactics can augment an event. Any company can “build a community around the event or take an event and plug it into their community” say, Ian. In the interview he outlines four aspects, they are:
Engagement – The engagement aspect can go beyond the traditional time and place structure of an event. The community can become engaged before, during and after an event. They can help create content for you as an exhibitor – helping you to determine what you should be highlighting at your booth. You can use tools like, Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn groups to interact with your community.
Interaction – Social media will aid your brand, content and subject matter as you use online, mobile communication and the show floor to get your message out. Having a TweetDeck on one of your PCs in your booth so attendees can view what is being communicated about the show is just one way to build this interaction.
Emersion – Two way communications is paramount now. Having a means for the audience to interact and be emerged with you can look like having Tweet Polls that you host and promote. This way the attendees can voice their opinions about your product offerings.
Internalization – Ian says, “the more you teach, the more you learn.” So he uses Twitter as one of his tools to internalize his learning. As he Tweets about a speaker or what he has learned on the show floor, that knowledge an integral part of him. It allows him to share this information with his community.
[audio:http://blog.iceem.net/audio/Ian_5539.mp3]
