mdg | Event Marketing Agency for Trade Shows and Associations

Insights

8 Ways to Build Event Awareness With Content

Before prospects will consider attending an event, they must first know it exists. Event marketers looking to grow their databases, build awareness, keep audiences engaged and ultimately increase attendance should consider the following top-of-funnel ideas for creating and optimizing content:

REPURPOSE EVENT CONTENT

Repurpose Event Content

1. Invite speakers to be guest bloggers Ask educational presenters to contribute an article about their session topic to an event blog or website. Many will enthusiastically take advantage of this additional opportunity to share their wisdom with a new audience.

For instance, PIHRA invited speakers and sponsors of their 2022 California HR Conference to write guest articles for PIHRA News, which resulted in several compelling content pieces such as “3 Top Threats Facing Talent Acquisition.”

2. Record event sessions Record keynotes or other event sessions (with permission) and then share short clips or select full sessions on YouTube. Be sure to include targeted keywords within YouTube posts, so they can be more easily discovered. If your organization hosts a podcast, the audio from recorded event sessions could also be used as podcast content.

3. Share memorable quotes or statistics Capture memorable quotes or interesting statistics from keynote presentations or educational sessions. These tidbits can be turned into quote graphics or infographics for social media.

Leverage On-Site Trends

4. Choose content topics based on popular sessions To understand which topics are resonating with a target audience, pay attention to the topics most frequently submitted by event speakers and the sessions most popular among attendees. Those sessions could be converted directly into articles or used as inspiration for other original content.

5. Feature new or innovative products Events are launching grounds for new trends — they’re found on the exhibit floor, in education sessions, in dedicated new product showcase areas. Feature innovative products, novel ideas and trending topics in articles, videos and social content.

For example, mdg created an article for World Pet Association, “8 New Pet Products to Stock for Summer,” which features select summery products from the SuperZoo show floor.

6. Interview attendees and speakers on a topic Conduct man-on-the-street interviews with speakers, attendees and exhibitors about the hottest industry topics. Ask interviewees for their names and contact information to give them proper credit and tag them in posts.

Turn Your Attendees Into Marketers

7. Create Instagrammable moments Turn your attendees into evangelists by creating photo opportunities with a photobooth or selfie station. Attendees will be eager to capture their own content and share it among their networks of friends and colleagues.

8. Curate content with an event hashtag By promoting a unique hashtag for an event, the content that attendees create becomes more discoverable. Hashtags can be used to curate content on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and TikTok, and there are companies such as Walls.io that can create virtual or in-person content walls to showcase the digital content from an event.