Virality; The Yawning Effect

The Power of Referral More and more, you see people tuning out ads on Facebook and search engines. Or, they run an adblocker so even the a really well designed advertisement don’t show up for them. This is stuff that virtually all marketers run into everyday. So, how do we circumvent this? We incentivize. 1. Social Shares A. The Contest. This is a super easy one to do and you might have already thought of it since a lot of events have used it to great effect to sell tickets online! Put on a contest for attendees and potential attendees to share the event on sites such as Twitter, Facebook, or even LinkedIn depending on the crowd you’re going for. Then you put everyone who shared it into a raffle and then winner(s) then receive prizes such as backstage passes, free passes, or other event-appropriate items. This one works super well simply because people are going to want the free stuff and so will their friends. Give extra “raffle tickets” to people who’ve liked your page. B. The Discount. After attendees have purchased a ticket, encourage them to share their purchase on appropriate social networks for your event. Once they share the site, have them send proof and then give them something like a drink ticket or a small discount off their ticket. This one could be a bit difficult to do and keep track of, but this one may be a bit more enticing to your attendees. 2. Attendee Affiliates This one will also be a bit more tricky but has further potential: offer to compensate attendees who refer other attendees to your event to purchase tickets in the form of either discounts, drink tickets, or again any other event-appropriate items/regalia. While difficult on its own, you could certainly use a software platform such as https://gleam.io/ which is perfect for running contests and getting users to complete actions to gain benefits. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="474"] Source: Gleam.io[/caption] Source: Gleam.io 3. Gamify What’s a better way to draw interest for your event than to make it supremely interactive and exciting for your attendees? After doing some research for helping events keep audience interest, I came across this: http://www.gamifyapp.com/ With the ability to get points for completing tasks, you’re going to have a much more engaged audience. Heck, even getting points for referrals is something that you could easily do and prizes are always appreciated. Source: Quickmobile In conclusion, there’s a lot of ways to really engage a contagious, “viral” effect to draw more attention to your event with very little marketing effort for yourself. Instead, your attendees are the ones who end up pulling the weight, getting their friends, family, and coworkers interested instead. The bigger plus for this is that you’ll have more people and your attendees will be much more excited to check out your event and will be more engaged before, during, and after.    ]]]]> ]]>