Events – Create, Publicize, and Promote – Part II

Disclaimer: As with everything on this site, the following is representative of my best assessment of the tools discussed and their features and functions. As such, it is recommended that you not take my word as “being law” (smile).

Before we get into Part II of this subject, I might suggest that you read Part I. Then, as we delve into this further, I very much want you to THINK LINK. Links are perhaps the most under-appreciated rock stars of the internet industry. They are like that Intel commercial with the engineer who invented the USB (smile). On top of that, you also have hyperlinks that allow you to make anything into a one click transport to anywhere you please on the web.

When you “think link” … think about this: link from your website to an event, link from an event to your website, link from your email to an event or a website,  or link from an event to a registration form. The list goes on and on and they are invaluable for what we are about to discuss. And finally, we are going to be discussing at least four major sites that you can create your event on. As the goal is to make your event as easy to find as possible for your potential attendees …. if it’s me, I’m going to be making it visible wherever I can (multiple sites) and then provide links, where necessary, to complete the registration process.

This is all going to be pretty down and dirty. We’ll explore some options and maybe provide you with some ideas. Of course, lots of links to let you explore more on your own (smile).  Away we go …

Ning: Ning provided the incentive for this blog post so we will start here. If you are not familiar with this platform, Ning is a free service that allows you to create your own social network and in a lot of ways it incorporates FaceBook-like features. I have created three networks on Ning: two for our networking groups and one for Sales & Marketing Executives of Boise. Please feel free to visit our Bing! and Business Minds group sites.

Ning allows you to create a very nice event announcement, allows folks to RSVP to your event, and provides the ability to automatically email professional invitations to a variety of your contact lists. A link is provided in the email to go directly to the event to sign up. However, prior to being allowed to do this, you must go through the process of signing up for membership in the network itself. This is kind of like Ning’s version of the registration. This is great if your network is open which means that anybody can join. In that way, the process of registration should not be that difficult. If you choose to employ this method, I would suggest that you make your “open Ning network” completely open. If you choose to moderate membership requests, you are going to create a loss of registration opportunity while the person who wishes to attend your event awaits your approval to join your site. Not good.

Our networking sites, while visible to the public, are closed. Anybody can request membership but only our members are granted that authorization. One shortcoming of Ning is that it is either private or public. If it is private, nobody can view the site. If it is public, anybody can request to join. I wish Ning had a third option that would allow folks to navigate the site but not even allow them to request admittance but, for now at least, they don’t. So, using Ning to send out invitations creates a problem for us.

Suggested solution: Disable “RSVP”. Within the body of the event description provide a link back to whatever site you wish to use for on-line registration. This may be your website, your blog, or a third-party service like EventBrite (more on EventBrite later). Your event also has a field for a phone number for attendees to call to make reservations. Do not ask Ning to send out invitations. Instead, when you click on the event itself, look up at your web address bar on your browser and copy the identified URL. This is the direct link to this event and will allow folks to view the event on your site without them having to sign up for the site. They won’t even be asked to join your group. You may then, using standard email or something like iContact or Constant Contact (more on these later), include this link to your event as a part of your email message. Not perfect. Not optimum. But it will work.

LinkedIn: LinkedIn does present one opportunity not found present on Ning….. massive membership numbers. Anybody with a LinkedIn account will be able to find, view, and “register” for your event. While you can invite your connections on LinkedIn to your event, there is no provision to send your invitation out to others outside of your immediate LinkedIn connection list. Our suggested solution is very much like Ning … When you set up an event on LinkedIn you will also find a field where LinkedIn will generate a URL for the event web address. I did conduct a test and you can email that URL to folks you have on any contact list and they will be able to follow that back to view the event. They will need to be members of LinkedIn in order to confirm attendance so you will want to provide that link to your registration site. In addition, you can also choose to advertise your event on LinkedIn. I am guessing that this is a fee based service. One note of caution, unless things have changed, you had best plan to hold that event because the last time I tried to cancel one, there was no way to do that without going to support and asking them to do it for you. Lame. I consider the definitive guidebook on LinkedIn to be “Windmill Networking“. Click here to go to Neal’s site.

This is turning out to be a more complex topic than I had originally envisioned. My guess is that this is going to go to four parts (smile). I’ll try to do one daily to keep them all together. Thanks for visiting!

Craig

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