This document provides 25 ideas for online marketing for events. It discusses optimizing websites for mobile use and includes tips for social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest. Suggestions include adding photo and video sharing to websites, using hashtags and including photos in social media posts. The document also provides advice on live tweeting events, engaging sponsors and followers on social media, and responding to all comments online.

1. saffireevents
THE BEST
25 NEW IDEAS
FOR ONLINE MARKETING
CASSIE ROBERTS|PARTNERSHIP DIRECTOR

2. saffireevents

3. saffireevents
HISTORY

4. saffireevents
EVENT PORTFOLIO
Rodeo Austin
South Texas State Fair
Rodeo Belton/ 4th of July
Celebration
Brazos Valley Fair
Heart O' Texas Fair & Rodeo
Amarillo Tri-State Fair
Fort Bend County Fair
Central Texas State Fair
Comal County Fair
Okeechobee County Fair
Amador County Fair
Chowchilla Fair
Palomino Fest
Lea County
Coors Cowboy Club
Washington County Fair
Texas State Forest Festival
American Royal
Colorado State Fair
Napa County Fair
Dodge City Round Up
Brazoria County Fair
San Angelo
Rogers County Fair
Greater Baton Rouge State Fair
Central States
Black Hills Stock Show/Rodeo
Los Fresnos
Twas the Lights
Reno Rodeo
Redding Rodeo
Northwest Washington Fair
Sikeston Rodeo
Delaware State Fair
Sangamon County Fair
East Texas
Park of East Texas
Laramie County Fair
Benton-Franklin Fair
Carroll County Fair
Pendleton Round-Up
Pony Express Days
Arizona National
Livestock Show
Yolo County Fair
California Rodeo Salinas
Rio Grande Valley
Livestock Show
Old Sorehead Trade Days
Cuero TurkeyFest
Fiesta San Antonio
Glenn County Fair
State Fair of Louisiana
Four States Fair
Montgomery County Fair
Agricultural Learning Center
Grant County Fair
North Texas State Fair
Rooftop Rodeo
West End Fair
Crabtree Amusements
Trinity Valley Exposition
Brackenridge Recreation Complex
Kitsap Rodeo Cowpokes
Refugio County Fair
Rockdale Fair & Rodeo

5. saffireevents

6. saffireevents

7. saffireevents

8. saffireevents

9. saffireevents
SAFFIRE ASSOCIATION PARTNERS

10. saffireevents

11. saffireevents

12. saffireevents
NOTES ABOUT THE PROGRAM
• No need to write it all down– Leave me your
business card or a piece of paper with your
contact information and I’ll send you the slides.
• Feel free to Use your device!
• Ideas are not in order of importance.

13. saffireevents
INFO ON HOMEPAGE
1
Now more than ever, your homepage must be enticing.
• Users want to spend an average of 10 seconds on a
webpage. What would a user see in 10 seconds on
your homepage?
• Could they find what they needed and move on
within your site or would they leave?

14. saffireevents

15. saffireevents

16. saffireevents
To Users:

17. saffireevents

18. saffireevents
CONSIDER BIG BRANDS

19. saffireevents

20. saffireevents

21. saffireevents

22. saffireevents

23. saffireevents
ADD A PHOTO UPLOAD TOOL
2
Use entertainment options to increase time on site.
• Allow your customers to upload their photos to
your website. Have a photo contest! (Then, you can
later use the photos for your marketing.)

24. saffireevents

25. saffireevents
ADD OTHER INTERACTIVITY
• You can also have:
•
•
Polls, Photo galleries, Video galleries, Twitter Feeds etc.
Your website has to be your main priority. It affects every
other portion of your online marketing & ecommerce
• GOAL: Drive traffic to your website.
3

26. saffireevents
SIKESTON RODEO

27. saffireevents
ON SOCIAL: INCLUDE A PHOTO
4
A VERY IMPORTANT TIP
• EVERY social platform reports higher interaction
when a photo is included.
• Tweets with image links get 2x more interaction.
• The Engagement Rate on Facebook posts with
photos is .37%. Without a photo, it’s .27%.

28. saffireevents

29. saffireevents
EXAMPLE

30. saffireevents
PHOTO IN POST, NOT LINK
5
• Use the Upload Photos/Video function to publish
photo files directly into your post instead of
posting a link that shows a thumbnail.

31. saffireevents
The
Difference?

32. saffireevents
LINK TO PHOTO

33. saffireevents
PHOTO

34. saffireevents
CAN EVEN EXPAND POST

35. saffireevents
ALSO INCLUDE VIDEO
6
• Include video on your website, on your social
media, wherever you can. Link to YouTube or
embed the video right in your page.
• Consider This: 100 MILLION videos are watched
every week on YouTube. Don’t you want to be a part
of the party?

36. saffireevents
Videos are shared
12x MORE
than links/text posts

37. saffireevents
HOT FAIR VIDEO
http://youtu.be/yOPP6HDCdJQ

38. saffireevents
VIDEO IDEA

39. saffireevents

40. saffireevents
FACEBOOK GRAPH SEARCH
7
• Have you used this yet? Figure out what types of
people have friended you!
• Let’s try it out!

41. saffireevents

42. saffireevents
MAKE FOLLOWERS INSIDERS
8
• Make sure your Facebook & Twitter followers are
the first to know about entertainers, ticket sales
and other big event announcements.

43. saffireevents
AMAZON GOLD BOX

44. saffireevents
POST VENDOR DEALS
9
• Ask your vendors in advance if they want to
participate in a “2 for 1” or other discount deal,
and then post it to your social media, website or
text it.
• Remember to include a photo if you’re sharing on
social media!

45. saffireevents
WEST END FAIR

46. saffireevents
EXAMPLE TEXTS

47. saffireevents
PARKING-GREAT FOR TEXTS
10
• If your event is notorious for bad parking, promote
your text list as a parking update mechanism.
• Easy to send out as your situation changes—put a
volunteer in charge.
• Might want to include a “Don’t Text & Drive!” every
so often for your civic duty.

48. saffireevents
CREATE INTERACTIVE CONTESTS
11
Facebook has changed its contest rules!
• Biggest change: You can now utilize likes and
comments as voting mechanisms.
• You still can’t make people tag themselves as part
of a contest.

49. saffireevents

50. saffireevents
BE A BIG DEAL
12
• Post information about weather, big local news stories,
incidents, accidents whatever you can think of on your
social media.
• Sometimes the things that people care about will SHOCK
you.
• You can also post YOUR breaking news and ask local news
organizations to follow you.

51. saffireevents

52. saffireevents
COLORADO STATE FAIR

53. saffireevents
INCORPORATE INSTAGRAM
Mainly
MOBILE
Organized by
HASHTAGS
Trends
YOUNGER
13

54. saffireevents
WHO USES INSTAGRAM?

55. saffireevents
Use #nofilter
14
• It seems crazy, but on Instagram, Fortune 500
companies recently reported getting 20% higher
interaction on photos with #nofilter than the next
highest filter option.

56. saffireevents
WHAT IT MEANS

57. saffireevents
DON’T FAKE IT!
www.filterfaker.com

58. saffireevents
TRY IFTTT
15
• It stands for: IF THIS THEN THAT.
• You create “recipes” to make something
automatically happen within your social media.
• For Saffire, we use: IF we post to our Instagram,
automatically post it on our Facebook.
• Search IFTTT in your App store or go to
www.ifttt.com.

59. saffireevents

60. saffireevents
PROMOTE YOUR SPONSORS
16
• Use your social media as a way to interact with
your sponsors—especially big ones!
• You can post about their deals, and they may
return the favor during your event.
• They will retweet and favorite you.
EVERYBODY WINS.

61. saffireevents
EDITORIAL CALENDAR

62. saffireevents
www.SaffireEvents.com/calendar

63. saffireevents
USE THE 80-20 Rule
17
Make 80% of your posts fun and 20% promotional.

64. saffireevents
POST FROM MASCOT

65. saffireevents
ADVICE POSTS
SHARED 522% MORE

66. saffireevents
LIVE TWEETS
18
• Put up screens that show your live twitter feed,
with #YourEventName to get your tweet on the big
screen.

67. saffireevents

68. saffireevents

69. saffireevents
OFF SEASON
19
• Post photos of your fairgrounds in the winter,
covered in snow…or rain as the case may be!
• Say something creative like, “We’re in hibernation!
What do you miss most about the fair?”

70. saffireevents
MORE OFF SEASON
19.5
• Everyone loves a random holiday. Look them up in
advance, and post about them. You can even
schedule it in advance through Facebook now!

71. saffireevents
GRANDPARENTS DAY

72. saffireevents
TEXT
“Happy Grandparents Day! If
you have a special memory with
your grandparent or grandkid at the
fair, please share!

73. saffireevents
EXAMPLE COMMENT
“Playing washer pull or draw a number. It
was something my family could afford & it
benefited a great group. We'd win a small
plant or something & just could not walk
away. We would just keep playing.” 

74. saffireevents
Make sure you
are
acting as your
page!

75. saffireevents
TWEET SHORTER
20
• No need to use all 140 Characters! (That would be
crazy long!)
• Tweets under 100 characters get 17% higher
engagement than longer tweets.
• This is partially because they can be retweeted.

76. saffireevents
QUALITY NOT QUANTITY
Most effective tweets ask for:
1. A Download:
Increase clicks by 11%

77. saffireevents
QUALITY NOT QUANTITY
2. A Retweet:
Increase retweet by 311%

78. saffireevents
QUALITY NOT QUANTITY
3. A Follow:
Increase follows by an average of 85%

79. saffireevents
WHEN TO TWEET
21
• 24 Hours a Day, 7 Days a week. Interaction levels
don’t point out a clear “winner” for when you
should post.
• You may find something different for your own
event by looking at your analytics—if so then
follow that trend.

80. saffireevents
TWITTER ANALYTICS
• You can now view analytics from your twitter
account!
• Go to http://analytics.twitter.com/
• It’s going to say “Advertise on Twitter” (Since
you’re smart, you will know it’s more than that
now!)

81. saffireevents

82. saffireevents
BUFFER-CREATIVE POSTING

83. saffireevents
INCORPORATE PINTEREST
22
• Add boards of things to do in your city, links to
your vendors pages, places to stay
• Craft projects, ‘how to’ cooking boards, etc.

84. saffireevents
COOL PINTEREST IDEAS

85. saffireevents
JOIN THE (EMAIL) CLUB
23
• EVERYBODY loves to be a part of a club.
• Make your email list or text list a “club” sign up or
encourage people to pay to join with perks.
• Can do kids & adults!

86. saffireevents

87. saffireevents
MOBILE IS A MUST
24
• According to Forbes:
“87% of connected devices sales by 2017 will be
tablets and smartphones.”
ARE YOU READY?

88. saffireevents
ALMOST LIKE AN APP

89. saffireevents
EXAMPLE MOBILE STATS
40% Mobile Visits
43% Mobile Pageviews
54% Mobile Visits
40% Mobile Pageviews
47% Mobile Visits
44% Mobile Pageviews

90. saffireevents
ONLY WRONG TO BE SILENT
25
• The internet is fast moving; people are quick to
forget. Today’s story is yesterday’s history.
• ALWAYS RESPOND to comments, even negative. The
worst thing you can do is not be a part of the
conversation.

91. saffireevents
FREE ONLINE MARKETING TIPS
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
Pinterest
YouTube
Saffire Events
@SaffireEvents
saffireevents
saffireevents
saffirestudio
Questions?

92. saffireevents
CASSIE ROBERTS
www.saffireevents.com
@SaffireEvents