With Bizzabo recently reporting that 80% of marketers believe that live events are crucial to the success of their business, it’s important for companies to squeeze as much ROI from their events as possible.
It’s no secret how influential content marketing can be when it comes to encouraging people to attend events, but the fact that events themselves can be leveraged to generate assets for future content marketing is often overlooked.
Today, savvy marketers view events as rich content goldmines where they can capture captivating content. It could be argued that rather than creating content, this new breed of marketer has chosen to follow the advice of marketing magnate Gary Vaynerchuk and donned their journalist hats to ‘document’ events instead.
With this philosophy in mind, the impact and influence of events can increase exponentially when they are leveraged to produce many different types of assets that can be trickled out to their target audience in the future.
So what exactly does event-based content look like and how can you craft it around your next event? Let’s take a closer look.
1. Social Media Content
Why not generate a steady stream of micro-content for social media during the event itself? This type of content can work fantastically well, particularly on Twitter and Instagram, and it’s a great way to engage attendees and non-attendees alike.
The possibilities for live social media content are endless, but here are a few examples to get your creative juices flowing:
live-tweet interesting quotes and statistics from keystones
retweet stand-out content posted by attendees and speakers
share behind the scenes photos and videos
set up a photo booth area and encourage people to share their snaps online with a dedicated event hashtag
launch a Facebook or Instagram Live video to broadcast key moments to the world
For this activity, we advise that you have a dedicated Social Media Manager or team on-site to handle everything so that your event has the chance to make as much of a buzz online as it is offline.
2. Interviews
Industry events really are unparalleled when it comes to gathering thought leaders en masse. So why not make the most of it to fuel your content arsenal for weeks to come?
A little preparation goes a long way when it comes to creating interesting and insightful interview-based content at live events. If your event involves a series of speakers, discuss pre or post-keynote video interviews and your proposed questions with them in advance to ensure that you can capture the footage you need.
If your event doesn’t involve speakers, why not connect with industry influencers in advance via email or LinkedIn to see if they’d be interested in being interviewed by your team.
Don’t forget to use our CLEAN method to keep your audience hooked for the duration of the interview video.
For this type of activity, if you don’t have the capability in-house, we’d recommend hiring a reputable videography team to take care of all the moving parts such as lighting, sound, visual technology and post-production.
If you can set it up, then go ahead and stream it live! Be the first to report those top trends straight from the event.
3. Live Streaming the Event
Recent advances in technology mean that live streaming is now incredibly accessible and increasingly more affordable for event marketers.
If your event is free to attend and is used as a source of lead generation, why not defy the limits of geography and allow people all over the world to attend via live stream?
If your event is a ticketed event that attracts a global audience, you could even create an additional revenue stream by selling live stream tickets to people who can’t attend your event in person.
4. Keynotes
If your event has a string of speakers booked, each and every keynote is a fantastic source of multiple pieces of content.
Let’s take a look at a few ideas:
record keynotes in full, which can then be shared on YouTube and your website so that they can be enjoyed again and again
edit each full-length video to create short and snappy summary videos for use on social media that highlight the key points from each keynote
share the keynote slides on your website and LinkedIn SlideShare so that attendees can revisit them after the event
create a sizzle reel showcasing the event’s highlights and infused with attendee testimonials to use as your promotional video to fill your next event
5. Summary Blogs & White Paper(s)
If you don’t have the resources to hire an external videography team, why not consider creating summary blogs instead?
Depending on the nature of the event, you may choose to write one single summary blog, or a series of summary blogs based on each topic, theme or keynote.
You could even take this one step further and create a White Paper summarising the event, which would act as a valuable souvenir that attendees could share with their colleagues. Or, take the opportunity of the event to launch a thought leadership paper on a trending topic, showing your expertise in that particular field.
These written resources will act as handy refreshers for event attendees, as well as bringing value to non-attendees who may be interested in attending your future events.
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Which of the above content strategies will you try out at your next event? Whichever methods are right for you, the important thing to keep in mind is that the content that you create should add value by educating and entertaining your audience.
Tweet us @DMA_Partners and let us know your thoughts on how you could put this into practice!
If you’d like to have a chat about how you can craft compelling content before, during and after your next big event, please contact our Managing Partner, Philip Martin: philip.martin@dma-partners.com.
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