A Guide To Promoting School Events On Social Media

As many School Marketers will already know, leveraging social media can revolutionise the way events are promoted, by ensuring that students, parents, and the broader community are well-informed and enthusiastic participants. Whether it's a fundraising gala, sports day, theatrical performance or an open house event for your prospective families, the success of these events often hinges on effective promotion.

When seeking to promote an upcoming event on social media, it’s important to ask yourself: who, what, where, when, why and how?

Who?

It’s vital that you are sure of which stakeholder-groups you would like at your event, as this will help to determine which platform you should use to promote said event. For example, you may wish to advertise an Open Event: you would see more of your intended audience at that event if you were to promote it on Instagram and Facebook rather than LinkedIn, where the majority of your alumni, staff and trustees will be, instead of your prospective families.

What?

Many people will feel more at ease (and therefore more likely to attend) if you provide a detailed plan of the event - this will help audiences to determine if this event is for them or not. If you are promoting these events in video format, you may choose to use a voiceover, and speak through a schedule of the event. Alternatively, if your promotion of the event is image-based, you may wish to break down exactly what the event entails in the caption or by using an infographic.

Where?

This is a fairly obvious point, but if it’s not obvious where your event is, your event is set to fail from the start. If your event is on campus, you should make sure that your school’s address is added to the platform’s dedicated address section, and that your address listed on your Google Business Profile is correct. If the event is taking place elsewhere, ensure this is made explicitly clear. If you are using an image template, you may wish to include the address in a clear and bold font that aligns with your brand guidelines.

When?

When your event takes place should be just as overtly conspicuous as where. There’s nothing worse than putting your heart and soul into organising an event, and having nobody turn up as the promotional social posts accidentally referenced the wrong date! It’s really important to consider exactly when you should start promoting the event. For instance, if you start advertising your open event a week before the event starts, the likelihood is that people won’t have enough time to prepare and will already have made other arrangements, leaving you with a near empty event.

Why?

Always keep the purpose of the event at the forefront of your mind. For example, If the purpose of the event is to raise as much money for your annual fund as possible, then it’s worth reminding your audience of how this money is used to improve the life of your students and the local community, leaving them compelled to attend and show their support. Your ‘why’ should always be your guiding principle when it comes to promoting events.

How?

How do you plan for your audience to RSVP to the event? If you are hosting an alumni event, you may wish for your audience to report their attendance via accepting a LinkedIn or Facebook invitation using the platforms’ Events feature. If it’s an admissions event and you would like your audience to sign up via an embedded form on your website, use a linktree or Bit.ly link in your social media captions (or bio on Instagram) to make it explicitly clear where and how they should sign up. You should also consider if you would like your event promotion to be organic or paid: if you are promoting an internal event, then there would be no value in a paid promotional campaign. However, if you are seeking to promote an open house event, paid advertising would be more strategically utilised to target families within areas or regions of interest.

Content Ideas

One of the most effective yet easiest ways to promote your events is by providing full coverage of previous iterations of these events to really show what to expect. Whether you choose to do this via high quality images or short-form video, providing exciting footage of what happens at these events can help to reel-in your audience, making them eager to join future events.

For events aimed at your current and prospective school community, Instagram Stories are a great way to actively engage your audience. Prior to the event, you could use the platform’s countdown feature, accompanied with behind-the-scenes sneak peeks of event preparation. Marketers could even make good use of the platform’s Q&A feature to encourage their audiences to find out more about the event. Post-event, you may consider using the app’s poll feature to encourage users to vote on their favourite part of the event or to provide feedback.

As many of you already know, here at Interactive Schools we are BIG advocates of #BrandedHashtags. By using and encouraging others to use a dedicated #BrandedHashtag for your event, attendees will feel more compelled to get involved by sharing their content and School Marketers will have a huge bank of event content to choose from!

By carefully constructing your strategy, creating engaging and varied content, and leveraging the unique features of different social media platforms, you can ensure your event reaches the right audience. With persistent effort and creativity, your school events can gain the visibility and excitement they deserve, making them memorable experiences for everyone in attendance. So, start planning, get posting, and watch your school community unite like never before! For more information on how to promote your events on Social Media, please reach out to wow@interactiveschools.com.