Hybrid events are great ways to host seminars with people around the globe, teach or learn remotely in conjunction with in-person students or professors, and meet with coworkers when you’re not all at the office. But these mixed live and virtual events need plenty of planning before they launch, plus scheduled announcements. Otherwise, people may not show up on time or know that the hybrid event is happening in the first place!
Fortunately, there are lots of ways to promote your hybrid event online. Let’s take a look at these smart strategies one by one.
Don’t hesitate to leverage social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter to announce your hybrid event. Social media promotion and advertising are important, especially if most of the event’s attendees will be people you work with or your friends and family members.
However, Facebook and other social media platforms can be beneficial in other ways. For example, you can create event pages for your upcoming hybrid event. These online pages can serve as hubs for everyone to exchange information, ask questions, and communicate with the event organizers or hosts as needed.
Twitter offers specific ways to promote your hybrid event as well. For example, you can create a branded hashtag event and spread the word about the upcoming meeting or class that way. Some examples include:
Hashtag tweeting makes it easy for you to announce things on Twitter. If you use hashtags appropriately, people interested in your hybrid event will automatically see those announcements or posts and remain informed throughout the days leading up to the event’s launch.
Any good hybrid event needs a dedicated landing page. The landing page is where people will arrive after clicking a link or social media post that takes them to the event area. The landing page should be attractive, easy to navigate through, and include a clear link that takes people to the videoconferencing lobby when needed.
Above all else, make sure the link to the videoconferencing lobby works properly before your event launches! It won’t do you any good for people to be locked out of the hybrid event or seminar due to a technical glitch.
You can also promote your hybrid event online ahead of time by making a well-designed, informative event page. This can be on your website or on one of the social media pages mentioned above. The event page should include more information about what the hybrid event will include, what it will discuss, and whether there will be any guest speakers.
If you have some web design experience or hire someone, you can even set a countdown timer on the side of the screen. Alternatively, you can put a button that enters people onto an event waitlist. This will save their seats for the hybrid event and help you get an accurate headcount before the event launches.
Nothing gets people excited for an event, either in-person or hybrid, than a well-designed, eye-catching invitation. To that end, you can use tools like PosterMyWall, which include dozens of dazzling online meeting invitation templates. These templates are the perfect starting points for creating online invites for VIPs, students, or coworkers.
When designing the invitations, make sure they include all the important information about the hybrid event, such as the:
The more information your invitations include, the more comfortable people will be accepting them. For even better results, include a link to an RSVP page or social media page so people can mark whether they plan to come or not.
If your hybrid event is more corporate or designed to draw people from the public, consider writing and promoting a press release. A good press release will be similar to the event page described above; it should include all the important information about the hybrid event, how people can join, and what will be discussed.
Alternatively, consider making teaser videos for the hybrid event. This is only really possible if you have held hybrid conferences or seminars in the past, of course. But you can make a basic teaser video showing speakers on stage or people clapping, then post that video on Facebook or other platforms.
Teaser videos can do a lot to drum up excitement for an incoming hybrid event, especially if it’s an important seminar or conference with a popular speaker or leader in a scientific field.
Lastly, don’t forget to use email marketing regularly! If your company or brand has a newsletter or email marketing list, send marketing emails to people who already know of your company with the details for the upcoming event.
For the best results, include links to the landing page or the event page for the hybrid event in your email marketing materials. That way, interested people can immediately click away from their email inboxes and see what the event is about in more detail.
As with other marketing materials, marketing emails about the hybrid event should include the date, time, and the cost of attendance.
As you can see, there are lots of different ways to promote your hybrid event online. The right promotional strategies will ensure your event is successful; they’ll bring people to your event on time and ensure no one gets lost.
Above all else, be sure to start your hybrid event promotion efforts early. The more time you have to promote your hybrid event, the more time people will have to decide whether they will attend. Good luck!