Ideas for taking advantage of social sharing | Guest Post

The following is a guest post from the fabulous Brian Slawin, Principal of Busy Event. I first met Brian in the Philippines at a conference we were both presenting at. I was so impressed by his humor, his Belinks product and his great presentation, I asked him to create a blog post for me on the topic of Social Sharing. The following is his take on the subject…

For most of us, sharing came naturally.  Sharing food or fun or experiences was a part of who we were as we learned how to become social.  But then, as the world changed and siblings encroached, sharing became part of a zero-sum game; If you have, then I don’t.

That of course, is when adult society got involved; “Go on, share that with your friends”, or the dreaded “So, Mr. Slawin, do you have enough to share with the rest of the class?”  From its natural beginnings, sharing became a societal norm; albeit controlled.

With the advantage of hindsight, we can see that sharing isn’t driven by technology.  Instead, sharing is driven by people’s need to be connected and accelerated by their ability to use technology to do it themselves, if they have to.

So, how can event professionals take advantage of social sharing for their events?  And most importantly, what’s going to happen if they don’t?

First, some assumptions, which you’ve already seen at your events:
1 – The core reason that events, tradeshows and conferences were developed has stopped being a problem: If The Old Events Model Is Broken – What Will Work In Its Place?

2 – Not enabling people to share beyond the 3 days and 4 walls of your event will result in lost opportunities, reduced event revenues and dissatisfied participants Will A Hybrid Event Cannibalize My Face-to-Face Attendance?

3 – If you don’t provide and manage a variety of face-to-face, virtual and hybrid channels for communication and information distribution, your event participants are going to do it themselves without your ability to monetize and profit from that conversation.

How to take advantage of Social Sharing for Fun and Profit!

1. Never mistake Shiny Objects with something that will truly impact the quality of the event and improve the outcomes for your attendees.  As an example, if a new mobile application requires your event attendees to do much more than sign up and show up or a vendor’s tools require them to access the venue supplied WIFI to get an app to work, people would rather just use Twitter (An Example of How to Integrate Twitter, Into an Event).
2. People do what they’re used to doing.  Asking your event attendee to change their behaviors to work within your system, typically won’t result in anything successful.  Instead, focus your offerings by leveraging what people are already doing and grow their capabilities.
3. Create experiences and content that are meant to be shared.  Encourage the use of social sharing applications and foster their use by promoting them broadly because social sharing becomes the ultimate form of distribution and word of mouth (Why Social Sharing Is Bigger than Facebook and Twitter)
4. Listen to what your event attendees are thinking and give them easy and immediate access to share their thoughts with you (What Your Attendees Are Thinking, Aren’t Telling You and Why You Should Care)
5. Make sure that every attendee, sponsor and exhibitor has the opportunity to participate in whatever systems you create.  If they don’t, or can’t, then you have already eliminated a potential source of revenue.
6. Know what matters most to your attendees and exhibitors.  Is it content?  Is it contacts?  It is leads?  (Changing the Equation for Organizers and Attendees)
7. Focus on actions, not what look like actions (Are Your Event Attendees Lying To You?)
8. Don’t forget about email.  With all the focus on Facebook and Twitter and event specific social networks, email is still a major source of shared links and click-throughs. Email is the original social network, leverage it with enticing content and useful information.
9. Use tools that do more than a single thing.  5 vendors and 5 different tools means your data is spread into 5 different buckets and there’s no real way to create seamless information in that way.  Plus, monetizing that disparate data is nearly impossible.
10. Know the power of data and leverage it.  Social sharing is the simplest form of public approval and feedback, think of it as a feedback loop that allows you to evaluate who your event influencers are, what their influence is and how to best engage them in real time.

About Brian Slawin

For more than two decades, Brian has been working in the events industry, managing programs for clients such as H&R Block, Maritz, Hewlett-Packard, National Geographic Publishing and Domino’s Pizza, among others. After graduating from Saint Louis University, Brian helped turn around the financially struggling Parks College Aviation Science Department into a revenue producing program with students from across the United States and contracts with Korean Air Lines, United Air Lines and Trans States.  At the same time, utilizing his capabilities in both marketing and technology, Brian co-founded the Toyota AirSports program which helped generate more than $50 million of new car sales.   Recognizing that technology could provide unequalled access to learning, Brian helped develop one of the first online learning systems and eventually took his new found skills into the dot-com world as  part of the founding team at StreamSearch.  Working with clients like NBC and the US Olympic Committee, Brian created a $5 million business unit supporting NBC’s desire to create entertainment events while monetizing their valuable content.  After he met his business partner David Schenberg, they began developing a business model focused on a re-usable Software-As-A-Service platform, which evolved into BusyEvent.  With a keen interest in connecting people with information, Brian writes extensively on how the use of technology can enhance relationships, connectedness and drive opportunities, in ANY economy.