Grow your B2B event with an online community

Social media has opened up a whole new world for B2B event marketers. The best way to take advantage of this – drum roll please – is to have an active, engaged online community for your B2B event. Facebook and LinkedIn have millions of users, many of which are potential visitors for your B2B event. So why not connect with them? The more people at your event the better, right?

Some benefits of an online community for your B2B event include: social collaboration, coming up with solutions and reaching a broader audience. In order to reap these benefits, however, it’s not enough to just have these communities. You need to be able to stay active and foster engagement in the group.

I’ve collated some of the best tips for online communities on both LinkedIn and Facebook to help you ensure that your online community is active and engaged.

Online Communities -How to make them better.

An online community is an incredibly valuable asset to own, but managing one is an art. Without a skilled community manager your group will go one of two directions: an engagement graveyard or a spam swamp. Trust me, neither of these will do your B2B event any good.

Follow the tips below to create a thriving community for your B2B event:

• Getting Started: When creating an online community on Facebook or LinkedIn keep it industry specific. Start by searching for relevant colleagues, clients and prospects and invite them to join. Starting with people you know will make it easier to get the conversation going.

• Chatterbox: Communication with potential visitors is the key to a great marketing campaign. And what better way to communicate than directly? Online communities are a great place to do this. With just a click of a button you’re able to engage with other industry professionals and prospects. B2B events that don’t engage on a personal level with their visitors lose out. Visitors that don’t feel cared about are less likely to attend an event.

• Content: Distributing interesting and important information to your target audience becomes much easier with a community. The specialised information allows you to engage with your prospects on a more personal level. You’re able to share ideas, opinions and receive a wide variety of feedback from industry professionals. The input and opinions you find in these communities have great value because they’re from people with immense knowledge of your event’s industry. The credibility of your brand will increase based on the useful and intriguing content you post.I

• Lead the way: Every B2B event can benefit from leads, amirite? Online communities are a great way find leads. You can identify leads through the way members interact with the content that you post. Members who are constantly engaging in the posts are the members interested in your content topic. Those are the members you want at your event!

• Out of site, out of mind: Short bursts of marketing are not the best way to fill your venue. We live in a busy world, and tend to forget about things if we’re not constantly reminded. With online communities and the constant engagement they offer, potential visitors are constantly reminded of your event.

So what the difference between Facebook & LinkedIn Groups?