For a few years at this point, I’ve written about Brands Worth of a Weekend – where the weekend in question is a one for enthusiasts to come together and bond with the people behind their passion brands. Meanwhile, Influencer Events – where influentual bloggers/tweeters and the like are invited to spend a day or two having a brand experience – have exploded in frequency. While each may be classified as events for content creators and there are some best practice similarities (make personal connections, send a thank you, be clear about where and how content can be tagged), I would argue that there are even more differences.
The below table is a consolidation of lessons shared in an internal discussion of 360 DI strategists across the network for best practices before during and after an event.
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Enthusiast Events
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Influencer Events
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Before |
- Co-Create the event agenda. They already know a lot about the brand and will be able to offer a lot of instruction on what they want to see.
- This is also an opportunity to build excitement – send something for them to wear to arrive or a special assignment.
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- Provide opportunities to experience the brand prior to the event so that they will get the most out of the time on the ground.
- Also, ask them what would be helpful – many bloggers have had multiple of these experiences and can tell you what they do and don’t want.
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During |
- You don’t need to “sell” this group on the brand, but the bar on what constitutes “exclusive” experiences or information will be very high as they already know so much.
- The opportunity is for time for people to connect – enthusiasts to one another and to brand teams.
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- Give a thorough “background” (origin, invention or founding story) to level set on knowledge
- Air out your agenda to allow lots of time for liveblogging & tweeting
- Design photo ops or “moments” worthy of documenting. Shoot video footage, photos, or audio as appropriate.
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After |
- Provide ongoing ways to stay in touch with the people assembled (Facebook group, brand community, etc)
- Channel your enthusiasts’ energy! Provide suggestions for ways they can help you – product testing, house parties, store visits – see how they might want to help.
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- Follow up with edits of the media you created and any appropriate tagging instructions for media uploads
- Keep this group at the top of your list for other outreach opportunities
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An additional follow up consideration for all, especially for complex programs, is Social Influencer Relationship Management.
If you have some experience designing or participating in these brand events, please throw in your $.02. I think it could benefit all parties to avoid the pitfalls in mistaking participants invited due to their audience and influence for people who are already passionate about everything your brand does.