Event marketing isn’t just for Bacardi and Budweiser anymore.  With the first Yankee Blog Swap right around the corner and the meme gone wild in the rearview, I think it’s time we tackle the power of online event marketing. If you need traffic or want to grow your blogging network, there is not better way to build your credibility than to host an event.  Those of you that have hosted a carnival know what I'm talking about.  Traffic and backlinks grow, new visitors show up, etc.  But carnivals aren't the only game in town.  You can coordinate some pretty successful online events if you just put your out of the box thinking cap on.  

What is online event marketing?

Web event marketing is really just online party planning. You can create an organic viral event like the recent meme that circled the real estate blogosphere or you can plan a structured event like a blog carnival, tour or swap.   The trick to any good party is just getting people to show up. So, what get’s people to the party? One word- Marketing. Let’s look at the how to’s of online event marketing for your real estate blog.

What are the benefits of online event marketing?

Saves money

Online events are the least expensive type of party you can throw. You don’t need any permits and you never have to feed your ravenous crowd. All you need is a good website or blog and a little marketing muscle.

Read also: Guerrilla blogging

Promotes your site

Free PR is something every blog could use. Create buzz that you can convert into focused traffic around your event by publishing a press release announcing the event to the community and asking participants to cross market your event on their sites.

Read also: Ultimate Guide to Blog Marketing

Sparks Participation/Extends your network

The whole idea of web 2.0 is that you make the web more social. By personally inviting or signaling your network of online friends to participate in a viral or structured online event you can spark participation. Ask your network to either cross promote the event on their blogs or directly contact their blogging network for participation. This not only pulls in more new visitors to your own site but also helps you to develop new relationships within the blogosphere that can benefit your site.

Read also: Viral marketing 101

Spikes Traffic

Events create a call to action, meaning, they spark a need to visit your site that day. Think about it, you don’t show up for a Rolling Stones concert on Wednesday when the event was last Saturday. People like to see the event “live.” So, online events, if promoted properly, can spike event day traffic substantially. And new visitors, if they liked what they saw, will come back time and again, who knows, they might even subscribe to your blog.

Read also: Boost traffic by 40% in less than 1 hour per day

Boosts Backlinks

If you plan an event where multiple blogs need to participate and cross promote the event, you can be assured you will walk away from the party with the gift that keeps on giving- backlinks. Oh, those precious little links from other sites back to yours that Google so dearly loves… Another way to boost backlinks is to issue a press release through PRWeb. 

Read also: Ultimate guide to building backlinks

How to come up with great ideas for an online event

You don’t have to be a marketing genius to come up with ideas for unique online events. Chances are there is a game show, traditional event or TV show you could easily transform into an online event. Look at Carnivals and Swaps, those are just brick and mortar events that we have translated into the online blog medium. So, don’t tear your hair out hiring a focus group to brainstorm “out of the box” ideas, simply flip on the TV or look at your newspaper’s local events calendar and let inspiration take hold.

Read also: What Madonna can teach you about blogging

5 Unique Online Real Estate Event Ideas

Creativity on vacation this week? Alright, here are my top 5 never been done before ideas for online events.

Celebrity Blog Roast: Structured event

Just like Celebrity Roast, you find a popular blogger and invite all his/her peers to a one day event of roasting. They can let their witty, sarcastic selves shine through and “roast” the guest of honor all in fun for the amusement of visitors. You can do this one of two ways on a blog: you could buy a new domain and start a monthly/quarterly event featuring a different blogger each time, giving the “roasters” logins to the site so they can add their jabs throughout the day or you could hold a one time event on your own blog and ask that “roasters” email you their $.02 so you can post them. 

I personally love this idea so much, that I am already coordinating a similar event. Want in? Just email RSS Pieces.

Survivor: Structured event

Round up 10 of your closest blogging buddies, design a challenge for each site and ask visitors to tour the blogs to complete all 10 challenges for the grand prize of, well, whatever the heck you want to give away- even if it is just a funky little graphic. What kind of challenges can have on your blog? Well, the idea is to create participation and commenting, so ask them to answer questions- they can be local trivia, funniest home story, logic games, etc.

Blog Debate: Structured event

We all love controversy and this one will stir up quite a bit of it. The idea of the tennis match is to create a multi-day event where you match up 4-8 bloggers into pairs of two and you give each pair a single topic to write about. The catch is, one blogger has to be pro and the other con. Ask visitors to comment on which side of the story they liked best and the winners from each pair move onto the next round and so forth until you have a single winner.

Reality TV: viral event

You must have some funny things happen in your office- get a digital video camera or video phone and record them as short clips. Or create your own reality show of either office happenings or a local review show of area hot spots like restaurants, golf courses and beaches. You can do this kind of stuff on a shoestring budget and get incredible results. Create your own reality show with enough humor, drama and character arch to engage people. Upload them to YouTube for best results and let your brand market itself across the Internet with video viral marketing. For example, after the holidays will be launching our office reality clip show- it will mainly feature our two favorite employees, Danny- the die hard Red Sox fan that can turn any SEO discussion into a Johnny Damon rant and Mike, our curmudgeon CFO who is so cheap we secretly suspect he buys two-ply toilet paper and separates the sheets.

Meme tracker: viral event

Now that you all know what a meme is based on last weeks response to the real estate meme, you get the networking and viral value of blogging’s equivalent of a chain letter.  If you want to start a meme, you do need to know a little bit about what compels people to participate and pass it on. The best memes involve a personal question about the blogger themselves. Why? Because most people, when given the chance to talk about themselves, will take it. Also, personal memes tend to translate across multiple industries than industry specific ones. 

Read also: What is a meme?

Conclusion:

If your traffic is stagnant, inject a little life into your blog with an online event. It may take a little planning but the increases in traffic, backlinks and new blogging alliances will be well worth the trouble.

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