Social media shouldn’t be used only to promote events. Hear me out!

You might vehemently disagree with that by saying something like: “well I saw that Florida Georgia Line was in town because of a Facebook event!”

That’s different. Facebook Events are an important part of any organization’s strategy, because they allow you to promote an event without being too aggressive and turning off your audience. The very idea of a Facebook event is to centralize all your event promotion into one place, and not to spam your profile or your followers’ newsfeeds with invitations.

I’m talking about the endless assault of posts from organizations that populate across Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram all day. Those are ineffective, annoying, and often cause your followers to tune out or unfollow.

Doesn’t sound like a problem yet, right? Just don’t post endless invitations! Unfortunately, that’s not how it works. Often, CEOs, event planners, and the “higher-ups” of your organization will demand that you promote the event on social media. This is not necessarily malicious, but it is a fundamental misunderstanding of how social media works.

You absolutely can and should use social media to promote events, but you should do it effectively. Post a Facebook event, share videos, photos, or quotes related to the event. Posting an invitation once is fine, but posting it over and over again is not. On Twitter, share what the “official hashtag” is for the event, on Instagram, share a behind the scenes look at how the event is coming together. Create a geofilter for Snapchat, or a trailer on YouTube.

Promoting an event on social media is just like promoting an event on TV or radio. You wouldn’t just say “come to this event, it’s going to be great” over and over again. You have to sell people on the event, provide content that is intriguing and relevant to those who can’t attend, and most importantly, offer a platform for feedback and questions. Remember, social media is not a podium, it’s a forum!