Can Social Media Enhance Your Next Meeting, Event or Incentive Program?

This article was written by Chris Gaia, vice president of marketing, Maritz Travel, and Neal Thompson, director, Strategic Technologies, Maritz Travel. Their company is the global leader in helping companies achieve business results through the effective use of meeting, event and incentive travel programs. Maritz Travel works with companies to reward and recognize top performers, ensure effective communications to customers or staff, spur innovation through enhance collaboration, and improve customer, employee and channel partner engagement.

Many companies today are asking if it makes sense to integrate social media tools available on today’s market into their meeting, event or incentive (ME&I) program. Social media tools can take many forms, from proprietary blogs, private virtual event platforms, forums and posts, to mobile applications, Twitter and social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn. These tools represent real opportunities to impact a program by exciting and engaging the audience before, during and after the live event, and extending the content to reach more people, more often.
To help navigate this ever-changing space consider the following Do’s and Don’ts for deciding how best to incorporate these various tools into your program design.

DO

Enhance communication through speaker feedback and attendee dialogue. Tweets, Facebook postings to an event wall, or even private virtual meeting platforms can help you get a quick pulse on the level of interest across agenda topics and activities prior to the event, provide a view into participant sentiment regarding how it is performing against expectations during the event, and affords you the ability to extend the content of your event. These tools are also a great way to encourage attendees to invite other people to your event via the social network platform.

Extend the experience. Many sites provide participants with the opportunity to not only post comments, but also upload photos and share experiences. These stories can help increase team camaraderie and extend the event well beyond its completion. You will want to make sure you have thought through the implications of potentially making meeting activities and content more visible to the general public. Recent security settings now available on Facebook enable you to provide greater control over who can and cannot see the content. A common approach to keep content private is to only allow invited attendees to see your private page and post to your wall. By collecting your attendee’s Facebook email address, you can invite them to the private page.

Go green(er) by replacing paper agendas, meeting notices and schedule changes through the use of mobile applications. You might think it odd to include mobile communication as a social media tool, but our recent client experience clearly indicates participants feel it is an added convenience because it enhances communications between the company and their participants. This makes sense as most mobile Internet traffic centers around social networking activities. Through our implementation on several programs, Maritz has found this provides an eco-friendly way to communicate program notices, schedule changes and set up personalized reminders. Participants are given the option of receiving information this way, and clients typically see opt-in rates of more than 70 percent!
While social media can enhance a program, there are several cautions around its use to consider during the decision process.

DON’T

View these tools as replacements for great content. Excellent meetings engage and connect your audience with your message and help people think and act differently. New technology cannot overcome poor messaging and ineffective communications. Some of the social networking tools limit the amount of content you can post and may not be appropriate for all types of communication.

View these tools as replacements for your meeting or event. People are wired to be social and face-to-face meetings help your business tap into this innate desire. Don’t short cut your event by implementing too much technology. Avoid this problem by starting small and figuring out what works well for you and your participants.

Assume all attendees want to engage in social media. Knowing your attendees’ preferences in whether or not they would like to engage in social media can make or break the impact you’re trying to achieve. Do some legwork when designing your program to better understand your audience and invest in the tools that enhance both the participant experience and your business value.

Avoid or ignore these tools. As social media tools have become embedded within most people’s lives, they are becoming an increasingly important part of how we relate to each other both personally and professionally. In all likelihood, there are varying levels of social media that occur already in relationship to your programs. Choosing to ignore or avoid the integration of social media strategies doesn’t provide you or your attendees any benefit. Embracing and educating yourself on these tools will help your program better connect with your audience members.
Social media can be an important contributor to the value created by meetings, events and incentives. Businesses should consider testing various approaches with their programs. It presents an opportunity for organizations to deliver new, exciting and important content in an effective and inviting manner. Your attendees will appreciate the effort!