For entrepreneurial artists, the internet contains a wealth of unexplored promotional opportunities. Here we look at six such places, often called ‘discovery sites’ that you an use in promoting your next show or tour.
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Guest post by Katie Sawyer of Eventbrite
If you’re an event creator, you might see the internet as a landscape rich with undiscovered promotional goldmines. And you wouldn’t be wrong. There are opportunities all over the web for you to list and promote your event.
Places people go to find out what’s going on are called discovery sites, and they’re abundant. From neighborhood guides to newspaper calendars to social media posts, there are more ways to find out about events these days than events themselves. (It seems that way, anyhow.)
So how does a smart event creator focus on the event promotion sites that will drive the most sales? Start with this list of the sites and apps event-goers rely on to make plans.
Event promotion website #1: Facebook Events
Facebook is where we find out what’s going on with our friends and what’s happening in our communities. So it’s not surprising that 41% of Facebook users engage with events each month — that’s 35million Facebook Event views each day.
Facebook Events are particularly powerful because of the social platform’s robust targeting capabilities. Facebook algorithms get your events in front of the right audiences in terms of things like geolocation, demographics, interests, and behavior.
And once a user expresses interest in your event, that “interest” is relayed to their friends in their feeds. Your reach is magnified.
How to get listed on Facebook Events: To become a Facebook Official Event that can sell tickets directly on the platform, publish your event to Facebook through your Eventbrite dashboard. (Here’s how.)
If you’re not an Eventbrite customer, you can set up a Facebook Event through your brand’s Facebook page — but you won’t be able to sell tickets on the platform. (Read our best practices first.)
Event promotion website #2: Eventful
At this point, 87% of Millennials are on Facebook — not to mention more than half of all senior citizens. But that still leaves some rogue event-goers who won’t find out about your event on social media. For them, there’s Eventful.
The name says it all. 15 millions users turn to Eventful to find events across an ample 29 categories. Type in your city, and you’ll find concerts, comedy shows, performing arts events, tradeshows, family friendly activities, and more. A presence on Eventful can drive sales for virtually every type of event.
How to get listed on Eventful: It’s easy to create an account on Eventful, and from there, event creation is free. (If you’re an Eventbrite customer, your event will automatically be promoted on Eventful.)
Event promotion websites #3-5: Goldstar, Spotify, and Bandsintown
For live music events, there are three discovery sites you don’t want to ignore.
- Goldstar is an event-discovery app that focuses on concerts, comedy, theater, and nightlife. Of Goldstar’s 7 million members, 91% have bought tickets to an event they found out about on Goldstar.
- The music-streaming service Spotify has over 140 millionactive users. Those music fans find shows via Spotify’s Concerts tab, which uses algorithms to deliver events based on a user’s location and listening style.
- Bandsintown is a platform to connect fans and artists. Its Concerts App builds on data imported from music platforms and select ticketing providers to make event recommendations. 30 million registered users count on Bandsintown to inform them of shows they otherwise might have missed.
How to get listed on Goldstar, Spotify, and Bandsintown: For Bandsintown and Goldstar, you can register as an Artist to submit your own event. But for Spotify, there’s a catch. The streaming service only lists events pulled from ticketing partners such as Eventbrite. (If you use Eventbrite, your music event will automatically be shared on the other platforms as well.)
Event promotion website #6: Google
People are actively looking for things to do, and Google is one of the first places they look. Technically, Google is not a discovery “site” in the sense that you can list your event on a calendar. But Google’s search results pages are a popular place for discovery.
Thanks to a recent Google Search update, it is much easier for searchers to discover events they weren’t aware of before. This means that your event will now be much easier to find by people who are looking for something to do — but aren’t sure exactly what yet.
How to get listed on Google: Search engine optimization (SEO) is a crucial element of event promotion. Making sure that you’re using the right language in your marketing copy — and that you create ample marketing content — is key to higher Google ranking.
To get your event in Google’s new event listing tool, you need to partner with a ticketing providers included in the launch (like Eventbrite), and then your event will be featured automatically.
Turning event promotion sites into actual ticket sales
Event discovery is essential to selling tickets. But making sure your event is listed on all the event promotion websites listed here is just step one.
Step two is actually selling more tickets. The smartest way to do that? Make it possible to buy tickets directly from event promotion sites. This is sometimes called “event distribution.”
So if a Facebook user finds out about your event in Facebook Events, they can buy a ticket right then and there, without leaving Facebook.
It’s crucial you offer your potential ticket-buyers the easiest possible path to purchase. Those who have to navigate to a different site to buy a ticket often bounce. In fact, events that sell tickets directly on Facebook drive 2X more sales and free registrations on average than events that redirect to a ticketing page.
But you shouldn’t have to do all this work yourself. Your event management solution should help with discovery and distribution by automatically pushing your event to all of these event promotion websites, and then helping you sell tickets on them.
For more about widening your reach and selling more tickets online, download How to Use Event Distribution to Double Your Ticket Sales.