This is an interview with Lucas Shaffer, a social media professional and founder of Stand and Stretch. In this interview he gives some insightful tips on marketing an event online using Foursquare and how he got into the social media industry. He can be reached on Twitter and Facebook or via email at lshaffer@standandstretch.com.
How did you start working in the social media industry? Give us some background information on yourself and your new venture, Stand and Stretch.
I could say I began on purpose but to be honest I sort of fell into it. I work with a nationally known headwear company in the Southeast and made a very convincing argument about creating a Facebook and Twitter account for the brand. A few months later I was inundated with passion and our first social media presence was born; and so was my desire to learn more about social networking. Today, with guidance from a few great mentors, I have engaged and interacted with a fan base of about 50,000 Facebook fans and Twitter followers over several major apparel brands and also write content for their blogs.
Stand And Stretch was the next plausible step as my passion for making connections was slowly moving from connecting people to connecting businesses with their customers. S&S is the vessel in which companies can rely on to build strong connections with their customers no matter what industry. Social Media is bringing the customer closer than ever to the brands and we make sure the door is always open.
You recently organized a Foursquare event for the restaurant Locos Grill and Pub in Columbus, GA. What was the concept and how did you promote it prior to the event. What are your biggest tips when promoting an event using social media?
The idea was to build a case study to find how Foursquare would impact a local restaurant. Prior to the event we used a Facebook event, EventBrite.com ticket registration and the Foursquare meetup to point traffic towards the event.
Each of these event applications brought different exposure and unique tools. We wanted to try them all to see what worked best. We also hit Twitter hard by tracking our hashtag, #locos4sq, and replied to every Twitter profile that posted a check-in within a 25km area. If they checked-in the week leading up to the event, they were alerted about the event. The promotions even extended into utilizing the EventBrite ticket registration as the event was willing to offer free food for anyone who brought in the ticket which was well designed and contained the event logo.
My biggest tip to businesses looking to launch a Foursquare event to promote their brand is to leave no avenue of engagement closed off. Strategically tweet and track users on Foursquare in the area and get them interested. Use EventBrite.com to gather emails and give them a tangible item to put in their hand. We could have made a handwritten list of emails but EventBrite allowed a digital listing and registered users were rewarded with free food. Everyone was buzzing about the EventBrite tickets! EventBrite + Foursquare + Twitter = Success! Facebook was good for awareness but users are getting smarter and have a tendency to use the ‘Hide’ feature which removes your updates from their feed limiting your exposure. On the other hand, EVERYONE always checks to see when or why their name is mentioned on Twitter so that was a great avenue for us to explore when promoting the event.
Here are the sites we used to promote the event (click the links to view the event or archived data):
Twitter (hashtag #locos4sq)
And of course..Foursquare!
I noticed you took your marketing efforts an additional step forward and sent out physical invitations to the event. I often remind my readers of the importance of keeping some traditional marketing techniques in mind when reaching out to their target audience. I found your physical invites to be a nice touch. What was the feedback from the people you sent them to?
I enjoyed the day I put those postcards in the mail and wanted to be there when every one of them reached their destination. It is unfortunate that I only received feedback from one of the 24 I sent out. This event was our first one for S&S and I specifically sent invitations to people I researched as linchpins in the area. I knew at some point they would come across this story or a future event and they would be empowered to interact with me personally. Were the invitations a success? I wish I could say yes but only time will tell.
However, I will always incorporate tangible items including the stickers and promotional caps I had made for the event. From invitations to social media to swag, I wanted to cover all our bases to ensure that I was recording and measuring the event from all angles.
What were your objectives for the event and were you able to achieve them?
Our goal list was extensive and I believe the event was an overall success! The list contained objectives such as company awareness, increasing sales, measuring customer and employee satisfaction, achieving the Foursquare Swarm badge status and empowering employees to convert customers to loyal fans.
Out of those five objectives, to say the least, we did not receive our Foursquare badge. Locos is now on the map with Foursquare and local customers and thought of as a ‘social media friendly’ business as the employees now engage the customers by asking them to play Foursquare.
I am in the process of compiling the data from the event and haven’t seen any ‘bottom line’ stats but we walked out feeling as if we made a difference. We made mistakes and will know how to overcome them in the future.
What would you do the same and what would you do differently for your next Foursquare event?
Everything was great, as explained above, but there are a few items I would change. Instead of trying to create an extended window of time (4-10pm), we should have pegged it for a 3 hour window since many attendees didn’t make it til a later time. At the event the 3 hour swarm window began moving forward and the users who checked in first began falling off the overall tally which held us back. Also, it was examined that for our ‘small town’ we may need to combine Foursquare with a Gameday football event or Thursday night trivia. Not everyone was as informed of Foursquare as we were. Also, we should bring more computers! We signed up 15 people on Foursquare that night in a last minute effort to get the swarm badge. It was exciting.
Thanks again Lucas for taking the time to chat with me about the event and your company!
Do you have questions about the event or additional suggestions on how to promote a Foursquare event? You know how to do it – ask/share away in the comments section.
