Monetization Magic

Colorado Website Development

How to Use a Blog in Event Planning (Part 2 of 4)

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Sales

A lot of times speakers will have published a book, are able to offer special offers on continuing training/coaching or have upcoming events of their own that attendees would be interested in.  Assist them in extending those offers to the audience in return for a percentage of the total sales.  Partner with a travel agent and negotiate a special rate for travel and hotel accommodations.  Partner with the venue’s kitchen to arrange for a special deal on meals so that the conference attendees are not inconvenienced by having to go offsite for a meal and assist the venue in generating revenue.  Allow them to purchase conference materials (coffee mugs, stationery, t-shirts, etc.) online and ship them before the event to generate interest.

Preconference use

A room and/or ride share area can be arranged for those needing assistance with room or ride accommodations.  A forum can be put together to help future attendees to communicate and generate interest for the event.  Information about the venue and amenities can be communicated to assist attendees in getting ready for the event.  Pre-conference training calls can be coordinated via the blog along with pre-conference material lists or training materials or assignments can be posted via the blog.  Encourage potential attendees to link to the blog post via Twitter or Facebook to generate interest for their personal tribes.  Advise everyone when the Earlybird registration deadlines are approaching.  Create a tweet session the night before the big event to elevate the excitement about the upcoming event.

Tell attendees about important happenings and press releases. If you are announcing that there will be a networking reception on the first night of the conference, this is one of the outlets you should use.

Inform attendees about a new speaker or go in depth on each speaker. This is especially useful, take one speaker per week (day) and feature them. Write an article about them, their accomplishments, their expertise and why attendees would want to attend their session. You could also have the speakers write a guest post which they like.

The same can be done for sponsors. Talk about event sponsors and what they bring to the table and why attendees should visit their booths. A WARNING – DO NOT make blog mentions or blog articles part of a sponsorship package, this will free you up to talk about lower level or new sponsors that may have an amazing product or service but may not have the funds for the larger sponsorship, it shows that you value them and that they are important as well.

Announce milestones, if the conference has reached an attendance record or the early bird is ending, make it a post in addition to the other places you will announce it.

How to Use a Blog in Event Planning(Part 1 of 4)

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What is a blog?

Wikipedia defines a blog as (a blend of the term web log)[1] is a type of website or part of a website. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order.  Most blogs are interactive, allowing visitors to leave comments and even message each other via widgets on the blogs and it is this interactivity that distinguishes them from other static websites.[2]

In case you were not aware, you are currently reading a blog.

How long does the event occur?

Let attendees know in advance when the event will occur.  Also advise them the hours of the event.  Sometimes events are scheduled earlier than 9 a.m. and after 5 p.m.  Typically your event will last 3-5 days.  Typically people travel the day before and the date after.

What happens at the event?

Travel, sleeping accommodations, networking, sales, coaching, food consumption, gift consumption, entertainment, sightseeing, training, event testimonials, speaker feedback.  These are all topics that can be covered in the blog and points that could be coordinated with reliable sources at the venue.  Addressing these topics ahead of time will generate interest for the event and set the expectations of the event attendees.

What is needed at the event?

Tell attendees what to bring, what to leave a home, what the weather will be, remind them to bring business cards for networking.  Will they need paper and pens for note taking or are you supplying those materials?  Will recording and videoing be prohibited?  Advise attendees of the expected attire (high heels or hiking boots, shorts or slacks, polo shirt or sport coat and tie).  Will there be any formal events?  Advise attendees of any special points that they would want to be aware of such as being prepared for a day at the beach or morning yoga or whatever you might have planned that they would like to be aware.  Will you have special accommodations for disabled attendees?

Generating interest

Interest can be generated by giving prospective attendees a brief overview of the benefits that will be gained by attending the event.  Will they also receive a DVD of the event?  Will they receive valuable knowledge at the event?  Do you have testimonials from past attendees?  All that can be shared via e-mail.  Invite them to bring a friend/business partner/team for free or at a deep discount.

Write Your First Blog Post (Part 2 of 2)

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In the first part of this article, we discussed finding and using keywords as well as how to utilize the Six Servants to give your post a structure so that the reader can determine if the post is appropriate for them.   We will now discuss how to move your reader forward as you lead them to your desired destination.

Lay Out the Path to Your Destination

Your reader will need to know how to get from point A to your desired destination.  Lead them step by step to the finished product.  Point A is simply where on the path your reader is now.  Your desired destination is where your reader will be once the information you have is transferred to them.  At the end of reading your article, you will want to include direction (hopefully to more of your content) to more information or the next logical step to take to get to the next level in their journey.  As your blog post unfolds, your reader may need specific tools/information to take them to the next step along the way.  Equip your reader as you proceed just as the Google Keyword External Tool was introduced at the beginning of this blog post.  Your blog post takes the reader on a journey from Point A to your desired destination with you leading the way.  The question you want to answer along the way is “The reader will leave with an understanding of…”.  If this question is answered with “I have no clue”, that’s a great opportunity for your to rewrite that area to gain clarity for the reader.  Here is a simple outline for you to follow:

o  Answer the Six Servant questions for the reader.  Give them a reason to want to read your article.

o  Describe Point A

o  What tools does the reader need at this point?  Where do they find the tools?  What is the tool used for?

o  The reader will leave with an understanding of…

o  What is the next logic step along the path?  Describe the next logical step.

o  What tools does the reader need at this point?  Where do they find the tools?  What is the tool used for?

o  The reader will leave with an understanding of…

o  Summary

o  What are the next possible steps once the desired outcome is achieved?  Where can the reader possibly go from here?  Why would the reader want to revisit your blog?

Key Points to Keep in Mind

Use the rule of 21 W’s.  You will want to create a template with 21 W’s to determine how wide to make your posts for easy reading.  A good rule of thumb is to put 21 W’s on your page as your guide to how wide to make your post.

Keep your posts to about 300-350 words.  Anything long can be broken up into a series for easier reading.  That way the reader can choose if they wish to continue reading or not.

At each point along the way, you will want to give a subheading to describe what that section of the article is about.

Summary

You now have a framework around which you can structure your blog posts.  By using the Six Servants and Laying Out the Path to Your Destination for your readers, you will have a well written, concise blog post that creates value for your reader.

Now that you have your first blog post written, you will want to publish it.  I will describe publishing a blog post in my next posting, Publish Your First Blog Post, with a video example.

Write Your First Blog Post (Part 1 of 2)

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This post series describes how to write your first blog post and gives you a two-part structure to use so that your blog posts convey your intended message.  This will help you to organize your ideas and focus on your topic.  You can write your blog posts using any word processor such as Microsoft Word, Wordpad (free),  Open Office Writer (free), Notepad (not ideal, but useable).  You want to center your blog posts around keywords so that Google can drive traffic to your website.  You can obtain your keyword list from the Google Keyword External Tool.  It’s very simple and easy to use.  Refer to your keyword list and simply pick a keyword.  As you write your article, you will want to utilize your keywords in your article.  A good rule of thumb is to make no more than 10% of your words keywords.  So if your article is 300 words long, you will want no more than 30 key words.

This article will give you a plan so that you will have a two-part structure upon which to build your blog posts.  Within your structure, you will refer to what I call the Six Servants.  These Six Servants are concepts which are likely very familiar to you.  They are:  Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How.  Yes, you probably know these servants well; however, we will be expanding these concepts to assist you.  Just as you use a map when taking a long trip, so too, we will build a map for you to follow.  Only this map will become a tool for you as you learn to insert and delete items to guide you to your desired destination which is to have a well written article that is of interest to your readers.

Utilizing the Six Servants

The Six Servants can be enhanced to assist you in creating the first part of your structure.  The information obtained from answering the following questions will assist you in creating the foundation to your article.  For example, upon writing this article, I may have used the following questions:

Who will be reading the article? Bloggers who either haven’t written their first blog post or bloggers who have written blog posts that are not receiving the traffic that they would like to realize on their blog.

What tool/new information will be transferred in the article? I’m introducing the Google Keyword External Tool and a two-part structure to create a structure for the blog posts.

When will they be reading this article? They will be reading this article when they have a blog started and need more information on how to create blog posts in an orderly, organized fashion.

Where on their path will they be when they use this tool or knowledge? Blog writers will utilize these tools every time they create a blog post.  This information can also be used in product creation.

Why will this information be important to them? This information is important to them if they wish to drive more traffic to their blogs from the search engines.

How can they obtain more information about this topic?  How can they integrate this knowledge to their particular situation? I’m currently giving an example of how I’m using this tool and structure to write this particular blog post to make it easier for my reader to see how to put it into use.

Next we will discuss how to create a logical path for your readers to follow as they read your blog post.