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How to Use Social Media To Promote Your Event
How to Use Social Media To Promote Your Event
Red Desk have worked on a number of social media campaigns for events and we’ve found a few common mistakes.
Don’t Let Your Social Media Go Dead
Firstly if your event is annual, it’s a really bad idea to just let your social media go cold once the event is over. People unfollow dead accounts very quickly, so you need to keep some kind of content running to keep the audience you’ve fought so hard to get. A good way to do this is adding a blog to your site. With a blog you write one or two articles a month and use that content to schedule posts across your social media.
Don’t Launch Your Campaign Too Late
The second big mistake is starting the full campaign too late; you need to create a detailed strategy at least 5 months before. This gives you time to make sure everyone working on the event is clear of the strategy and you’re all working with the same aims in mind.
If you do have a blog you can use it to post your Mission Statement for the event; do this a good 3 months prior. This mission statement can then be pushed out via social media to your audience and also your event partners. You can also at this stage create a pre-event page on Eventbrite.
Your Social Media Team & Influencers
You need to make sure all your partners, exhibitors and team are all on board with the social media. Beginning your social media early is important to build a support community and build momentum. By this stage you should also have a good list of influencers that you can target to get the word out.
Who is Your Campaign Aimed At?
When creating your campaign it’s important to use a User Persona to get a really good idea of the type of person you are targeting with your campaign so you know what type of content they like and where to find them i.e which social media platform they use. A good campaign will also have a good list of key search terms and hashtags that will be pushed through the website, blog & social media.
Make sure you have set up Google Alerts so you are aware of any mentions of your event and also any news related to your industry. You can work with exhibitors to find good human element stories for you campaign plus ideas for polls / promos and conversations that can be used throughout.
You should launch your event 3 to 4 weeks prior with a blog post, newsletter, social media and press release, all to include key search terms. Concentrate on the USPs (what makes your event unique) and always have a supply of high quality images. As well has the hard sell to push the ticket sales you also need to provide good, interesting and useful content.
On The Day
Once you get to your event day make sure you have a dedicated person on site working the social media, the behind the scenes shots of set up and the special highlights of the day make for great content that can be used for this event and future ones.
Red Desk are here to help you with any aspects of your event including planning, organisation, project management and social media. We’d love to hear from you so get in touch today.
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How to Deal With Bad Debts
How to Deal With Bad Debts
Running a small business has its challenges: your day-to-day work, staff, social media etc. One thing that you could do without though is customers not paying on time or even worse, not paying at all.
This article is about how to deal with bad debts.
Pay up front
We have learned that it is more difficult to get money out of people for work done than for work not done. Therefore we introduced the policy that for new clients who sign up for a set number of hours, we would issue the first invoice up front. Once the invoice is paid, we start work. Any other work done is billed at the end of the month.
Small businesses sometimes have cash flow problems and unfortunately if they don’t get paid then other businesses providing them services often suffer as a consequence. Invoices can end up being paid a month late or sometimes so late that it could be considered a bad debt.
Another way to deal with persistent late payers is to have a clause in your terms of business like:
“At our discretion, we may charge interest on overdue payments in accordance with clause 5 of our Terms of Business”.
You can then send interest invoices to cover your time spent chasing these debts on a monthly basis.
Set up a payment plan
Sometimes you might not know that one of your persistently late-paying clients is actually in financial difficulty. All of a sudden there are three invoices outstanding, so you need to take action.
It’s not nice but you are going to have to stop providing services to your client until you recover your debt. Normally they find a way to settle the invoices and normal service resumes. However for those who just can’t find the funds then the next best thing is a payment plan.
Agree with your client that it is better that they send you £50 or £100 a month (or whatever sum you agree to) over a certain period than having to take further action to recover the debt. You do need to be stubborn with payment plans, as if you don’t get the funds in on a certain date then you might find they are behind and essentially defaulting on their plan.
Send regular emails and phone calls reminding them on the date the amounts are due and how much is left.
Small Claims Court
If the payment plan simply isn’t working then the next course of action is taking your client (or possibly ex-client by now) to the Small Claims Court. This is suitable for debts up to £10,000.
You need to send them a Letter before Action which will give them time to think about whether they settle their debt with you or in the courts. You can find many templates for this letter online. Find one at a reputable source like Which.
If that doesn’t yield results then you put a claim into the Small Claims Court. You can find the full process on their website.
The alternatives
- You can also check out Money Claim Online which is the online Government debt recovery court process
- Pass the debt onto a debt recovery agency – it’s what they do every day
- Use a solicitor to draw up and send legal letters on your behalf
So if you want to avoid bad debts, think about getting yourself a Credit Control department. This is essentially chasing for payment and can be easily outsourced to a Virtual Assistant company like Red Desk.
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