Effective Ways to Promote Your On-Campus Event

By Emma Bonney

College campuses are always full of events, whether it’s a concert, a film screening or a nationally acclaimed speaker. When you’re planning a campus event, getting people to attend can sometimes be more difficult than coordination the event altogether. So, what are the most effective ways you can get people to hear about the event and spark their interest to participate?

Social Media

Social media is probably one of the most effective ways to advertise an event. Create an event on Facebook and share it with everybody on campus. Invite people to the event and ask them to invite their friends as well. Instagram and Twitter are also a good way to promote the event, although it has to be done in a more creative way. You can share the poster of the event on Instagram or even go a bit further and share stories from the whole planning process. This will attract people’s curiosity and convince them to attend.

Email

When trying to find an effective way to advertise something through email, think about the newsletters that you receive from your favorite subscriptions. You would not even open the email or read the content if it was not something that caught your interest. Try to create the content of the email based on that idea. Put together an informative text about the main theme of the event and advertise your event in the end. This will make sure to get people’s attention and will not make the email seem like spam. Then, send it to everybody on campus and ask them to further invite their friends by forwarding the emails to them.

Flyers

Although they are one of the oldest forms of advertising, this does not mean that flyers are less effective. Eye-catching flyer designs will attract people and spark their curiosity. Don’t put too much information on it. Just the highlights of the event, the date and time and one or two important ideas. Leave flyers in the most frequented places on campus, such as cafeteria, dorms or library. Ask friends to spread them around and don’t forget about bulletin boards. Another effective way to make sure they reach your audience is to also send flyers in the mail.

College Newspaper or Website

If your college has a newspaper or a website, discuss with the editor and ask if they can post a short article or description of the event. It can either be a short O&A session with the speaker or a short story about the overall event. You can write a short text explaining the reason you thought about putting together the event, what your experience has been so far and what you plan on accomplishing with this. Don’t forget to include the date and time of the event, contact information if necessary and any other important info. You can also choose to go a simpler way and just have the flyer or poster of the event un in the newspaper or on the website.

Word of Mouth

Perhaps one of the most effective ways to attract people’s attention is to have other people talk about the event. Make sure you spread the word about it through friends, classmates and even teachers. Tell people about the event and make sure to encourage them to tell their friends also. If people are talking about it, this means the information is going to reach more students and bring more attendees. Make sure to also ask people to share the event on social media or invite their friends. Although not literally, this counts as word of mouth too.

Send Invitations

If you plan on inviting the professors and faculty members too, it would look more professional if done through a printed invitation, instead of an email. Just like the flyers, make sure to include the important information on the invitation, as well as the name of the person it’s handed to. A nice touch is to handwrite the name, as it will look more personal and thoughtful. Make sure someone from the organizing team is handing down the invitations, so they can answer any questions the professors might have. Tell them about the importance of the event and why their presence would be valuable.

A bit about myself:

Emma Bonney is a successful blogger whose articles aim to help readers with self-development, Women’s Empowerment, Education, entrepreneurship and content management.

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