Rae Cline, Ty Nowell, Lisa Bregman and Tim Carr make up a social media panel at EAMC at Loews Hollywood Hotel. (VT photo)
REPORTING FROM HOLLYWOOD, CALIF. — Digital was dubbed the “shiny penny” of the industry at the Event & Arena Marketing Conference here, June 10-13. Social media has transformed the world of marketing, instituting new trends and requirements for venues, teams, artists, promoters and agencies. As such, a number of sessions were devoted to the discussion of digital trends, including one that featured a panel of Lisa Bregman, digital and social marketing manager, Wasserman Media Group; Tim Carr, director of social media, U.S. Touring, Live Nation; Ty Nowell, manager of new media, Los Angeles Lakers; and Rae Cline, social marketing director, AEG Live.
“Every week we’re trying to analyze what’s the top content, what’s converting the most, what’s engaging the most,” said Carr. “It’s considering our brand voice and what communicates that the best.”
When it comes to the venue side of social media, all the panelists agreed that the building’s cooperation plays a vital role in the successful marketing of an artist or team. Those relationships should be fostered and utilized as often as possible.
“The venue pages across the board that we’ve analyzed are really going to have the biggest connection with the fans,” said Carr about venues’ Facebook pages. “Fans are naturally going to be more drawn to seeing what’s happening at the venue they grew up going to versus the ticketing company or the promoter.”
Because of this, Cline encouraged venues to take advantage of local connections, as AEG and others often look for that extra something they can do to promote an event, not only on their national channels, but through localized efforts as well.
“If you can identify who your local influencers are, work with my team and we’ll work with the artist to engage with your influencers,” said Cline. “That can have a really great effect. It strengthens your relationships. Ask us for localized content. The more creative you are, that’s doing our job for us, and we love it.”
With digital best practices changing every week and new platforms popping up regularly, how important is it for a venue to be on each of these platforms? Panelists agreed that it comes down to resources.
“I don’t necessarily think you need to be the first people to jump on a new application because, at the end of the day, you need fans there,” said Bregman. “Look at what resources you have first. If you don’t have the resources to do something, don’t do it. It’s much better to be great at one thing than OK at five. You’d rather have someone rave about this amazing Instagram account that your venue has or your tour has versus saying, I don’t really know who these guys are; they’re sort of below par on everything. At the end of the day, the most important thing is having a strategy for everything you do. Doing it just to do it is not going to help.”
Nowell agreed, also stressing the need for a social media strategy. Having one will simplify the process of pushing out content through a number of different platforms. Repurposing content also helps with the process.
“If we’re getting on a plane somewhere, and I’m trying to get a photo for Instagram, a Vine, something for Twitter and Snapchat all at the same time, it’s a mess,” said Nowell. “I try to focus on which one I need to get and do the next one at another opportunity. We can’t feed all of our platforms constantly with one person.”
The smorgasbord of social media platforms can still be daunting to smaller venues and local events. Not only that, but establishing a loyal fan following and producing enough content for all of them can seem an endless cycle. Carr said sometimes Live Nation allows venues to post their content on the promoter’s national accounts, garnering a farther reach and, hopefully, more engagement.
“Having 10 different platforms to build up and think about content and how to build your fan base doesn’t always make sense for local accounts,” said Carr. “Often we’ll work with them and get them access to a national account and let them use that to share content on the night of the event.”
Return on investment is always a concern. When it comes to social media, ROI can be measured in different ways beyond revenue.
“ROI is really related to what your goals are, so are you looking for reach or are you looking for engagement?” said Bregman. “If you’re trying to get followers, you’re going to have a different strategy than if you’re just trying to get reach or awareness.”
Each of the panelists explained how they were finding success with their teams or events over different platforms. Nowell explained how a large number of the Los Angeles Lakers’ social media followers are not local to Los Angeles. Because of that, they don’t do much selling or marketing over those channels, but offer fans unique content.
“What we do try to do is build that next generation of fans that are going to love our team,” said Nowell. “And we’ve actually started doing more because we’re not good right now. We try to highlight other things going on. For that, Instagram and Snapchat have been great for us. All of our guys understand it, so our players get involved and do a lot of it for us, which the fans obviously love.”
All of them agreed that video is the way to go right now. With Facebook video, Bregman said the videos they post are getting three to 10 times the views on Facebook than what they were getting on YouTube.
“The idea of video can be daunting, but video can be a lot of things,” said Cline. “It has to look good, because not all video is equal. If it doesn’t look good, then forget it and don’t use it. The average viewer on Facebook is going to watch 11 seconds, so 15 seconds to 30 seconds is kind of the maximum. You want to make sure it’s interesting in the beginning to keep people, however, there are always exceptions. If something is amazing or it’s a narrative piece and it’s longer, as long as it’s interesting at the beginning, use it. There are always judgment calls. If it’s a crappy looking video and it’s not charming, don’t use it. But sometimes you can make an exception and people will actually appreciate that. You don’t always have to spend a lot of money and get a produced video. There are ways around that.”
One of the biggest benefits of digital media is the analytics that come with it. That data gives marketers a more accurate picture of who their audiences are, enabling them to target and engage them even better.
“I’d say that’s still a pretty underutilized asset that all of these platforms provide and something I definitely suggest everyone getting better versed in and understanding your audience and understanding what content performs well,” said Bregman. “The tools are there now, and I think people are still doing a lot of guessing, and you don’t need to be.”
The ever-changing nature of social media was constantly stressed. Facebook is constantly changing its algorithm. If you want to drive to your website, create a custom link and don’t paste a URL in your status. Don’t post images with text overlay. Never post a YouTube link on Facebook. All of those tips are true today, but what will they be like a month from now?
“Come to us to pick our brains, because a lot of the time we are seeing best practices because we get catered to by the different social platforms,” said Cline. “Those best practices change sometimes weekly, so use us and we’ll be happy to share what we know with you.’
Interviewed for this story: Lisa Bregman, (310) 407-0200; Tim Carr, (213) 774-0783; Ty Nowell, (310) 426-6000; Rae Cline, (213) 763-7700