So you’ve got an event happening at your restaurant but you don’t have a huge budget for marketing. We hear you. The good news is social media can help you spread awareness with little to no money spent. A great place to start: your restaurant’s Facebook page! Facebook has a diverse demographic and with the right tactics, Facebook can help you make your next event a success. Here’s how to promote an event on Facebook to publicize your next restaurant event:
Create a Facebook event
First things first: create a Facebook event so people can have something to RSVP to. Once you set it up initially, Facebook events automatically remind users when your event is coming up. Make sure to optimize your Facebook event with all the important details such as date, time, location address and cost, if there is one. Include pictures of your space and any information that would get people excited to attend your event. This is a crucial step when learning how to promote an event on Facebook.
Starting from scratch? Use this helpful tutorial to help you get started:
Use Facebook ads to boost attendance
If you’ve got a little extra money to put towards increasing your event awareness, Facebook ads can be an amazing way to generate excitement and attendance. You can target your ideal location and demographics to be sure your money spent is well worth it. If you want to increase ticket sales, here’s a quick formula to use:
- Click Boost Event on your event page
- Choose Increase Ticket Sales
- Select your audience. You can target people based on gender, age, location, and interests.
- Choose your budget and schedule
- Click Boost.
Create a post on your business page and link them to your event page or ticket page
In addition to paid advertising, you’ll definitely want to use Facebook to create posts on your business page as well. You already have the perfect audience in place – they know and love you and because they like your Facebook page already, they’re much more likely to share your event with their friends. It’s a good idea to post a few times leading up to the event (note: spread out your posts, you don’t want your followers to feel annoyed and spammed).
How to Promote an Event on Facebook: Make Use of Facebook Live Video
Facebook Live is a great tool to generate excitement in-house. Pro-tip: You’ll want to give your audience at least 24-hour notice that you’ll be going live to increase attendance. You can go live to show off your awesome event space before the event, show sneak peeks, or whatever else you think might generate more event attendance. Not sure Facebook Live is worth it? Check out these stats that definitely show otherwise:
- Live Video is Extremely Engaging: According to Facebook Live, users spend more than 3x more time and comment 10x more when the video is live.
- Live Video Grows Attendance: 30% of people who watch a livestream of an event will attend the same event the following year.
- Live Video is Cost Effective: It’s a common misconception that live video is costly, but thanks to tools like Facebook Live, anyone can leverage the technology and see a positive return on investment.
Overall, Facebook Live can be a fun tool to help you generate excitement, especially when you’re using it with the above tactics to promote your restaurant’s event.
If any of this sounds like more effort you’d like to put into your event, you can always explore our packages. We’re here to help!
Did you know?
We've been managing social media accounts for restaurants since 2012. For almost a decade, we've partnered with restauranteurs who are serious about using social media to generate business. Whether you're a good fit for our service or not, let's schedule a call and we'll give you free personalized advice on how to improve your social media presence. Either way, you'll walk away from the call more confident about your ability to promote yourself online - completely for free.
