How NGS can develop their social media channels to create more value and visibility for their event. The Northern Game Summit website was also considered because the NGS social media channels are built around it.
Categories of Social Media Channels
A few of the most popular and well-known social media sites, their concept and terminology, are described in this chapter. These worlds have played a major role in the development of social media technology, applications and services.
Search Engines and Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
The domain name of the site is recommended to be used as a keyword for the search and to place it in various search engines. Because of this integration, it is recommended to create a Wikipedia article about the organization, its operations and products with facts and links to the site.
Monitoring and Tracking of Social Media and Internet Sites
The popularity of social media is based on the development of technology, new application solutions and ease of use. Kananen (2013, 9) says that social media has created a collaborative environment for both businesses and consumers. Social media is an effective and diverse tool for networking, marketing, creating and managing customer relationships (Kananen 2013, 13; Kortesuo 2014 a 58).
With social media channels and search engines, this information is easily accessible and within everyone's reach. It should be noted that what is posted on social media represents the entire organization and the opinions of the organization. For these reasons, organizations need to be careful about what they post on social media channels.
Social media marketing is done by publishing information on every channel at the same time. The organization may delegate some of the social media tasks to communities or their members for compensation.
Outbound and Inbound Marketing
The distinguishing difference between outbound and inbound marketing is the way the message is delivered to the consumer. The outbound marketing is based on sending messages through those marketing channels where the target groups are most exposed to the marketing. Outbound marketing can interrupt the consumer from his or her activities with an unwanted message.
Usually, consumers actively fight against these messages with e.g. adblockers and junk email filters. The inbound marketing principle is based on the idea of consumers' own interactivity and acceptance, where the marketing message corresponds to the recipient's wishes. Instead of interrupting the consumer, the responsibility of the marketer is to provide the right and interesting information to the customers.
The guide goes through creating ads and campaigns, organizing them, targeting the right segments and search engine optimization.
Organizing Social Media
As with creating a social media strategy, event marketing should be built out of the organization's operational plan and as part of the organization's marketing strategy. It is imperative in event marketing that the event is linked to other marketing activities and that each event has defined its purpose and a target group (Vallo & Häyrinen Strengths in event marketing are opportunities; 1) to create personal contacts and networks between the organizer and visitors, 2) to control the frames of the events and its communication, 3) to limit the participating group according to the needs and goals of the event, 4) to receive comments on the goals achieved and not achieved, 5) to differentiate from competitors in a positive way and 6) to create unforgettable experiences (Vallo & Häyrinen. Budget Answers to questions; With what resources and investments the event is organized.
Expertise Answers to the questions; Who organizes and how the event is organized (organization itself, outsourced party). Answers to the questions; When, where, how and with what time schedule the event is organized. Even the organization of the event was briefly presented, you can easily see that it takes careful planning, a lot of work, diverse expertise and dedication to make the event a success.
Even when an event is carefully planned and precautions are taken, it is still good to expect that something unexpected will happen that we were not prepared for. Vallo and Häyrinen suggest that if the event is public or paid for, the organizer must consider a marketing plan for the event. Vallo and Häyrinen suggest that an event marketing plan should include 1) internal marketing for one's own organization, 2) press information, 3) media marketing, and 4) external marketing.
Social Media Channels in Event Marketing
- Blogs
- YouTube and LinkedIn
Although, they add, larger events can have their own websites and social media channels. and event information and 8) exchange links with exhibitors so that their customer can become informed about the event. The possibilities offered by social media are useful in organizing an event, and these possibilities can be exploited before the event, during the event and even after the event in post-event marketing (Vallo & Häyrinen 2012, 84). A public profile can be created for an event to provide information about it, as well as private groups for members of the organization.
Facebook event creation features make it easy to invite and share event information and see how many visitors are coming to the event. By adding a location to a Facebook event, attendees can gather information about other services in the area. During an event, you can use a blog much like Facebook, posting pictures, videos, and interviews about the event, sharing links and presentation materials, and starting conversations.
During the event, organizing party may encourage the visitors to send Tweets of their experiences and opinions about the event. Event attendees can follow speakers, topics, and conversations that are most interesting to them, even before the event, during the event, and after the event.
Event Homepages
In addition to the home pages, the Facebook profile is the main social channel of the event, as it usually contains the most information about the event. It is a concern for customers that some information cannot be found on the home pages or some links to other social media channels are not updated. This creates difficulties in finding certain channels and information that could influence the purchase decision or the image of the organization.
Home pages are not interactive and customers have no way to contact the organization through the page other than email contact provided. As mentioned earlier, unfinished home pages can affect the organization's image and customer experience. It is good to ensure that the links work even if the pages are otherwise under editing.
At the time of writing this work (August), information about the NGS 2016 event was available on Facebook pages and homepages. Instagram and Facebook pages contain information about the "Vote Mascot" contest, which was organized to find an official mascot for the NGS event.
Homepages and Social Media Channels Visibility
Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are important channels for interactive communication between visitors and potential customers. The main pages of the Northern Games Summit are intended to be an information channel, an event marketing site and a sales channel for tickets. From the point of view of Internet users, it seems that managing and updating the site is a huge workload and lags behind as the information is updated slowly.
Other search words, terms and their combinations (+) used to search for the event were; NGS, event, conference, game event, game development event, Kajaani. When using the search terms 'NGS', 'game event', 'game development event' the results were very poor, but when including the terms 'Kajaani' and 'conference' the results were much better and the homepages were found at the top of the first page . The search terms 'instagram', 'twitter' + 'ngs' or 'northern game summit' did not find any results for the NGS event.
NGS Social Media Channels
Due to the lack of updates and usage for the 2016 event on LinkedIn, Flickr and Instagram, these social media channels are not researched in depth for this work.
NGS Facebook Pages
Three different pieces of information can be gleaned from these weeks; people talking about this channel, the number of page likes in general and the number of new page likes. When this numerical data is tracked over a long period of time and reflected in the channel's content feed at that time and also in other events related to the organization, the organization can generate hypotheses and conclusions about; how active followers are and why, what and how it affects follower activity, channel growth status, channel popularity status. Tracking likes is essential as they are social media ratings that increase visibility and knowledge of the event and the organization behind it.
The number of likes and followers may not tell the whole truth about the popularity or quality of the organization and the event, but it does indicate the interactivity between the participants of the event and the organization within the Internet. It is difficult to determine how actively event attendees are talking about the event outside of organizations' social media channels. Interactivity is required because, by activating the community, the organization can obtain the necessary information for the development of the event.
NGS Twitter Pages
When developing social media channels, it is vital that the organization has channels or feedback channels that work. It is likely that these consumers are not as active on social media channels as they are on forums and blog sites. As Northern Game Summit already has several social media channels, but only some of them are in active use.
It is recommended that Northern Game Summit go through their social media channels and create a priority order for them so that the most important can take full advantage of the resourcefulness of the contributors. It is recommended that NGS organizers and social media staff become acquainted with this service. And above all: what do they want to achieve with social media and the channels as a whole.
All of the social media channels NGS has had low activity rates and low traffic. The development suggestions can work as a structure for the organization to build their social media business as a whole.
