23
One has a 24% engagement rate
and 2,000 followers which generate
480 engagements in 24 hours. The
other has an engagement rate of
2.5% that would require 19,200
followers to get the same amount of
engagements in the same time.
Beech says that the venue with
higher engagement received more
than four times as many
impressions as it had followers,
while the next best performer in the
study received fewer impressions
than it had followers.
“I’m keen to put an end to the
notion that, in our industry,
followers equal awareness, and
rather encourage the concept that
being interesting, social and
interacting in public is the way to
generate the awareness they strive
for, and consider it an independent
or driving metric,” says Beech.
Beech goes on to say that the
numbers aren’t important on their
own, but rather they are
interconnected. “If a brand joins
a discussion on Conference
News’ Twitter, it has the
potential to be exposed to
over 21,500 followers,” he
says. “If you join discussions
on the right topics, which relate to
your USP, then it is going to be
exposed to the right people. The
more people that join a discussion,
the more networks combine, and
the louder the voice on that topic.
“Comments in discussions can
be tracked as impressions and
engagements and the exposure
leads to more engaged followers.”
Beech shares a case study of
innovative social media thinking,
one he worked on for Patch Media
for their client 10-11 Carlton House
Terrace.
“10-11 Carlton House Terrace
worked with us on a social media
engagement campaign to support a
growth year. I was looking at their
floor plan for inspiration and noticed
it looked a lot like the Cluedo
board.
“Using their floorplan as a
Cluedo board, we defined a
campaign played online
and in person, but all
guesses had to be
submitted on social
media,” explains Beech.
“We roped in suppliers, partners
and publishers to be characters in
our game ensuring their
“I’m keen to put
an end to the
notion that, in
our industry,
followers equal
awareness.”
Matt Beech,
marketing director
at Patch Media
www.conference-news.co.uk
Cover Story
participation
and support
promoting it. Our
social media forces were joined for
maximum reach.
“The game was live on their
exhibition stand at an event and on
the weeks before and after. We
released digital daily newspaper
front pages throughout the
campaign to keep it alive and
provide clues and answered
guesses online. This generated a lot
of exposure in the short term and
everyone who participated was
compelled to look at our custom
board modelled on the venue’s floor
plan with pictures of rooms set up
for events as part of the board.
“They had to get to know our staff
and partners, and through this our
personality and brand values. They
had a handful of important
takeaways to learn from
participating in the game: The
venue is a historic venue, it’s a
Georgian townhouse venue, it is
high quality and ornate, it can host
business events and parties and it’s
in central London.
“In everything we did to promote
the campaign we directed the
activity to our social media
channels. This helped us to
increase online exposure during the
exhibition as well as use this and
other on and offline
communications channels as a
springboard.”
Was it a success? “The campaign
didn’t just get more exposure for the
venue’s core USPs across to a large
audience in a short space of time,”
says Beech. “Because social media
favours serving up content from
interesting accounts (those people
engage with) it meant that for the
weeks and months after the
campaign the venue benefited from
increased exposure so as it
continued to establish its reputation
online to a listening audience.”
Venues would do well to think
outside of the box on how they
manage their social media. Don’t go
out there just bragging about what
you do, tell people something they
may not know.