Tips for Using Facebook's Photo Tagging Feature for Events

Posted by: Jenise Fryatt

Monday, November 21st, 2011

Facebook’s feature allowing you to tag photos with your Facebook page name holds many new marketing possibilities for events.  While photo tagging has always been available for profiles, the ability for pages to do it is new.

Just as with Facebook profiles, when you tag a photo that appears on someone elses profile or page with the name of your Facebook page it will show up on your Facebook page. But unlike profiles, the photo will not be seen on your Facebook page wall.  It will be seen in the “Photos” section.

Here are a few ideas for using the new feature for marketing your event.

Tag Your Event in Attendees’ Photos

Any picture you see posted on Facebook of your event can be tagged.  So when you see photos like this, don’t miss the opportunity to give your event more exposure by tagging them with your event’s Facebook page name.

Encourage Attendees to Tag Their Own Pictures of the Event 

It’s always great when you can identify your event more strongly with fans. Asking attendees to tag their pictures with your page name (anyone can do this) is good.  But why not go a step further?  Have a contest where the most creative pictures that are tagged win a prize or a discount on next year’s registration.

Encourage Attendees to Tag Their Pictures of Related Activities

Is your event held for pet lovers? Ask attendees to tag a picture of themselves and their pet with your event name. Or is your event held for an association of professionals? Have attendees tag pictures of themselves working at their associated profession. This is a great way to get more exposure for your event, while also building the community by giving attendees a chance to get to know each other on your Facebook event page.

Encourage Fans to Tag Photos Related to Conference Topics

Focus on a particular topic that will be addressed at your upcoming event. Say, one of your sessions will be on team building. Have people take pictures of their team (business, sports, personal) and tag them with your event Facebook page name.  The pictures can be projected and used to spark discussion at the session about what makes their team stronger or weaker. (And they, of course, will add to your exposure on Facebook.)

Get the Sponsors Involved

Kyle P. Lacy had a great idea on his blog (see below) for getting sponsors involved.  Invite them to tag your event pictures with their Facebook pages.  Again, more exposure for your event plus it helps to get their name out there and helps to tie their brand with your event.

Add a Philanthropic Element

Lots of events have a philanthropic tie in, whether it’s team building activities such as building bikes for disadvantaged kids, or contests that raise money for worthy causes. Don’t miss the opportunity to:

a) take pictures of any activities like this at your event and invite attendees to tag themselves.

b) encourage attendees to take their own pictures of these actvities and tag them with your Facebook page name.

Another great idea from Kyle P. Lacy (link below) is to encourage fans to take pictures of themselves doing a particular philanthropic activity (one that supports your chosen cause) before or after the event and tag them with your event’s Facebook page name.

(This post is inspired by Kyle P. Lacy’s blogpost 5 ways to use Facebook’s Photo Tagging for Pages)

For more information, check out TechCrunch’s post Facebook Now Allows You To Tag Pages in Photos

Posted with permission of Jenise Fryatt. Originally posted at http://icon-presentations.com/blog/bid/38223/Tips-for-Using-Facebook-s-New-Pages-Photo-Tagging-Feature-for-Events