Most events don’t fail because of the lineup, the venue, or the catering. They fail because not enough people knew they existed, and even fewer cared enough to buy a ticket.
Social media is the engine that changes that. Not by blasting a Facebook event and hoping for the best, but by building a campaign with a proper arc: one that creates anticipation before the doors open, captures the energy on the day, and keeps the conversation going long after the last session ends.
🔗 Quick links: Strategy first | Pre-event | Live on the day | Post-event | Measure what matters
Done right, your social media campaign doesn’t just sell tickets. It builds a community that comes back year after year.
We’ve been running social media for events in WA for over a decade, including State of Social, Australia’s premier digital marketing conference. Here’s what actually works in 2026.
tldr; everything you need to know
Strategy first. Always.
Before you write a single caption or schedule a single post, you need a strategy. Not a content calendar. Not a Canva template. A strategy.
That means knowing the answers to these before anything goes live:
- What is the single most important outcome? (Ticket sales? Waitlist growth? Sponsor visibility?)
- Who is the audience, and which platforms do they actually use?
- What does success look like — in numbers — by event day?
- Who is responsible for what, and when?
Pick your platforms deliberately. In WA, Instagram and Facebook are doing the heavy lifting for most experience-led events. LinkedIn earns its place for conferences and industry events. TikTok is growing fast for younger audiences and festival formats. You don’t need all of them; you need the right ones, executed well.
For State of Social, we run a multi-platform approach that treats each channel differently: LinkedIn for credibility and professional FOMO, Instagram for atmosphere and excitement, Facebook for community and direct conversion. Each platform has a specific job.
Pre-event: build the machine before the day arrives
The groundwork you lay in the weeks and months before your event determines how much you have to work with once things kick off.
Build your content calendar
Map out every content moment from launch to pack-down. Announcements, ticket releases, speaker reveals, countdowns, behind-the-scenes. Know what’s going out, on which platform, in what format, and who’s making it happen. Content types that consistently perform in the pre-event phase:
- Speaker or lineup reveals (drip-fed to build anticipation, not dumped all at once)
- Behind-the-scenes setup or production content
- Short-form video teasers: Reels, TikToks, and YouTube Shorts
- Countdown posts with a direct link to purchase
- Social proof: testimonials and highlights from your previous event
- Early-bird and ticket-tier urgency posts
Make short-form video your pre-event engine
Short-form video isn’t a content nice-to-have in 2026; it’s the primary discovery mechanism on every major platform. Instagram Reels, TikTok, and Facebook Reels are prioritised by algorithms, meaning video posts generate significantly more organic reach than static images.
- Short-form video delivers the highest ROI of any content format Sprout Social, 2026
- 82% of people say watching a video influenced a purchase decision Teleprompter.com / HubSpot, 2026
- TikTok engagement rate: 3.70% — highest of all major platforms Sprout Social, 2025
- Instagram Reels: 3.5 billion reshares daily across Meta Black Pug Studio, 2025
- Short-form video receives 2.5x more engagement than long-form Sprout Social / Teleprompter, 2026
For events, use short-form video to tease the experience: a speaker’s best quote from last year, a 10-second montage of crowd energy, a first-look at the venue. Keep it under 30 seconds, mobile-first, and caption it. Around half of all social video is watched on mute.
Create your event hashtag and own it early
A strong event hashtag is a tracking tool, a community anchor, and a discovery mechanism all at once. It should be short, specific, and impossible to misspell.
Use it on every piece of pre-event content. Put it on your email footers, your printed collateral, your email signatures. By the time your event opens, your audience should know the hashtag without being told.
For State of Social, the hashtag framework has been consistent across years (for example, #StateOfSocial24, #StateOfSocial25), making it easy to search historical content and new attendees to find the community.
Use retargeting to convert the warm audience
Paid social is not just for awareness. Retargeting people who have visited your event page but not purchased is one of the highest-ROI moves in your campaign.
Set up your Meta pixel or LinkedIn Insight Tag before your campaign launches. Build retargeting audiences from website visitors and video viewers. As ticket urgency increases, your retargeting messaging should shift: from ‘here’s what to expect’ to ‘only X spots left.’
Make it easy for people to share
Before the event opens, give your audience the tools to share on your behalf: a branded frame for their profile photo, a GIF set they can use in Stories, a shareable graphic for LinkedIn. The easier you make it, the more they’ll do it.
Live on the day: capture it all, share it selectively
Live event coverage is where most brands drop the ball. They either over-post everything indiscriminately, or they get so caught up in the day that social falls away entirely.
Build a shot list, not a vibe plan
Work from your event run sheet and map out exactly what needs to be captured, when, where, and by whom. This isn’t about controlling every moment; it’s about making sure you don’t miss the non-negotiable ones.
For State of Social, we produce a detailed shot list before the event opens. Each platform gets specific content: LinkedIn gets depth and thought leadership; Instagram Stories get energy and immediacy; Reels get the moments that travel.
Platform-specific content on the day
Not all platforms are created equal, and your live content should reflect that:
- Instagram Stories: atmosphere, immediacy, polls and Q&As. Use countdowns for session starts. Post reactions as they happen.
- Instagram Reels: curated highlights from each day. Aim for at least one Reel per event day.
- LinkedIn: considered, text-forward posts with key insights from speakers. Photo albums at end of day with an editorial caption.
- Facebook: community tone, link sharing, longer captions that contextualise the action for those not there.
At State of Social ’21, our end-of-day LinkedIn photo albums delivered engagement rates of 53.4% and 74.29% respectively — against a platform average of 0.35% per post. That’s not luck; that’s platform-specific thinking.
Fuel the FOMO, deliberately
Your live coverage should make two groups of people feel something: those who are there (proud they came) and those who are not (gutted they missed it). Every post should do at least one of those two things.
Share speaker insights as quote graphics. Post crowd reactions. Capture the moments between sessions. The informal, unchoreographed content often outperforms the polished stuff, because people trust it more.
- 92% of consumers trust user-generated content more than traditional brand advertising National University, 2026
- 64% of attendees cite immersive experiences as the most important element of an event Thunderbit / Cvent, 2026
- 82% of attendees prefer in-person events over virtual Thunderbit, 2026
Encourage UGC and engage with it in real time
Search your event hashtag during the event. Reshare the best attendee content. Reply to posts. Tag speakers when you quote them. The more you engage, the more others post.
User-generated content is your most credible social proof. In 2026, audiences trust peer content over branded content by a significant margin, so every piece of organic attendee content is an asset worth amplifying.
Post-event: don’t let the energy die
The moment your event ends, the campaign for the next one begins. The content you produce in the days after your event is the foundation of your 2027 campaign.
Share a surplus — but make it curated
You’ll have more content than you can post in one day, and that’s the point. A post-event content queue that runs for two to three weeks keeps the conversation alive and gives the algorithm more to work with.
Use this content to:
- Build FOMO for those who missed it (highlights, speaker moments, crowd reactions)
- Reward those who attended (behind-the-scenes, group shots, moments they might have missed)
- Tease next year (if dates or themes are known, start the conversation early)
- Repurpose long-form sessions into short Reels or quote tiles for extended reach
Send your post-event survey — fast
Send a post-event survey within 24 hours. The feedback you collect doesn’t just improve your next event; it tells you exactly what to put on social. If a particular speaker or session resonated, double down on that content. If something fell flat, don’t post it.
Quotes and testimonials from the survey are some of the most powerful content you can publish. Short, specific, and from a real person. Screenshot it, caption it, post it.
Nurture the community you just built
Every event grows your social following and your mailing list — if you’ve made it easy to join both during the event itself. QR codes linking directly to email sign-up, a follow prompt in your event app or run sheet, a clear CTA in your post-event email: all of these compound over time.
The audience you build at one event is the warm audience for the next. Don’t go quiet. Keep them engaged with regular content through the year, then ramp back up when the campaign cycle restarts.
Measure what matters (not just what’s easy)
Social media metrics are only useful if they connect back to your actual event goals. Reach and impressions tell you how many people saw your content. Clicks, conversions, and ticket sales tell you whether it worked.
- Only 55% of event professionals track social media engagement in their ROI metrics Cvent, 2026
- 41% of marketers say they struggle to properly measure event ROI Splash Events Outlook, 2025
- 95% of B2B event teams say proving event ROI is a top priority Thunderbit, 2026
The metrics worth tracking for an event social media campaign:
- Reach and impressions (how far did the campaign travel?)
- Engagement rate by platform and post type (what content resonated?)
- Link clicks and ticket conversion rate from social (what converted?)
- Hashtag volume and sentiment (how did the community respond?)
- Follower growth across the campaign period (what did we build?)
- Post-event content performance (what extended the hype?)
Record everything. Your post-campaign report is your strategy brief for next year.
📊 See it in action: State of Social State of Social is Australia’s leading digital marketing conference, run annually out of Perth, WA. Coffey & Tea has delivered the social media strategy and live execution for multiple consecutive years: building FOMO, driving ticket sales, and creating a community of loyal attendees who return year after year. Read the State of Social case study to see how the strategy translates to results.
