Tracking is important. You need to know whether your attendees are using your hashtag, sharing it, commenting on your event and whether they are creating their own hashtags to help continue the conversation. Every post will help generate data that you can use to better understand your event's reach and attendee experience. Analyzing your event's social media activity is one of the many ways you can measure ROI. Here's how to go one step further than just tallying "likes" and "follows."
Timeline
Pay attention to the timing of all the posts. If you make sure to look at posts throughout the entire lifecycle of the event you will be able to get a big picture understanding of what your attendees did, where they went, and what their thoughts were about each element.
Content
Are your attendees sharing content from your event? Are they excited about a particular feature? Analysis of what is being shared and at what time will help future programming and production. For example, are there many posts centered around one particular speaker? If so, are they positive, are they starting conversations and deep dives into the content that was shared?
Author
Look into your attendees and who is posting. Are they influencers? How many followers do they have and what is their reach? Knowing the author of the info will help define your actual reach.
Location
If you are able to add GeoTags to your social media channels you will be able to see where the info is coming from. This works well for large events like festivals or conferences/events that take place over multiple locations. This doubles as a great way to add value to sponsorships. If you are able to provide data referencing your attendee's location during the event and the frequency of visitation when it comes to booths, speaker rooms or experiential exhibits that will help provide a quality ROI measurement for you and your sponsors.
Longevity
Take a look at the length of time each attendee spends sharing info on social media. Are there consistent messages, posts etc. that span the entire lifecycle of the event or are there bursts of energetic posts followed by radio silence? If you can create a big picture of what, when and how the posts and shares are taking place you will be able to tell a more detailed story about the success of your event.
