Expos, Events, ISPA, and IMC

This week in class was all about events, event planning, and how IMC plays into all things event. By event I mean conventions, trade shows and such similar events. One of the examples and case studies was the International Spa Association’s annual conference in sin city itself Las Vegas. The expo lasted three days from October 21st to October 23^rd.

Am I an expert in event planning? Absolutely not, not even close. However this expo and the week’s material is a great opportunity to learn about such events. So to learn more about events, share some of thoughts, and hopefully earn a good grade we will analyze the online presence of the ISPA 2013 Las Vegas Conference and Expo. For added excitement I will brake down the ISPA social media activity into The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

Overview

The ISPA created a website specifically just for the conference that linked to all the ISPA social media platforms. There were no unique accounts just for the expo, instead all expo related posts were integrated with the regular ISPA posts on their regular pages. The ISPA has a blog, Facebook page, Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and a YouTube channel.

The Good

The webpage is great. It is simple to navigate, provides all the info about the conference, and links back to the ISPA page. After analyzing with a code checker the website seemed to be well built with very few validation errors and opened on mobile as well as different web browsers. The only possible issue was that the social media links were placed at the bottom of the page out of sight when the page first opens. This is not quiet bad enough to merit to be in the Bad section, it is simply a design choice, a choice I don’t agree with. If you are trying to drive up conversation on social media then it should be displayed prominently.

ISPA 2013 Expo Webpage

The show was promoted prior to it kicking off on almost all of the ISPA platforms. The Facebook and Twitter pages were filled with info and promotions for the ISPA 2013 conference. ISPA also promoted a lot of the companies which were scheduled to attend the event as well as their products. On Twitter ISPA heavily Tweeted and interacted with all the companies that were to attend. Every single day there were a dozen tweets about different deals, promotions, and highlighting different booths. ISPA also used a number of hashtags, especially #ISPA2013 specifically for the event. They also used hashtags identify certain companies and their products.

ISPA Twitter

 Facebook was updated daily, even multiple times a day, before, during and after the event. Just as on Twitter they not only promoted the event but all the different companies that were to attend. Unlike many other ISPA also utilized hashtags on Facebook. Although hashtags are only ever so slowly becoming popular on Facebook it can never hurt. Overall Twitter and Facebook were well executed before, during, and after the conference.

Pinterest and Instagram both had numerous images from the expo. They were posted by both the ISPA and the attending companies. The companies themselves were encouraged to post images to Instagram and Pinterest with the hash tag ISPA2013 so they would be syndicated on the ISPA profiles.

The Bad

Although I liked many of the posts on Facebook there were simply too many. The Facebook profile was simply flooded with posts, especially during the actual event. I understand the enthusiasm but I would get incredibly annoyed if my feed was filled from top to bottom with just one entities posts. I understand that this would not happen due to Edge Rank. I am not sure about the exact inner workings of Edge Rank but from my understanding over posting is penalized and this was definitely over posting.

The LinkedIn page no visible mention about the event apart form a short blurb at the beginning in the Summary section. I am not connected to the ISPA but was hoping for a bit more. The initial name makes no mention of the expo, there are no graphics from it, or any links.

ISPA LinkedIn

The Ugly

YouTube. I would give a longer description but it is hard to describe the complete lack of anything. The expo presents a great opportunity for both the ISPA and the companies to create videos about anything spa related. Tips on how to relax at home, how to pick a spa, what’s the latest in facial treatments, anything would have worked. Videos like that would have promoted both the ISPA and the event to other companies for the next years expo but also would have given extra exposure to the companies themselves. It is hard to explain a spa experience in just text and an image, video would have been a great medium in which to show of everyone and everything at #ISPA 2013.