Robobro: HOW TO: Organize an Event on Facebook

October 14, 2009 by Josh Catone183

Some people wonder if all this social networking is really making us more social — we’re just sitting in front of our computers, after all. But Facebook, the web’s largest social network, plays host to 3 million event listings each month. And these are offline events, ranging in size from small, friendly get-togethers, to company picnics, to enormous political protests.

In the past, getting the word out about an event, even if you only intended to invite your close circle of friends, meant a lot of work getting on the phone or emailing invitees individually, coordinating RSVPs, or even hanging up flyers. Facebook, though, allows you to quickly create an event listing, invite people, and then watch word of the event spread virally out from your network of contacts (if you choose to allow it). This guide will show you how to successfully run an event on Facebook.

Creating an Event Listing

Events on Facebook are managed by an application that is installed by default and can’t be removed (so everyone already has it). For many people, if you haven’t edited your bookmarked applications, an icon for theEvents app will appear on the bottom navigation bar while logged into Facebook. However, the best way to find the Events application is to search for the word “Events” in the search box in the upper right-hand corner of Facebook.

On the Events page, you can view upcoming events that you have been invited to (or are hosting), events that your friends are attending, past events, and a list of your friends’ birthdays. But to begin an event, click on the “Create an Event” button.

You’ll be asked to input your event’s name and location, as well as a start and end time. Optionally, you can also add a tagline to the event (a sub-header that is displayed in smaller letters below the event headline), and an address (be careful about including your address if the event is open). The most important part of the first step is to set your privacy options for the event. You have three choices:

Open – Open events can be seen by anyone, and anyone can RSVP or invite others to the event, regardless of whether they had been invited in the first place.

Closed – Anyone can see that a closed event exists, but the event details can only be read by those who have been invited, and guests will need to be invited in order to RSVP. Guests may request invitations.

Secret – Secret events are only seen by those invited (so they won’t show up in the news feeds of those who are attending), and only invitees can RSVP. This is probably a good idea if you’re planning a surprise party.

After you set the main logistics of your event, you’ll be asked to add details. That includes a picture, category, and description, as well as important rules about what your guests can do on your event page. These details are optional (though some are selected for you by default, so it’s a good idea to go through them).

Enable the event wall – This option adds a message wall to your event page. It’s a good idea to include a message wall if you want people to be able to post reasons why they can or can’t come to the party, or be able to ask questions.

Enable the event photos, videos, and links – You can also allow people to post photos, videos, and links to your event page. This is great for certain types of events — such as posting pictures of your mailbox so guests know which driveway is yours for a party, or posting links to articles about a specific topic for a political rally, or videos of a band for a concert. You can restrict the ability to post media to admins only.

Allow guests to bring friends to the event – This toggles a message about whether guests can bring friends on and off.

Show the guest list – You can toggle whether to show the guest list, or you can restrict the shown guest list only to guests who are attending.

You can actually skip this step and either proceed to your event page, or to the final step, which is to invite friends. You can invite an unlimited number of people, but you can only invite 100 people at a time. When you invite friends, you can also include a personal note, which is a good idea.

Without the personal note, your friends will receive an email invite (assuming they have the app set to send emails for new event invites (this is the default behavior)) that says, simply, “[Your Name] has invited you to “[Event Name]” on [Date] at [Time]” These emails aren’t, well, very inviting. By including a note, you can add some extra info about what your event is all about and why people should come.

You can change any of the details of your event after the fact, and you can invite more people later. However, if someone has declined an invitation once already, you will not be able to invite that person again.

Managing and Promoting Your Event

Once your event is up and running, you have two options: let it stagnate and hope people show up, or get actively involved in promotion and management. For anything but a small, private get-together with friends, the latter is usually a better option.

If your event is open and allows guests to invite others, you should encourage that behavior if you want word of the event to spread virally. Send messages to those who have attended urging them to invite friends and help spread the word (you can send messages to invitees by clicking on the “Message Guests” link below the event photo on the event’s page). You can also send messages specifically to those who have not yet replied to the invitation or to those who have indicated that they may attend urging them to come to the event. For open events, guests can click the “Share” button, to share a link to the event page on their mini-feed or send a message about the event to friends.

You can also use the messaging feature to pass along information about the event, such as changes of plans, venue rules, or background information about the guest of honor, etc. But don’t over-do it — no one wants to go to an event that is spamming them. (Note that events with over 5,000 invitees will no longer have the ability to mass message — instead, you’ll have to use the event’s wall and description to communicate, and Page admins will not see the messaging option for events hosted by Pages — they’ll need to add event admins in order to message invitees).

Remember to monitor your event page regularly to keep track of wall postings and respond to queries.

Open events also have the option of purchasing Facebook ads to advertise the events. Click on the “Promote Event with an Ad” link below the event photo on the event’s page to access the advertising area of Facebook.

If you’re running an RSVP-required event, Facebook helpfully lets you print the guest list (the link for the option is below the event photo). You can also have Facebook include the profile photos of attendees on the printable guest list page, so that whoever is manning the door to your party can make sure only invited guests get in.

You can also cancel an event — an action that can’t be undone once it is selected. Facebook lets you optionally attach a note to all invitees with reasons why the event was cancelled.

Selling Tickets

Facebook’s Events application has two major downsides. The first, that it doesn’t support recurring events, unfortunately has no easy fix, which means Facebook is probably a lousy venue for getting the word out about a weekly or monthly meetup. However, if you don’t mind reentering all the event details, you can make your life a little bit easier by creating a special friend list of regular attendees for your event. That way, when you get to the “invite friends” step of event creation, you can filter your list of friends by your special event list and then select all to invite them in one go.

The second shortcoming of Facebook Events, however, is that it doesn’t support ticket sales. That is easily, if somewhat inelegantly, fixed by the Facebook Connect integration at Eventbrite.

Eventbrite is one of the most popular ways to promote and sell tickets for events online, and they offer a smart way to connect your events to Facebook, have them automatically added to the Facebook Events app, and invite your friends. Though the ability to sell tickets to your event cannot be natively integrated into the Facebook Event page, Eventbrite will include a link to your event’s ticketing page in the event description, and a link to “Order Tickets” in the news feed insertion about your event.

Other, similar options, are the EventPal and the Ticketing Facebook applications. Both apps allow you to set up ticket sales for your event and then create special ticket ordering pages that you can send to attendees.

More Facebook Resources from Mashable

- HOW TO: Integrate Facebook With Your Blog
- Facebook Pages vs Facebook Groups: What’s the Difference?
- HOW TO: Manage a Facebook Group
- HOW TO: Build Your Personal Brand on Facebook
- HOW TO: Use Facebook for Professional Networking

Print Story Email Story Reprints