Twitter has had analytics for any advertising that you may have done on their platform, but now they have opened up those tools for use with your regular tweets and to look at your followers in more depth.

To access the analytics, go to ads.twitter.com – the advertising platform on twitter. Login using your Twitter account login. You will click on the Analytics tab on the left part of the navigation. You can select either Timeline Activity or Followers. (Followers only provides information when you have a large enough group of followers.) Selecting Timeline Activity displays a dashboard like this:

You can choose to view All, Best or Good. Best shows you the top 15% of tweets with some level of engagement within the date range you are viewing. Good shows the top 66% of tweets with some level of engagement within the date range.

You can now easily gauge referrals now since the tool shows you how many people clicked on a link in your tweet. You can even download the data as a CSV file to track behavior over a longer period of time and use it to build compare with other tools and data.

As Twitter continues to figure out ways to make money with advertising and other options, I’m certain that the analytics will get more extensive, but this at least gives a nice, easy way to track performance and help determine engagement with your tweets. And best of all, it’s free.

Facebook introduces Hashtags

Facebook has stated that they will be rolling out more features to help surface the larger conversations and topics that people are talking about. The first of these will be the use of hashtags.

Thankfully if you have already been using hashtags on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, etc., you will just continue those same efforts now on Facebook. They will be used the same way to add context to your post or indicate that it is part of a larger conversation.  (If you haven’t started using hashtags, see our blog post, Hashtags – They’re not just for breakfast anymore, to help you get started.)

According to Facebook you can:

• Search for a specific hashtag from your search bar. For example, #NBAFinals.
• Click on hashtags that originate on other services, such as Instagram.
• Compose posts directly from the hashtag feed and search results.

As always, you control the audience for your posts, including those with hashtags.

As an event marketer, the benefits are that you now can begin to see similarities and differences in the behaviors around your conversations across all of your primary social media efforts. #lovesimplification

The Children’s Center of Clackamas County has become the latest organization to join the Saffire movement! We’ve worked with them for several years, and they were so excited about Saffire and the control it will give them to manage their own website and content, they just couldn’t wait any longer to make the switch. Our team believes in the mission of The Children’s Center, which is a medical evaluation center for children suspected to be victims of abuse or neglect. Children are referred to the Children’s Center from law enforcement agencies, child protective workers, parents, teachers, doctors and others concerned for the welfare of a child.

It is our hope that Saffire can help make a difference in the professional lives of the dedicated staff at the Children’s Center to help free them to focus on much more important and vital parts of their day, providing care to the children of our community. We are humbled by their courage and inspired by the size of their hearts!

Pinterest now has over 49 million users who spend an average of 14.9 minutes per visit to the site. That’s a lot of time checking out, curating and organizing photos and ideas! By having great photos on your website and Pinterest page, Pinterest continues to be a great way to showcase your event and drive traffic to your website.

As you may have heard Pinterest recently announced the addition of analytics to their site. This gives you an easier way to determine the impact of your images on your website and the contribution of Pinterest users to your traffic. To get started, you’ll need to convert your account to a business account in order to access the analytics dashboard. Go to business.pinterest.com. It is very easy to convert. Just need to make sure that you input some basic information and description. Likely you already did this when you set up your site the first time. (Company UserName, About You Section, Reference Link, Differentiate your Pin Boards) Only slightly tricky step is verifying your website. Go to Settings >> Click Verify Website>> Download HTML Verification >> Upload this to your webserver in a subfolder (super simple for your tech person) >> Click “Click Here” on the verification screen (once code has been uploaded). Once verified, then Pinterest analytics begins tracking what is being pinned from your website. You will see a check mark next to your site name and you will have the option to select analytics from the dropdown menu.

Once verified you see the check mark next to your URL and have analytics as an option in the dropdown.

Key Metrics to Watch:

1. Pins from your site (Site Metrics tab) – Informs you of the daily average number of pins from your verified website.  Helps to determine whether the visual content is interesting enough for your visitors to pin to your boards.
2. Repins from your site (Site Metrics tab) – Informs you of the daily average number of pins from your website that were repinned. Helps to determine whether your visual content is resonating with your Pinterest audience. Repins give your content a chance to be seen by people that don’t follow you directly.
3. Reach – (Site Metrics tab) – Informs you of the success of your content. Helps you understand how large an audience your content reached for branding purposes and as a comparison to how much traffic did or did not generate to your website.
4. Visitors/Visits to your website – (Site Metrics tab) – Clicks is visits to your website and Visitors is the total number of people who visited your website.  Some pins drive engagement on Pinterest and others will drive traffic to your website. You want engagement on both.  Comparing Clicks to Repins helps determine what types of action your different content helps to drive.
5.  Most Repinned – (Most Repinned tab) – Informs you what content is resonating with your audience the most. This tab shows actual pins that were repinned for that specific date range. Look for patterns in your content which will help you determine what types of content to create in the future. Try new things and experiment; then use the report to see if it was successful.
6. Most Clicked – (Most Clicked tab) – Informs you what content drives the most traffic to your website. If you are selling online, this could help you to understand the potential to generate revenue from Pinterest (concerts, merch, etc. ) Helps determine if the Pin It button on your website is driving your visitors to pin specific images to their boards.

All of these are easily accessed from the dashboard that Pinterest provides.

    By watching your Pinterest analytics, you’ll gain insight into what types of content is resonating with your customers which can help guide you on providing more of what they like. As with any of the tools in your marketing toolbox, Pinterest Analytics now gives you one more tool to help you determine how your website content is performing.

The Refugio County Fair of Texas has decided to join the Saffire movement this week and we could not be more thrilled to bring on such a friendly group! This southeastern Texas event is held every October and is complete with a livestock show and auction, food and drink stands, arts and crafts vendors, dance, carnival and pro rodeo. We are looking forward to helping this fair increase their sponsorship and revenue with a brand new online presence!

We also welcomed the Rockdale Fair & Rodeo this week! Just down the road from our Austin office this is one event we can’t wait to attend for ourselves. The Rockdale Fair Associaton is a 100% volunteer organization who’s mission is to support the youth and communities of Milam County as well as maintaining and enhancing Fair Park, the location of this annual event.

We are thrilled to announce another Washington organization that has joined the Saffire team, the Kitsap Rodeo Cowpokes of Bremerton, WA! The mission of this committee is to promote and raise funds for the Kitsap County Stampede. The Cowpokes will be using their new Saffire site as a means to generate enthusiasm, sell tickets, host VIP events, increase membership and ensure that this rodeo is one of the best around.

1. SaffireScan is now available, and we think it’s one of the most exciting pieces of Saffire to date! Our clients are now able to sell print-at-home tickets from their website. We’ve developed an easy-to-use app for Apple devices (which we can provide if you need) that allows you to scan the ticket your customer has purchased and printed from home anywhere on your grounds. This new way of selling and redeeming tickets will make it even easier for our clients to increase their advance online revenue. Here’s a video to find out more about SaffireScan!
2. We have completely overhauled editing and creating events with the addition of “Quick Add”. We now have a way for our clients to put an event on their interactive event schedule without the need of creating items or building out their event page along with updating the entire process of editing events.
   1. Quick Add will allow you to post just the day and/or time and name of an event to your schedule.
   2. Easier to use drop downs for selecting days and times for creating and editing events.
   3. Simpler filters to quickly reach the events you’re ready to edit.
   4. Toggling between listed and unlisted events can be done with one click from the admin tool, as well as selecting an event to be an “our pick.”
3. We are introducing new homepage features and interactive event schedule customization!
   1. Now our clients can link the image on their homepage to any page or event they choose. We think this will help to get your customers clicking as you can select any photography you like for an event.
   2. “Thanks for Attending” message can be automated with the click of a button long before your event happens so that you don’t have to worry about updating your website immediately after your event.
   3. You can pick the default view of your interactive event schedule with the click of a button too. You decide if list or gallery view is the way you want your schedule to appear.
4. We’ve added Instagram as a social media outlet for your customers to stay connected to your event.

As always, you can check out our YouTube Channel – SaffireStudio to keep up with this release. If you have questions on any of these new features or items we’d love to fill you in or catch you up on the quick-paced evolution of Saffire Events! Give us a call at 512-430-1123 or email us at info@saffireevents.com. 

1) Create a sense of urgency

Create special bundles of items or a limited-time discounts, so you can tap into your customers’ sense that they may be missing out on something if they don’t take action (e.g., for a limited time, offer free parking with event tickets). Use retail as your guide here. They often have repeated sales, sometimes with a little twist, to keep eyes on their offerings. These don’t just happen. Create an editorial calendar that includes promotions throughout the year.

2) Mobile – If your site isn’t mobile friendly, you are losing sales

Use your smartphone or tablet to purchase something from your website. How was the experience? Would you buy from your site? Make sure you have a touch-friendly user experience. Get rid of the Flash and minimize how much the customer has to type. Consumers must be able to easily interact with your site no matter where they are. If not, consumers will lose patience and you will lose a sale. Picture it this way – we use computers during the day, tablets on the sofa in the evening and we always have our smartphones on us.  Internet Retailer reports that M-Commerce sales were up 82% in 2012 and they will rise another 56.5% in 2013. Even though mobile doesn’t represent a huge percentage of sales now, it’s only going UP!

3) Email everyone that bought something last year

Thank them for being your customer in 2012, and highlight anything that is new this year, potentially including a promotion to reward their loyalty (e.g., special pre-sale privileges or discounts). Train your customers to know they will get the latest and best info by signing up for your email. Facebook and Twitter are also obviously important ways to get information out, but don’t spend all your time there at the expense of email, which will create your highest revenue days of the year.

 4) Make it social

The audiences you get in your online store are active on social networking sites. (Nearly everyone on the internet is on some social platform.) They use social media to share and recommend things they are currently excited about, including things they buy. And for most, if they are making a purchase, then they’ve gotten excited enough to open their wallets. Consider posting exclusive promotions just for your fans or followers. Encourage them to interact by posing questions to get the conversation started.

5) Give your customers the choice of how to get their tickets

You’ve optimized your website for the best experience, insured that your site works great on mobile, streamlined purchasing to make it as easy as possible, and added social links to encourage sharing.But how do you deliver tickets? Make it just as easy to get tickets as it is to buy from you by allowing your customers to print their tickets at home. Not only do you “Wow!” your customers and give them instant gratification on their purchase, you’ll save money. Fulfilling advanced ticket orders in-house, whether by mail or will call, can be expensive and time consuming. In addition to hardware and paper stock expenses, fulfillment requires your event to devote staff resources to print, sort, and mail tickets to each of your customers. Leary of fraud? With the right application and bar-code scanners (like SaffireScan just introduced from Saffire),  you can verify not only the validity of a ticket, but also eliminate counterfeit tickets by including a unique code on each ticket.

Each of these tips can make its own impact, but as you use them together, you’ll have the best chance of increasing online sales.

The tougher they are, the more important it becomes to end meetings well. So even though Saffire specializes in online marketing, today we’re stepping away from the computer and sharing 6 tips for what to do when the meeting’s over.

It’s not so much about ending the meeting. It’s what to do when the meeting is over.

1. This one is obvious. You shake hands. You smile. But here’s the key. Smile and shake hands in a way that suggests you are 30% happier with the outcome than you actually are.
2. If it was tough, acknowledge it. Say this was hard, and I’m happy we dealt with it. This gives everybody an understanding that it was hard on everyone. Plus it gets the elephant out in the room. (I’m a big fan of that.)
3. Establish common ground about anything, even if you couldn’t in the meeting. Talk about anything except what you just met about. Talk about something personal and above all, neutral. Before you physically move on, establish that you’ve moved on from the topic.
4. Who do you talk to? Engage anyone who for whatever reason didn’t participate much. It’s a nice thing to do and fulfills the purpose of the meeting, to get everyone involved.
5. The main message to communicate is gratitude. No matter what, find something to be grateful about the meeting.  Again, 30% more positive than you feel.
6. This one is the toughest for me. Don’t take the last doughnut. Step away from the doughnut. OK come to think of it, go ahead and take it. We won’t judge!

(We were originally inspired to cover this topic by an article in Entrepreneur, but we had thoughts too, so we made it our own.)

In February we took a trip down to Edna, TX and visited with the Brackenridge Recreation Complex where we fell in love with the serenity and beauty of the outdoors, lake and wildlife of this wonderful facility. This complex is a home away from home to rodeo, music, camping, and lake-goers from all over, and with their new Main Event Center they offer every amenity you could need for an indoor or outdoor event.  What really helps put on the charm of this park is a little old chapel you can find nestled among the trees. So quaint!