Over the past few weeks we’ve been posting on the YALSA Blog about the upcoming Booze for Books event on April 12. It’s a fundraising event focused on raising monies for YALSA’s Books for Teens initiative which gets books into the hands of underserved teens.
We’ve posted about planning for the event, moving beyond the booze box, and getting the word out about your event. This time around I want to throw out some ideas about getting some buzz going just before, during, and just after your event whether it be Mocktails for a Mission, Chocolate for a Cause, Booze for Books or something else.
- Use the #b4byalsa hashtag for Twitter posts before, during, and after the event. Make sure to let your attendees know about that hashtag.
- Have people take pictures at your event and then post them on Flickr (or the photo-sharing service of your choice). Make sure to use the #b4byalsa and the #yalsa hashtag. By doing that we’ll be able to put together an album of photos from the variety of events that take place across the country.
- Since so many people have video cameras on phones and iPads and other devices you might shoot short interviews with those at your event. They could talk about their favorite book or what they love about working with teens. Upload the videos to YouTube and tag them with yalsa and yalsab4b. We can then put together a gallery of video too.
- For those using mobile Facebook you can also encourage those attending to post on YALSA’s Books for Teens Facebook wall during the event. That way there will be a live stream on Facebook of the fun (and fundraising) taking place across the country
Those are just a few ideas of what people might do to create buzz just before, during, and just after the April 12 event. What do others think would work?
As you continue to plan your event no matter what the theme, feel free to get in touch with me (Linda W. Braun) with any questions about planning and implementation. Don’t forget that the YALSA Financial Advancement Committee developed a fundraising guide that has a lot of ideas and information that is sure to help in planning your event. There is also a Booze for Books page on the YALSA website.
