Skiddle’s Freshers Week Checklist

Get your listings in tip-top shape

Listing your Freshers Week event early is like being in pole position in Formula 1. 

While everyone else is playing catch-up, you’re ahead of the game. Why not give yourself an extra boost by making sure your listings are in tip-top shape?

Start by nailing your short description. It’s a 150-character tagline which can catch the eyes of excited Freshers. So, get creative. 

Next, check over your images. You want to avoid anything with too much text here, so consider a press shot of your headliner or an image from a past event. Customers can’t expand images on event listings and too much text can look messy. 

Be sure to get the size right, too. A stretched event image may mean your listing isn’t shown on our website or app, which means you’re missing out on all those eyes on your event. 

With correct images and a short description over 100 characters, you’ll be eligible for our FREE Facebook Retargeting service and inclusion in our customer newsletter. Facebook Retargeting shows ads to people who’ve viewed your event but not bought tickets, acting as a friendly nudge to purchase tickets. Both of these will help to amplify your event. 

Don’t forget to tag your artists, either. If students are following them on the Skiddle app, they’ll receive a notification that the artist is appearing at your event. 

Looking for more information on Facebook Retargeting? Need extra help with your listings? Our FAQ page can help. Tap the button below and ensure your listings are the best they can be. 

Prioritise safety inside and outside of the venue

As an event promoter, the safety of your attendees is paramount.

Have you finalised a safety plan for your venue? Think about how attendees will enter your event and where they’ll exit if an emergency happens.

But safety precautions don’t stop there. Think about how you’ll prevent overcrowding and bottlenecking once attendees are inside the venues.

It’s all about anticipating what your attendees will need and being prepared for anything. If you’re prepared, you’ll be able to approach these issues with confidence and find a resolution quickly.

We’ve got tools that can help. RapidScan, our FREE scanning service, gives you information on how many people have entered your venue and how many people have left. Having this data will be able to assist you with crowd control.

The app scans a ticket per second and gives you information on who has come through each entrance. So, if you’ve got multiple entrances, like a VIP line, for example, you can keep track of people coming in and out.

For more information on RapidScan, tap the button below and read our FAQ article. 

Check all equipment, liaise with the venue and brief your staff

Look, we don’t want to sound like your Year 11 Maths teacher here, but the old adage can bode well for your events: fail to prepare, prepare to fail. 

Before your event, check all of your equipment. Decks, mics, lighting and anything else that involves electronics. You want to make sure that everything is good to go beforehand and that you can source backups if the equipment doesn’t work. 

Booking performers? Arrange a time for them to get to the event, briefing your staff on who will walk them to and from the venue and look after them throughout the night. This will usually fall on your artist liaison team. 

Make sure everyone is on the same page, too. Assign everyone specific roles, letting them know where they should be and exactly what is expected of them. 

Start your promotion campaign!

Event promotion gives you the chance to get your creative juices flowing. 

Social Media will be your friend here and we recommend using the 80/20 rule. Make 80% of your content valuable to your audience through entertainment or information, and make the remaining 20% promotional. Think line-up posters, ticket updates, exclusive offers and merchandise offers. 

You can make your event stand out with entertaining content. Plus, people want to feel aligned with the event brands they buy tickets from. If a customer feels like what you’re posting speaks to them, they’ll be more likely to grab a ticket and attend. You can communicate your brand identity through social media, taking this to the next level with exclusive groups. More on that here. 

Skiddle tools can help you here, too. Why not create discounts with our Discount Codes feature? Then you can run competitions on social media. Our Reps feature can help you sell to Freshers on campus, opening your event up to a brand new market. 

Don’t forget post-event promotion either. Encourage your attendees to tag your account in any photos and repost them to your story. This creates a sense of FOMO, encouraging people to buy tickets next time if they missed out. 

Skiddle’s Promotion Centre Blog is packed with expert marketing and promotion advice to take your events to the next level. Tap the button below to read all the latest updates. 

Ensure your event is inclusive & accessible

Freshers are a diverse bunch, so it’s crucial to make your event a place where all students who attend feel safe and welcomed. 

The road to inclusivity begins before your event starts. So, sit down with your team and create a safe space policy. This is a set of guidelines which your team and your attendees adhere to. 

Share it across social media before your event, print the guidelines onto a poster and stick them up around the venue. 

This makes people aware that you have a zero-tolerance approach to any homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, racism, ableism and violence at your event. Once you’ve done this, think about how you’ll deal with attendees who don’t abide by the policy. Let your door staff know and make sure everyone on your team knows the process. 

Is your venue accessible? Think about how you can make the experience the best it can be for people with disabilities. Make improvements where you can and listen to feedback from attendees with disabilities.

Looking for more information on inclusive events? Click the button below to read our article.