There are a lot of social media brand ambassadors nowadays. As of June 2023, there were nearly 370,000 influencers on Instagram alone!
It sounds like a good thing to have a pool of ambassadors to choose from… right?
Well, it’s both good and bad.
Many choices make finding the right partners for your event more challenging. What are the results of working with a potential ambassador who doesn’t align with your brand? Spending time and money reaching an audience is unlikely to buy tickets.
Keep reading to discover how to find the right brand ambassador for your event, plus six event promotion ideas for inspiration.
Having helped event creators sell over 284 million tickets in 2023, we have a unique perspective on how to boost ticket sales, and we’re here to guide you. Ready to reach a wider audience? Let’s get started.
Table of contents
Are brand ambassadors worth it?
How to find the right ambassadors for your event
6 Show-stopping ideas for brand ambassadors to promote your event
Tips to build a solid relationship with brand ambassadors
So anyway, what is a brand ambassador?
Brand ambassadors are a subset of influencers you hire to cultivate a long-term relationship with your brand. They promote your event to their online followers and receive compensation in return.
Similar to a traditional marketing strategy spokesperson, a brand ambassador might be a celebrity who agrees to endorse your event. A household name example is Taylor Swift — who was a brand ambassador for Apple Music in 2015–2016. She appeared in the company’s ads, tweeted about their brand, and released her ‘1989’ album on their platform.
But not every brand ambassador is a bona fide celebrity. Social media channels have made it possible for everyday people to become online influencers. Now, regular citizens with a passion for a brand can be very influential. You just need to know who to look for and where to look.
Are brand ambassadors worth it?
We’d be lying if we said that running ambassador programs is always a walk in the park. Conflicting opinions, managing budgets, aligning messaging, and keeping up with social media trends are some of the challenges you might face.
Is all this worth it?
Yes! If you do it right, working with ambassadors has the following advantages:
- Brand ambassadors have a natural apt for online marketing. They have an impressive network, intuitively know how to get a positive brand message across, and have the platform to support those efforts.
- Build trust with potential guests. In 2023, 61% of Gen Z and millennials trusted social media influencers, up from 51% in 2019. Why? Influencers have a relationship with their followers, so you can build trust and credibility with their audience.
- Reach a wider audience. Working with ambassadors means getting your event in front of more people. Choose wisely, and it’ll be the right people, increasing the likelihood of them buying tickets.
- Create engaging and appealing promotional content. Ambassadors know their audience well — and they know exactly how to engage them. In fact, nearly 50% of millennials found influencers’ recommendations more engaging than regular ads.
How to find the right ambassadors for your event
Working with brand ambassadors is only worthwhile if you partner with people who align with your brand and have the same target audience.
Here’s how you can find your ideal brand ambassador and make the most out of your working relationship.
Who are you trying to reach?
The first step to finding a brand ambassador is to think about your audience demographics and your budget. Morgan Freeman is a charismatic talent, but is he the right choice to convince millennials to attend a rock music festival? Probably not.
Partner with influencers targeting the same demographic as you to increase ticket sales. Surprisingly, only 42% of marketers know the basic demographic information of their target audience! Don’t be a part of that statistic.
To get clued up on your target audience, use an event marketing platform like Eventbrite. Our platform allows you to analyze data from previous events (and audience groups from similar events) to better understand who you’re targeting.
Understand your ideal target audience
How much are you willing to spend?
Determine your budget before reaching out to potential brand ambassadors. Brand ambassadors don’t need to be Oscar-winning actors. Sometimes, a local celebrity or popular blogger is a better choice for your brand and your budget. In fact, most marketers choose to work with smaller influencers instead of celebrities because it yields better results!
Instead of payment, you could provide your brand ambassadors with free VIP access, event merchandise, or custom vanity promo codes. Sharing unique codes with followers is beneficial for both parties, as it encourages engagement and builds relationships with followers and makes it easy to track the performance of each code.
This is particularly useful if you’re working with more than one influencer. You can easily assess which relationships are most profitable and rewarding.
What do you need ambassadors to do?
Fifty-one percent of brands say that influencers could become more valuable by creating more suitable content for their brand.
How do you achieve this? By being clear about what you expect from your brand ambassador. This means clarifying tone, messaging, images, hashtags, and so on from the get-go. When everyone’s aligned, you’re more likely to create valuable and on-brand content.
It’s also useful to clarify how you’ll measure results. Are you hoping to simply raise awareness or actively sell more tickets? Knowing exactly what you hope to achieve empowers your brand ambassador to talk about your event in the right way.
Are there any requirements brand ambassadors must meet?
Make a note of any must-haves to narrow down your search and find ambassadors who are right for your brand. For example, if you’re running a vegan food festival, you’ll want a brand ambassador with a vegan following.
One thing to keep in mind: Just because someone meets your specific requirements doesn’t mean they’re a worthy brand ambassador. People can be popular online but unpredictable and volatile to work with. Look for someone professional, respectful, and communicative. You’ll often get an impression during the early stages of what they’ll be like to work with.
Does anyone in your current catalog fit the bill?
One of the best places to look is within your own ranks. Who are your most vocal fans and advocates on social networks already, and how can you further empower them?
SocialLadder is a social media tool that allows you to discover brand ambassadors among your existing followers. First, pinpoint your most popular and passionate followers, then engage with them.
If you’re using Eventbrite for your ticketing, you can manage your SocialLadder activities on your event dashboard.
6 Show-stopping ideas for Instagram brand ambassadors to promote your event
Want some inspiration for your influencer marketing? We’ve got you covered.
Take a look at these exciting and unique ways to promote your events, reach a wider audience, build trust, and generate more income with brand ambassadors. Though we’re using Instagram as our example, these principles apply to other short-form video platforms such as TikTok or Snapchat.
1. Create a sense of adventure
2024 is the year of adventure for event-goers! Sixty percent of 21 to 35-year-olds say they want to get out of their comfort zone, try new experiences, and connect with others (with over half of respondents agreeing with this sentiment).
Brand ambassadors are the vessel for adventure. They can showcase the excitement and intrigue of your events, encouraging people to sign up and try something new.
Take your ambassadors on a fun trip and get them to post about it, like one of the Outsiders hikes or canyoneering experiences. Show potential customers what the adventure entails, and encourage them to join future events.
Or give people a taste of adventure by interviewing ambassadors, like the Outsiders podcast featured above. This event creator runs a podcast where they interview members about their life experiences and the power of adventure.
2. Highlight what makes you unique
With endless events, highlighting what makes yours different is life or death for your events (and your business).
Thirty-six percent of marketers say influencer content outperforms branded content, so it’s important that your brand ambassadors share your event’s uniqueness.
Look at Deep House Yoga, for example. The event showcases their approach to Vinyasa flow — combining deep house music with a yoga class’s soft and strong flow. In the saturated yoga market, these classes add a layer of intrigue for potential guests.
3. Show event coverage, but make it authentic
Give people a taste of your event with live event coverage from your brand ambassador. From TikTok to Facebook, it’s a great way to show potential guests why your event is worth attending.
It’s also an opportunity to share exclusive access to certain parts of your event (backstage tours, speaker interviews, or VIP experiences). Ambassadors can then share this exclusive content with their followers to create buzz and excitement around the event.
Look at the above example of influencer Kat Stickler, an Instagram brand ambassador for Olay. She tours the facility during the event, creates a body wash, has a bit of fun, and experiments with other products.
Convert Instagram followers into ticket sales
Remember, there’s a fine line between authenticity and a video for a paid partnership. You don’t want people to watch the video and feel as though it’s forced or fake. That completely undermines the whole purpose of working with an ambassador in the first place!
It should feel natural and represent the real feel of your event or brand. Here are some of the ways ambassadors can showcase authenticity:
- Talk directly to the camera
- Attend the event with a friend
- Answer questions from followers
- Don’t overly promote event branding
4. Focus on well-being and self-care
Eventbrite’s latest events trends report, TRNDS 2024, shows that people actively seek transformative experiences to improve their well-being, with 73% wanting events that offer a meaningful, transformative experience.
What does this mean for your brand ambassador partnerships?
People are interested in how other guests feel after an event.
Ask your ambassadors to share their genuine experiences of how your event impacts their well-being. This silent meditation retreat review is a great example, where the influencers talk about what they liked (or didn’t like) about the retreat.
Social reels are ideal for this type of content. They’re more personal than a static post and allow the ambassadors to talk casually (which also builds trust and credibility).
5. Run an account takeover with games and challenges
Let your brand ambassador control your account for 24 hours. It’s a good way to encourage new followers to engage with your social channel, and it adds some authenticity to your brand. Watch Ryan Griffis take over the Cheer Choice Awards account to see this tactic in action.
Make it even more engaging with games and challenges for the ambassador to complete, with followers tagging along for the ride. An appropriate example is a virtual treasure hunt where ambassadors have to solve riddles to find the next location. At each spot, there’s a gift or prize they can give away to followers!
6. Host a brand ambassador Q&A, but let followers ask questions
Give followers insight into why ambassadors support your events by hosting a live Q&A session on your social channels, like the online trivia events hosted by Social Events.
The twist? Let your followers ask the questions!
Allowing followers to take part in the Q&A makes it more engaging. Plus, it adds authenticity to your partnership. The questions and answers aren’t rehearsed or pre-prepared — it’s all 100% authentic.
The live ask-me-anything (AMA) with Sony Brand Ambassador Kesha Lambert shows how this type of Q&A works.
When running a Q&A like this, you might need someone behind the camera to track and vet the questions. Or, if you want to make it as authentic as possible, let the ambassador read the questions live on the screen in real time.
Tips to build a solid relationship with brand ambassadors
Having a positive relationship with your brand ambassadors helps you make the most out of your partnership. Here are some tips for building and maintaining a solid relationship:
- Compensate them fairly. Openly discuss rates to ensure ambassadors are happy with their payment. You should also review compensation in line with performance. If an ambassador provides a lot of value to your brand and helps you sell more tickets, increase compensation to keep their motivation high.
- Establish clear and open communication channels. If it’s hard for brand ambassadors to contact you, it can cause friction in the relationship. Make it clear how they can contact you to discuss queries and performance and seek approval on any social media posts.
- Get to know each ambassador. Work on building relationships with ambassadors. Whether it’s a face-to-face meeting in a coffee shop or a regular video call check-in, it’s important that ambassadors feel valued and known.
- Empower creativity. You have guidelines and boundaries for the type of content ambassadors can post, but this doesn’t mean you have to totally restrict creative freedom. Let them try new things, think outside the box, and take their event ideas on board to build a collaborative relationship.
Up your brand ambassador game to reach more customers
When you partner with the right social media ambassadors, you’ve got a recipe for success. Not only will you reach a wider audience to promote your event, but you’ll reach the right audience. The results? Better relationships with potential customers and a higher chance to boost ticket sales.
Need a hand to get things off the ground? Use Eventbrite’s all-in-one event management platform. Promote events to your ideal demographic, track performance, and sell more event tickets.
