How to Find Events on Instagram and Facebook (And Get Your Event Discovered)

Facebook and Instagram are two of the most powerful event promotion platforms. And no one knows how event-goers use these platforms better than the teams at Instagram and Facebook. Download this ebook for exclusive new data and insights from the Instagram and Facebook Events teams, plus examples of how events like yours have already put their strategies into action.

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Facebook and Instagram are two of the most powerful event promotion platforms. 700 million people use Facebook Events each month to find things to do, and 80% of Instagrammers follow at least one business.

You can turn these social media platforms into the most impactful part of your marketing strategy. But to do so, you need to understand how they work; to learn how to find events on Instagram and Facebook and how event discovery works differently across each channel.

So here’s a quick guide…

How to Find Events on Facebook

On the platform, open up the menu in the right-hand corner of the screen and navigate to ‘Events’
Here, you will find your upcoming events and curated event recommendations based on your profile and friends list
Use the filters to search for events by category, location, and date. If you are looking for a specific event, navigate back to the general Facebook search, type in your keyword and scroll across to the Events tab to filter the results
In cases where you know the host but not the name of the event, navigate to the host’s page and select Events.

How to Find Events on Instagram

At the time of writing, Instagram has not yet rolled-out a native events feature. However, there are some easy ways to find things to do on the platform:

Open search, type in your keyword and scroll across to Tags to get a list of associated hashtags. This trick is particularly useful if you want to browse a certain kind of event, such as ‘#comedyinLA’. You can also search location tags for specific venues or areas
Follow publications with event listings and keep an eye on their posts, stories and reels to see what’s coming up. Once you spot something of interest, you can use Instagram’s Remind Me feature (if the organizer has it set up) to avoid missing out
Another option is to search for your favorite promoter and look through their links in bio for upcoming events.

Now that you know how consumers find events, it’s time to make those insights count for you as an event creator. Packed with exclusive data and insights from teams and brand ambassadors from Instagram and Facebook, our ebook contains everything you need to know about integrating the social media platforms into your promo strategy.

Specifically, you’ll learn:

Data-driven strategies to get your event discovered from Mike Bronfin and Virginia Maloney, product marketing managers at Instagram and Facebook Events
How to use the platforms to reach a local audience and build your event’s community
How five events have used the “event discovery flywheel” to grow their followings and attendance.

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The event discovery flywheel on Facebook and Instagram

People turn to Facebook and Instagram every day to discover local businesses and experiences like your event – and they want to share what they discover with their friends. This creates what Mike Bronfin, a product marketing manager at Instagram, calls a “flywheel” of event discovery. Once you set the wheel in motion, it will spin faster and faster on its own momentum – growing your following and attendance without taking up more of your team’s time.

A flywheel is a self-reinforcing cycle made up of a few key initiatives that feed each other and build long-term momentum.

Social media is a prime example of the flywheel effect in action. The more you post and gain followers, the more people come to your event, the more people post on social media about your event – which in turn drives more followers to your account and the cycle begins again.

“Facebook Events makes it easy for people to find things happening near them,” says Virginia Maloney, product marketing manager at Facebook Events. “People can explore events in their area, see suggested events their friends are interested in, and get notified about events created by Pages they follow. It helps strengthen local communities.”

On Facebook and Instagram, where users are constantly engaging with local businesses’ content, events have a prime opportunity to push the flywheel into motion in a few simple steps:

The content you post on Instagram and Facebook grabs users’ attention
Users learn more about your event and buy tickets
People post at your event, driving more people to check out your content and your events

“This flywheel is a powerful way for businesses to be discovered by their local community,” says Mike Bronfin, product marketing manager at Instagram. “Encouraging the right types of content creation and sharing while customers visit your event is the best way to get discovered.”

It’s a cycle that creates exponential exposure and – if your team takes full advantage – massive ticket sales.

How to put the flywheel in motion

To set the event discovery flywheel in motion, your team’s first step is to grow your following through content.

“Instagrammers constantly are inspired by visual content taken at local businesses and experiences in their community,” says Instagram’s Mike Bronfin.

In fact, one-third of the most viewed Instagram Stories are from businesses, according to Instagram. So what type of content will activate your event’s flywheel? Most events are inherently visual, making your Instagram content a prime opportunity to bring the experience to life for users.

That’s the approach that Joan Rosenberg, the director of marketing for Maker Faire, uses. “Maker Faire is a very visual and hands-on event with a lot of projects, so we feature the makers that create the experience.” Rosenberg says. “That way people who look at our Instagram account get a good taste of what the faire is.”

If you have a Facebook Page, using Facebook Events promotes your event to a built-in audience. Those that have already liked or followed your Page will automatically be notified when you have an Event coming up after you publish the event to your page.

Take a note from Foodwise, a San Francisco-based agricultural nonprofit that uses Facebook Events to connect local farms with shoppers in person.

“Part of our mission is to cultivate a healthy food system, and we do that through the educational events and farmers markets,” Marcy Coburn, the executive director at Foodwise, told Facebook. “Making a Facebook Event is the first thing we do. It’s the thread that links a lot of different parts of the community together.”

Put the flywheel in motion

Use your Facebook Events or Groups to engage your community: Your Facebook Event or Group is where the entire community surrounding your event can connect. In fact, there’s been a 40% growth in engagement with Facebook Events each year, Facebook’s Virginia Maloney says:

“We post once or twice a day on the Event page.” Maker Faire’s Rosenberg says. “Our posts are a mix of schedule announcements, engaging news articles, reposts, and features on the makers and presenters who exhibit at our flagship fairs. We try to keep the messaging fresh and not just focus on ourselves.”

Share content in your Facebook Event or Group such as pictures, videos, stories, or updates, or even go on Facebook Live from your Event to drive even more engagement.

Lean into video: On both platforms, video — both recorded and live — sees massive engagement. Host a weekly “behind-the-scenes” live video leading up to an event, and have one person dedicated to video at your event itself. Take advantage of Instagram Stories (which you can post directly to Facebook Stories) for other video clips and interactive content throughout the week.
Make sure each post is well written: To build your following, content is everything. If your team simply shares dry announcements and information, you won’t trigger the flywheel into action. To help your team write social media copy that engages followers and turns them into attendees, point them towards this free guide: Storytelling Sells: Bring Your Event’s Copy to Life on Social Media.