Here's a question we ask more often than you might expect.
Who is covering your social media on the day of the event?
Sometimes the honest answer is: nobody.
The team is running the event. The comms person is back in the office. The manager is answering questions at the gate, and the moment something brilliant happens, the performer who does something unexpected, the face that captures exactly why your attraction exists, passes without a single piece of content to show for it.
Your busiest days are your quietest online
School holidays, half terms and Christmas events are when your social media matters most. They're also when your team is least able to manage it. Everyone is doing three jobs at once.
The posting might survive. It's everything after the post that gets dropped. Tagged photos go unshared. Questions go unanswered. Glowing reviews get no reply. And because engagement slows down, the platform shows your content to fewer people, at the exact moment you want the most people to see it.
Why event day matters for your marketing
Our Great Days Out Survey found that 30.2% of families plan just a few days ahead. Events are exactly where that impulse to book lives.
A strong, real-time presence on the day of an event doesn't just celebrate it. It sells the next one. Families who aren't there see what they're missing. Families who are there see themselves reflected back. And the queue that moved faster than expected, the activity that sold out by lunchtime, the visitor who said it was the best day they'd had in months, all of it becomes content you can use for weeks.
You can't schedule spontaneous. You can only be there when it happens.
Plan your cover before you need it
The attractions that keep social media strong through busy periods aren't the ones with bigger teams. They're the ones that decided in advance who looks after the conversation when the usual team can't.
Look at the next three months. Mark your events, school holidays and the weeks your marketing lead is on leave. Those are your cover gaps. Ideally, arrange cover four to six weeks ahead, so whoever steps in has time to learn your brand voice and your plans.
Social Sitters and Social Sitters Live
TMC Social Sitters steps in when your team can't. We reply to comments in your voice, reshare visitor content, answer questions before families lose interest, and drop booking links into conversations at the right moment.
For events, Social Sitters Live goes further. One of our team comes to you, covers your channels in real time and captures the day as it actually unfolds. Not the polished version. The real one, which is usually better.
Got events coming up? Find out more about Social Sitters or tell us what's coming up.
This blog started life as a Friday Funk, our weekly myth-busting email for visitor attractions. Join the Friday Funk list here.