Which event is on the website?
Friday's band was cancelled on Wednesday. The Facebook post was edited, but the website still lists them, and the Google profile shows an event post from last month. The chalkboard outside says quiz Tuesday, which was right until you moved it to Wednesday. A customer turns up for the band and finds a quiet pub.
Each week someone has to post the week's events in four places, then make a poster for the toilets and the noticeboard. It takes an hour or two, and it is always the job that gets left until Friday afternoon.
Why the what's-on drifts
Every channel wants the same information in a slightly different shape: a web page, a Facebook event, an Instagram post, a Google post, a printed poster. Each has to be updated by hand, and the person who books events is not always the person who posts them.
Changes are the worst part. Posting new events happens eventually. Updating or removing an event that changed, on every channel, is what gets missed, because nobody keeps a list of where each event was posted.
Regular events make it worse, not better. The quiz happens every week, so it is easy to forget to post it at all, and new customers searching for a quiz near them never find it because the last post about it was months ago.
What stale event listings cost
| Problem | Effect |
|---|---|
| Cancelled events still listed | Customers arriving for something that is not on |
| Events posted late | Smaller crowds on nights you paid for |
| Different details on each channel | Confusion over times and prices |
| Hours spent posting | Manager time taken from the bar |
| Google profile not updated | Searchers never see what is on |
For many pubs, events are the reason people choose you over the pub down the road on a particular night. If they cannot find out what is on, or find the wrong thing, that advantage is gone.
It also takes up the time of the person who is best placed to run the bar. The manager who books the acts is often the one who ends up posting them, and every hour spent on social media on a Friday afternoon is an hour not spent getting the pub ready for the evening.
One events calendar, published everywhere
- Every event goes into one calendar: quiz, bands, sport, food nights, league home games, ticketed nights, with a time, short description and image.
- Your website's what's-on page reads from the calendar, so it is always current.
- Events are posted to your Facebook page and Instagram through their business interfaces, and to your Google Business Profile as event posts, on a schedule you set.
- When an event changes or is cancelled, the change is pushed to the website and Google, and the social posts are updated or a correction is posted, depending on what each platform allows.
- A weekly what's-on round-up is generated for email subscribers and as a printable poster for the bar and noticeboard.
- Events booked in other tools, such as gig bookings or ticketed nights, can feed the calendar so nothing is entered twice.
Each platform's rules on automated posting change over time. We use their official interfaces, check what works for your accounts, and tell you where a manual step remains.
Monday morning with one calendar
The week's events are already in the calendar. The website shows them. Facebook and Instagram posts go out at the times you chose. The Google profile shows this week's quiz and band. When Friday's band cancels on Wednesday, you change the calendar once and the website and Google update. The poster for the bar prints from the same list.
- One place to enter and change events
- Website, social pages and Google kept in step
- A weekly poster and email without extra work
- No customers turning up for cancelled events
Is your what's-on like this?
- Events are posted by hand to several places each week.
- Your website lists events that have changed or been cancelled.
- Your Google profile rarely shows what is on.
- The chalkboard and the website disagree.
- Posting the week's events is a job that slips to Friday.