Music City has a new signature home event launched in June by 2012 Southern Living Custom Builder of the Year, Castle Homes. There was a whole lot of PR wonderful in this latest Forest Home Media project and here are some of the great ways to create engagement around your home lifestyle industry event.
The Southern Contemporary Folk style home, built by 2012 Southern Living Builder of the Year, Castle Homes, and designed by Wade Weissmann Architecture, is Nashville’s newest signature home event. (Photo by Geinger Hill, Forest Home Media)
Event Hashtag & Contest
As we had introduced for the holiday Parade of Homes, we suggested the launch of a dreamy Instagram account for the award-winning Nashville area custom builder and remodeler to help engage the legions of photographers, bloggers and visitors touring. And, yes, a hashtag contest perfectly complemented this effort as well. Check out all the great pics on Instagram and more via #NashSymphonyHouse and give @CastleHomes a follow!
Engage New Technology
In addition to working with all Nashville and regional media, we also went international using Periscope for a variety of fun moments which were live stream broadcast. One of our favorites was a wrap up interview with interior designer Julie Couch and floral & succulent designer Tim Riffle after their on-site segments with NewsChannel 5’s Talk of the Town. Here are the TV segments we helped coordinate as well as the fun Periscope recap.
Tim Riffle, Tim Riffle Environments, weaves some succulent magic with NewsChannel 5’s Talk of the Town’s Tuwanda Coleman.
Red, white and fabulous with Julie Couch, Julie Couch Interiors, was also taped at the Nashville Symphony Show House with News Channel 5 – Talk of the Town – Tuwanda Coleman.
Our Periscope recap with the talented Couch and Riffle was the first Periscope for each and we used it as a great way to talk about live on tape TV interview tips.
Find A Cross-Promote
The cross-promote is one of our favorite tools when weaving a project into the conversation of a community. A cost-free opportunity we used before and during the tour event was the Tennessean’s Sunday builder, designer and architect profiles in the real estate section.
Also, in April, I was asked by Franklin Life to submit a recipe – yes, we love all things food, home and garden! The awesome editor allowed me to weave upcoming projects into my bio.
We used an informative Periscope also as a cross-promo for the Nashville Symphony Show House. Periscopes not loaded to our YouTube channel have been added to the video section of our Forest Home Media Facebook page making Facebook oh, so happy with original video content. This also uses the Periscope in multiple-ways, a favorite technique of Forest Home Media when generating content for marketing.
Another dreamy cross-promote and the ultimate was being featured on the cover of two area magazines. The fab folks at Your Williamson magazine used the Southern Contemporary Folk style home as a backdrop for their May salute to area matriarchs. It was such an honor to host these wonderful women. The magazine also included a great story on what’s cool, new and different with the upcoming premier home tour! #CrossPromoteHappiness.
Pre-Event Photos
Finally, it is never easy and sometimes hard to communicate to clients and event participants how important pre-event photos are in creating excitement. We do a lot of front-end PR loading for an event and then encourage opinion leaders and visitors to carry the conversation forward during the event supplemented with advertising.
The pre-event photos are created during the chaos of construction with a lot of people including the photographer on ladders and knees to get the perfect shot.
This year, we earned a lot of great media stories including the cover of Greater Nashville House & Home with a terrific preview of the upcoming event creativity of the builder, designers and architect. You have to be prepared to have fresh content ready based on magazine deadlines or you miss this entire important vehicle.
Media & Bloggers On-Site Events
One of the HUGE and we mean REALLY HUGE days was the sneak peek tour and garden party for area media and home bloggers. Our talented friends Carmen Johnston, of Carmen Johnston Gardens and contributing garden editor for Southern Living mag, joined us with PBS Volunteer Gardener Troy Marden, who signed and gave participants a copy of his latest book, “Southern Gardeners Handbook.” A beautiful tea was prepared by iconic Miss Daisy King.
So many gorgeous blogs were created by the talented community of home, food and garden bloggers. Forest Home Media once again hosted a live Pinterest party in the kitchen of the Nashville Symphony House. Before, during and after, we broadcast fun Periscopes where we talked about areas of the home highlighted by the bloggers. During the live Pinterest event from 7 to 8 p.m., we pinned beautiful images from the blogs while getting to discuss them simultaneously with folks on the Pinterest board created for the fun, engaging event. Another element we love is being able to capture for our clients a snapshot of the great profiles of the home event while exposing these talented bloggers to a new audience.
From engaging society photographers and traditional media to weaving wonderful Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter and Facebook moments, Forest Home Media is pioneering for the home, food and garden industry a full-circle experience which has so many positive, lasting effects for the talented folks who are smart enough to take advantage.
Next up for Forest Home Media, we joined the virtual party launching our friend Lucy Farmer’s national appearance on HGTV Beach House Flip. It premiered on Sunday, July 5 and we were thrilled Team #Laphney won the first master bedroom competition. Find out more info on this talented jewelry artisan at Lucyinspired, who was also featured in the May Southern Living magazine! #GirlOnFire
We’re heading to the Haven Blogger Conference in Atlanta and can’t wait to share the latest in what’s cool, new and different! #WeLearnWeShare
