State FairsState Fairs Using Social Media

Introduction

In preparing the Best State Fairs post, I had the opportunity to visit the websites of most, if not all, of the state fairs in the United States.  Website quality, currency, and usability varied greatly, and I also observed a large variability in the state fair organizations’ use of social media.

These are the impressions I came away with:

State Fair Websites

State Fairs’ websites vary immensely in quality.  Many are professionally done, easy-to-use, and pleasing to look at.  Others appear to have been designed fifteen years ago without being brought up-to-date as technologies have evolved.  Still others garner only a small portion of a greater organization’s website.  One state, Hawaii, appears to have a state farm fair, but I could not find a website for it.

State Fairs’ Use of Social Media

I was pleasantly surprised to see that a majority of state fairs are using one or more forms of social media.  The most popular are Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace, with many using two or three of these.  A few state fairs are using photo or video sharing sites or writing a blog, but these are still rare.

Social media is used to present information and updates as well as to host contests and giveaways sponsored by the state fairs.  As is the case in any field, the quality of use of social media has wide variance.  Some accounts are only updated when it’s fair time, while others post updates year-round.  Some have only a few followers, while others have thousands of fans interacting.  While most Facebook accounts are “fan” pages; several are still using “friend” pages and requiring people to be approved manually before being allowed to see any information on the page.

Promotion of Social Media

This is perhaps the area that surprised me the most.  While many organizations display buttons linking to their social media presences on the front pages of their websites, in many cases I could not find links to the social media formats anywhere on the web pages.  This was true of several state fairs that are very active in their use of social media.  It is surprising that they would not place buttons linking to their social media presences on their websites’ front pages.  Buttons that are displayed on websites range from gaudy and almost overwhelming to tiny and hidden, but the majority of those that had buttons are using appropriate sizes and locations so that the buttons are both visible and fit with the page design.

If I did not find buttons for social media on the site, I searched in Google:  statename state fair twitter (or facebook or myspace).  I found many social media accounts through these searches which were not promoted on their respective websites.  Still more surprising was the fact that occasionally one social media account would be linked, but others would not, i.e. Twitter account linked but Facebook page not.  Notations of these cases are made in the data below.

Keeping Current with Social Media

This may be the biggest challenge for fair organizations.  Many of the state fair social media accounts are not updated consistently.  Others were set up and never used, or used for one or two posts before being abandoned.

I wrote @ replies on Twitter to many of the state fair organizations three days ago and have only received replies from two.  I will update if I receive further replies.  I am interested to see the level of interactivity between the fairs and their fans in social media.

Final Thoughts

State fairs, like other tourism venues, need to add social media to their marketing toolbox.  When deciding which media to use, they will need to decide which avenues they can best use to dispense information and interact with their users, while being aware of the time involved in social media.  They must choose carefully so that they can keep up with what they begin.  It is better to use one or two aspects of social media well than to have a flurry of accounts that are seldom updated.

If state fairs are indeed using social media, they need to have links on the front pages of their fair websites to those social media accounts.  As more and more people use social media, they will be looking for a quick link to Twitter or Facebook.  Catching people when they visit a fair’s website, and having them subscribe to a feed from Twitter, Facebook, or MySpace, will keep forthcoming information in front of those people for a long time.  It needs to be visible and easily accessible.

Facebook pages should be “fan” pages rather than requiring friendships to be approved.

I was surprised that more are not using photo-sharing groups such as Flickr groups being used by the state fairs.

Numbers

While the individual states’ data are listed below, this is a general breakdown:

51 state fair websites were examined.  (Some states have multiple state fairs.)

Of those 51, I found no social media presence for 8, while 43 are using one or more forms of social media.   13 of the 43 have no links to their social media presence from the front page of their state fair’s website.

Media being used:

  • 35 Twitter
  • 28 Facebook “fan” page
  • 21 MySpace
  • 10 Facebook “friend” page
  • 9 Blog
  • 6 YouTube
  • 1 Shutterfly
  • 1 Podcast
  • 1 UStream
  • 1 Flickr

Data

Below are listings of social media being used by the various state fairs, as found by visiting state fair websites and conducting Google searches on 9/19/09.  I did my best to examine the front pages of the websites, but I did not comb through an entire website to look for social media links.  Keep in mind that this type of information changes rapidly, so it may not remain current.  Also, the accounts listed will vary greatly in their currency of use.  The twitter accounts with only one or two posts are listed along with the Facebook pages with tens of thousands of fans.

This information is presented as a snapshot of the state fair organizations and how many types of social media they are using.

Alabama (Greater Gulf State Fair):

Alaska (Tanana Valley State Fair, Fairbanks):

Alaska (Alaska State Fair, Palmer):

Arkansas State Fair:

Arizona State Fair:

California State Fair:

Colorado State Fair:

Connecticut:  Holds multiple fairs.  No social media information found for Association of Connecticut Fairs, the parent organization.

Delaware State Fair:

Florida State Fair:

  • MySpace (Found through Google search; no link from fair’s front page.)

Georgia (Georgia State Fair):  No social media found.

Georgia (North Georgia State Fair):

Hawaii (Hawaii State Farm Fair):  No website or social media found.

Idaho (Eastern Idaho State Fair):  No social media found.

Idaho (Western Idaho Fair):  No social media found.

Illinois State Fair:  No links to social media from site’s main page.  Found through Google search.

Indiana State Fair:

Iowa State Fair:

Kansas State Fair:

Kentucky State Fair:  No links from website main page.  Found through Google search.

Louisiana (Greater Baton Rouge State Fair):  MySpace linked from main page, but not Twitter or Facebook.

Maine (Bangor State Fair):  Facebook linked from main website page, but Twitter found through Google search.

Maryland State Fair:

  • Twitter (Not linked from fair website main page; found through Google search.)

Massachusetts (The Big E):

Michigan State Fair:

  • Facebook Fan Page (found through Google search)

Minnesota State Fair: (Found through Google search; no links from website main page.)

Mississippi State Fair:  The Mississippi State Fair itself only gets a single page on the Fair Commission website.

  • Facebook Fan Page  (found through search, not linked from fair page)

Missouri State Fair:  No social media listed on main website.

Montana State Fair:  Social media not found on fair’s website primary page.

Nebraska State Fair:  All found through Google search.

Nevada State Fair:

New Jersey State Fair:  No social media found on website or by search.

New Mexico State Fair:

New York State Fair:

North Carolina State Fair:

North Dakota State Fair:

Ohio State Fair:

Oklahoma State Fair:

Oregon State Fair:

Pennsylvania:  Has multiple county fairs. No social media found for main association.

South Carolina State Fair:

South Dakota State Fair:

  • Facebook Fan Page (Found through search, not fair website)

Tennessee State Fair:

Texas (State Fair of Texas):

Texas (North Texas State Fair):

Utah State Fair:

Vermont State Fair:

Virginia State Fair: No social media found.

Washington (Puyallup Fair):  Social media found through search.  Washington has multiple state fairs, several of which are active in social media.

West Virginia State Fair: Not on fair’s front page; found through search.

Wisconsin State Fair:

Wyoming State Fair:

Photo credit:  Joe Shlabotnik on flickr

Linda (minnemom) writes about family travel at Travels with Children.

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