It was a big wall, probably 12 feet tall. I should have had somebody stand next to it for the photo! And it was pretty cool. We set it up right by the registration area. We also had a booth there where participants could redeem the tickets they received for participating in sessions and exchange them for t-shirts, coffee mugs, etc. So it was a place where we got lots of traffic, and people would walk by and see the wall. And then, of course, that would encourage them to post more pictures.

I think the big benefit is that when our participants see the wall projected, it encourages them to engage more on social media. So it’s a bit of a carrot to get them to jump on Twitter or Instagram and participate because they see the wall projected. Participants want to see their images and contributions projected for everybody else to see. So I think for me as a comms person, that’s the biggest benefit of it. And then there’s the practical side, where it’s just a great way to combine all of our activity around the event and have a visual representation of that.

Social media helps us raise excitement for our events and to engage students and community members in a positive way. We display our Walls.io social media wall at SUNY’s Got Your Back assembly events and conferences. Students and community members post photos and messages which are then rotated on the screens. This helps our attendees engage individually and collectively with the program in real-time.

Creative Center of America created the social wall with the hashtags #MentalHealthKC and #MHKC19 so that hope could be amplified, and help could be more easily found by anyone struggling with the challenges of mental illness. We displayed the social wall on a 50-inch TV screen in the high-traffic, registration check-in area at the conference. Cerner also embedded our wall in the app for the event that was used by conference attendees.

Running is very emotional. This is why we have been using Walls.io social walls for years. It’s easy to get runners to post their experiences from races and training sessions on social media and share these moments with others. This integration of UGC creates a closer connection between the runners, us and our race.

We were so happy to find the features Walls.io offered. It allowed us to create a virtual audience so that anyone watching could cheer on teammates and celebrate wins at home. It kept engagement up on social and also helped spread the word about our events. People were excited to see themselves on the wall!