Photo Booth for Events Using Social Media Integration

Our friends at Swat.io, who we share an office with, threw a wonderful summer party this year, inviting clients and industry connections to celebrate over beers and barbecue. To make the party even better, they decided to make use of Walls.io. They hooked a Snapify photo booth up to a social wall, set up a large display by the pool, and provided party guests with endless fun.

Thanks to our social wall API, integrating a Walls.io social medial wall with a photo booth is fairly easy. But we wanted to know a bit more about the setup at the Swat.io party and how the photo booth and social wall performed.

To learn more, we talked to Carina Kröpfl, Content Marketing Manager at Swat.io and Michael Kamleitner, CEO of Swat.io and Walls.io.

Why did you choose to use Snapify for your photo booth?

Most photo booth vendors operate locally, so Snapify was a logical choice for us. They’re based in Vienna just like we are. Plus, we’ve used their photo booths at two of our company Christmas parties in the past — with great results, so we already knew Snapify to be a well-tested and stable solution.

The best thing about using a local vendor was that they took care of everything for us. They delivered the hardware and lighting and set everything up. All in all, that meant one less thing for us to worry about in the party-planning process.

How did you integrate Walls.io and Snapify? 

It proved super-easy to integrate Snapify with Walls.io through our API. Snapify’s developer did this within an hour and without any help from our side. So even though someone from the Walls.io team could have jumped in and helped at any time, it wasn’t necessary. That speaks for how easy it is to integrate Walls.io with photo booths.

It would be cool to have more photo booth vendors ready to hook their booths up to the Walls.io API. Photo booth providers tend to be local rather than global businesses. But there is no reason why a photo booth provider halfway around the world wouldn’t be able to offer a Walls.io API integration to their customers. That’s the beauty of a social wall that you can pull up wherever and whenever.

What are the advantages of using the API to post directly to the social wall rather than posting pics to social media first?

The main advantage is that, often, people don’t necessarily want these pics to show up on social media. At small business events, weddings and other private functions it can feel uncomfortable to ask people to post their pics publicly on social media with a hashtag. A photo booth elegantly solves this problem.

But there’s also the element of fun that a photo booth adds to an event. It’s way more interactive than merely taking selfies with a phone camera. And you’d be surprised by how well an “old-school” photo booth can still draw attention at an event — especially after a few drinks. ;). It’s an attraction for all types of events, and it gets amplified by having the pics projected on a screen via the social wall. In a way, it’s self-reinforcing.

Of course, it’s not necessarily an either/or situation. It makes sense to combine social media channels with a photo booth to give people multiple options and cover more of the event.

Did you or are you planning to use the photos as user-generated content? 

We are just now starting an event series, so we are planning to use the images to promote future events.

It’s very important for our brand to get in touch with our customers offline. A personal relationship is essential for Swat.io, which is why we love to invite customers for a drink and a chat at various events throughout the year.

User-generated content is perceived as far more authentic than brand-generated content. I see great potential in using the pictures to attract even more guests for our next event. 

Another significant effect is that people were sharing their pictures from the photo booth on social media. As they are all branded with our logo, this can help raise brand awareness among professionals connected to our industry.

How did party guests react to the photo booth and social wall?

Our guests loved the photo booth in combination with the social wall! A team member encouraged guests to give it a try and helped them with the props and printing the right amount of pictures.

As soon as the first pictures showed up on the wall, more and more people wanted to get a fun picture with their friends and colleagues. Many also used the event hashtag to post their own pictures to the wall.

I think the social wall was a great icebreaker as well. Since our summer party had the character of a networking event, and the majority of guests did not know each other, it definitely served as a conversation starter.

What I especially love about the set up is the combination of digital and analogue photos, the combination of online and offline usage of the pics. While every guest could take a printed picture home as a souvenir, the wall also shared the best moments of the party with everyone.

Perfect for private parties

Setting up a photo booth at an event is a good way to circumvent social media and still have a social wall. This is especially good for parties, weddings, and other events that are too private to share on social media.

Of course, you can always combine both conventional social media sources and a photo booth for your social wall as well.

Photo booths also add a fun element to an event, and the social wall is a good ice breaker and helps start conversations. Fantastic for parties where not everyone knows each other or even for big, professional events where you want people to socialise.

Collect tons of user-generated content

One of the biggest advantages of a photo booth, aside from being a crowd-pleaser for events, is that you get lots of photos from the event. Those photos are user-generated content and, as we all know, user-generated content is something you can make great use of.

For example, you can make your photo booth pics part of the marketing campaign for your next event. The pics taken in the photo booth will look more natural rather than staged event pics or stock photos. You can use them to give an impression of what audiences can expect at your events.

Photo booth providers and software differ wildly in what they offer. So when choosing your photo booth, keep in mind that you need to be able to download the photos and ask for consent to use the pics as UGC.

An opportunity to raise brand awareness

Photo booth photos can often have some sort of branding added to them which, as Carina has mentioned, is an excellent opportunity to get your brand seen by a wider audience when your event attendees share pictures from the photo booth.

Choose your photo booth provider wisely

As Michael mentioned, it almost always makes sense to choose a local photo booth provider. Delivery logistics are vastly improved over short distances and keeps your carbon footprint lower. And it’s easier to get the provider’s help during the set-up process and when choosing the features you want.

Of course, the quality of the photo booth is important as well. You want good lighting, fun gimmicks and props, an appealing backdrop, and solid printing capabilities.

Depending on the photo booth’s features, you could also collect email addresses to build your email marketing list — with consent, of course.

If you are planning to use a photo booth provider local to you and would like to use Walls.io for your event, please, ask your provider if they would use our API to add Walls.io to their features. And if they have any questions regarding the implementation, tell them to get in touch with us, and we’ll try to make it happen.