How Should You Assign Visit Dates When Inviting Influencers to a Pop-Up Store?

The basic approach to scheduling influencer invitation dates for a pop-up store is to concentrate high-buzz influencers early in the run and broaden the mix toward the later days. Drawing attention early helps motivate general visitors to come in later. However, if you concentrate too many invitations on the same day, the flow for photo shoots and customer service becomes crowded, and the quality of the experience suffers.

Why should you concentrate high-buzz influencers early in the run?

Posts made early in the run are the first touchpoint for people who don't yet know the pop-up exists. When posts from high-buzz influencers cluster at this stage, they tend to work as a reason to visit throughout the entire run. If you bring in high-buzz influencers all at once in the later days, the information has already circulated, so it is harder to create the same sense of novelty as in the early period.

How should you spread the number of invitees across each day?

Concentrating buzz and increasing the number of invitees per day should be considered separately. As noted in How does time spent at an event affect the persuasiveness of a post?, the persuasiveness of a post depends on securing enough time on site, so the number of people invited on the same day should be limited to what photo spots and customer service can handle comfortably. If you want to gather high-buzz influencers early on, it is better to spread them across the first several days rather than inviting many on the same day. This keeps the impact while avoiding crowding.

Who should you invite on later visit days?

The later days are well suited to inviting influencers who can convey the actual atmosphere of the store and visitors' reactions, as they take over from visitors who became interested after seeing the early posts. As covered in When should you separate photo-shoot lanes at an event?, separating the shooting flow is most effective in the later days, when the paths of general visitors and influencers are more likely to overlap. When designing the later invitation dates, adjust the schedule based on how crowded the store is with general visitors.

Scope of This Article

This article covers the thinking behind how to assign invitation dates. It does not cover the criteria for selecting individual influencers or the wording of invitation messages. Sample invitation emails are compiled in the S/PASS GUIDE's invitation email templates.

Conclusion

Invitation dates should be designed with distinct roles: the early period to generate buzz, and the later period to encourage visits. We believe that avoiding concentration on the same day and keeping flow lines uncrowded is the best way to protect the quality of the experience.