Help spread the word where your local bead shows are by using #BeadShowNow

I am a big fan of shopping in person for handmade beads, strands and tubes of beads, lapidary items, tools and findings. If I can support a brick and mortar store or a bead show vendor so they can cover their costs, I will!

It used to be really easy to open a bead magazine and see ads for upcoming shows about 10 years ago. With the influx of social media and internet shopping I find that I am buying magazines less, and wanting to find out where shows are, but often experience: Darn! I just missed that show.

As a bead show vendor and a patron of bead shows and shops, I thought it would be great for people to use social media to help us figure out where we can find each other. Why not give it a try?!

Help promote brick and mortar bead shops by posting photos via Social media and use #BeadShopNow

Bead Shows and Bead Shops where you can physically go and shop are the main focus of these posts #BeadShowNow and #BeadShopNow

STEP 1: Go to a bead show or a bead shop and take photos of cool beads (you may want to ask the shop owner or bead show vendor if it is ok, and what their social media handle is).

STEP 2: Log into your social media platform and post your photos, making sure to tag the shop or vendor with their social media handle, use location for where the show or shop is, and make sure to use the #BeadShowNow or #BeadShopNow hashtags.

An example of what you would write attached to your photos may be:

Check out the awesome @MarshaNealStudio beads being sold at the #InnovativeBeadsExpo in Edison, NJ #BeadShowNow this weekend!

The @Name is the vendor/bead shop social media handle.

The #BeadShowNow is the subject you want to file this under (as of March 2018 Instagram shows up to 10 hashtags in your original post only).

If you are a vendor or bead shop owner, please DO post your own photos showing off your fabulous beads! And if you are lucky enough to have a customer come in and show off their beautiful finished piece with your beads, ask to grab a photo, get their social media handle and use #BeadShowAndTell or #BeadShopAndTell

If you have made something with beads from a bead show and want to show them off, please use the hashtag #BeadShowAndTell or #BeadShopAndTell to give us a peek and tag the artist/vendor/shop to help support their efforts!

If you want to promote your Online Bead Show Now use #OnlineBeadShowNow

For those of you selling through the internet or social media (Facebook Groups, Websites, Instagram, etc) use #OnlineBeadShowNow so you can post pictures of what you have and where you are going to be selling.

Please try to keep the hashtags clean so people can actually find what they are looking for and it does not become a complete mess and pointless to use.

If you want to create your own images or use these to help distinguish your post, please take a screen shot here or via Instagram. Change them however you want or make your own.

I used the Word Swag App to create these images and thanks to my friend Diane Hawkey for helping me with the #BeadShowAndTell hashtag (because Bead Show Bling – is just not where I wanted it to go…).