We had two weeks to market the National Literary Festival, here’s how we did it.
Last year, the National Arts Council of Namibia approached our team through its Literature Committee, and asked us to market the second-ever National Literary Festival–a two-day event, themed “Open a Book”, centred around reading, writing, and the future of Namibian literature.
From the onset, we understood that the festival was going to be a cultural intervention, bringing together writers, publishers, poets, educators, students, and literary enthusiasts to celebrate the love of literature, and call the nation to explore the importance of not only reading books, but of reading local works and promoting them.
Our Role Was Clear
Our team was charged with leading the social media strategy, managing the digitl platforms, producing and packaging content, and handling live coverage of the event. In essence, this meant we had to make sure people knew about the festival, felt invited to it, and also felt like they were part of the happenings.
Before any production began, we studied the concept note, unpacked our objectives, and examined ourselves with questions to better understand the theme:
What does the culture around reading look like in Namibia today?
What does “Open a Book” truly mean beyond the literal?
How do we invite the public to not only attend the event, but to become more open to exploring local literature?
These are the questions that shaped our strategic direction.
The Strategy
We sat down and brainstormed as a team; mapping out our audience segments, and built a focused marketing strategy that could be accommodated by the little time we had.
The next step was creating a content calendar that allowed us to move quickly. We had to make sure that each post that went up served a role, whether that was educational, invitational, or hype-driven. The rollout needed to feel consistent and responsive to the urgency of the timeline.
Our Content Day at the National Library laid the foundation for this project.
We filmed interviews with performers and created short-form video content to build hype around the oncoming festival. The team also captured content of the location to help audiences visualise where the festival would take place, and produced a teaser video to encourage people to think deeper about the theme. All content was shot on location, and edited, and packaged, in-house.
Throughout the two-week build-up, social media management remained active. Messaging was refined continuously, copy was tightened to ensure clarity and tone alignment, and posts and stories were scheduled.
On Event Day
When the festival arrived, half of the Beso team was on-site on both days, managing live coverage across social platforms.
We documented speeches, panel discussions, workshops, performances, and maintained audience engagement in real time. Live posting required us to be agile, capturing moments as they unfolded while monitoring digital engagement and adjusting to programme changes accordingly.
The objective extended to more than mere documentation here. Our intention was to amplify the experience beyond where it was happening and to make people feel like they can be part of it.
The experiencec was well-attended, with strong engagement on the ground and online. Following the festival, our client commended the management of the social media presence and the way content was packaged for continued future use.
Reflection
Looking back, what stands out to us is not simply that we delivered within two weeks.
It is what those two weeks demanded:
Alignment across the team.
Clear and focused strategy.
Fast, decisive execution.
And a shared understanding that this project carried cultural weight.
The National Literary Festival was a milestone moment in Namibia’s literary landscape.
A moment that we got to contribute to, and one we accomplished with a sharp strategy.
You can do anything when you have a clear strategy.
