One of the best ways to build connections, boost your brand and get our business’ name out there is to host a business event. However, many business owners shy away from doing so because they think it will be a lot of hard work, and there is obviously a lot of pressure for events to be a big success.
The good news is, although it does take some serious planning to pull off a successful business event, it’s not as difficult as you might think. Here are some simple steps that will help you create a successful event and reap the rewards that come with it.
Think About the Purpose
If you want to run a successful business event, you first need to determine WHY you are bothering to do this in the first place. Do you want to increase brand awareness? Would you like to attract talent to your business? Do you want to make connections in your industry? Once you know the why behind it, it will be so much easier to organize the right kind of event.
Set Your Budget
Unless you have an unlimited amount of funds, setting an event budget is going to be really important. Knowing how much you have to spend is the first step to narrowing down your choice of venues, speakers and entertainment. If you can be flexible, that will help you to get the best deals for your money. If not, doing some research on affordable events/vendors will help you to create something special no matter how little you have to spend.
Make a Plan
When it comes to organizing successful business events, you cannot afford to wing it and expect everything to turn out alright. You need to create a detailed plan that covers every aspect of the day/night and any potential issues that might come up unexpectedly. This plan should include everything from venue and catering to entertainment, registration, security and health and safety.
Cover everything you think could happen. Have a backup plan so that if your event doesn’t go exactly as planned, it should still go well.
Hire a Great Team
A lot of business owners make the decision to use their regular office staff to help them run business events. This can work well, but it may not be the best way to do things. If you want to ensure your event goes off without a hitch consider hiring professional greeters, servers, DJs, guest speakers and so on. They are professionals in their chosen occupations and they will get the job done extremely well.
If you’re worried about managing temporary employees for your event, you can always make use of things like crew management software, which will allow you to organize, monitor and pay them efficiently. Yes, it might cost a bit more than it would should you use your regular staff but it will make things run so much more smoothly.
Choose Your Venue Wisely
If you want to not only impress your guests but ensure you get the maximum number of people showing up to your event, you need to put some serious thought into your venue. For example, if your venue is a rundown, uninspiring dive, it’s hardly going to show you and your business in a favorable light. It also won’t persuade many people to make the effort and show up. Whereas, if you choose a swanky venue, it is likely to pique more interest.
Not only that but choosing a venue in a location that’s easily accessible for the number of guests you anticipate and which has other interesting attractions and amenities close by is the smart thing to do. This is particularly important if your event is lasting more than one day. Attendees will want to know there are places they can go to eat, drink, shop and have fun in the area when they aren’t busy with your event activities.
Delegate
Once you’ve hired some staff to help you with the event, don’t be afraid to use them. Many business people feel the need to have total control over their business events because they want them to go right, but if you try to do it all, it’s more likely to go wrong. You can be in charge overall, but choose the best person for any given task and trust them to do it well after being given your instructions, It’ll take the pressure off and help things to run more smoothly in the end.
Check Out the Speakers
If you are going to have speakers at your event, which you most likely are, it’s so important you take time to vet them before you book them. There are literally thousands of people out there offering their services as a speaker. Many will not be right for you and your event and some will not be as interesting as you would like them to be.
Your event is hardly likely to be a success if the guests are bored into submission so take the time to carefully choose speakers who are relevant to your business and your guests, and who are also really entertaining. You won’t regret it.
Create a Buzz
It doesn’t matter how well you plan or how many great speakers you line up, nor does it matter how amazing the venue is if no one turns up. Business events rely on having lots of great, interested guests for their success and this means marketing your event hard. Post about it often on social media, create and post video teasers about the speaker. Send invites to the movers and shakers in the field and make it sound amazing to draw them in.
Hosting your own event can be a valuable way to reach your company’s goals. Don’t rule it out thinking it is too overwhelming of a task for you to accomplish. With the right plan, you can create a successful business event people will talk about for a very long time. Here’s to YOUR success!
Carolyn R. Owens has over 25 years of proven experience and serves as a Career Strategist, Leadership and Life Coach. She is the Chairwoman and CEO of Infinity Coaching, Inc. where they help you up-level your skills so you can up-level your income. Infinity Coaching, Inc. provides one-on-one and group coaching, organizational training, personality assessments, and a signature program, the Infinity Coaching Inner Circle. Carolyn is certified to give both The Energy Leadership Index Assessment and Myers Briggs Type Indicator Assessment. You can find out more about both assessments and other products and services at https://infinitycoaching.net.
