11 Tips For Successful Event Management
Successful event management isn’t easy. If you have never done it before, the challenges of event management can be even more daunting. Finding a suitable venue, putting together event staff, pleasing the attendees, and staying under budget might seem impossible at first.
Fortunately, event management is common and there’s a wealth of knowledge to gain that can guide you to a successful event. Learning about what successful event management is and following some tried and true tips is a great place to start.
Here are 11 things to consider for successful event management
I. Start Early
Start planning as soon as you possibly can. If you’re planning a large event, you should ideally start to plan it at least four to six months in advance. If it’s a smaller event, however, you require at least one month to plan. Make sure that all vendor contracts are completed a few weeks prior to the event to keep the final run up to the actual event flowing smoothly.
II. Identify the Target Audience
The next important thing you should do is define your target audience. Once you do that, all the other decisions will fall into place. Location, content, format, etc. will all flow from this first decision. Having such a structured approach will also help you remain focused on achieving specific goals. That way you will be less likely to let the scope become either too watered down or broad.
III. Have a Clear Business Purpose for Holding the Event
You should first be clear on why you are actually holding the event for successful event management. The reason for this is that every decision after that needs to support your main goal. Is your goal to ensure better employee engagement? Is it to generate more leads? Whatever it might be, plan accordingly and set goals that are not only clear but also achievable.
IV. Find a Suitable Venue
It’s often costly and challenging to find a suitable venue and it isn’t uncommon to experience problems with your choice of venue. Finding and booking the venue is an essential part of successful event management. Unless your event can be easily rescheduled, it’s generally advisable to reserve a primary event space as well as a backup event space, according to Mavrix.
V. Set and Stick to a Budget
You should set a budget and stick to it. Determine the exact amount you can spend on the venue, entertainment, catering, and various other miscellaneous costs. Remember to consider all potential costs from the beginning so that you don’t end up with a figure that’s far greater than what you had initially estimated.
VI. Remain Flexible
Nothing is ever set in stone when it comes to events. Always remember that things will likely change over the course of planning the event. Whether it is event locations, times, or even the type of event that you are hosting, it’s always important to make sure that you are flexible and able to meet the changing demands.
VII. Have a Backup Plan
It’s rare that a successful event is pulled off without any issues at all, an important person may arrive late or an item may fail to turn up. Assess the event’s most important assets and then have a backup plan for each. In the unfortunate event that several issues arise, you should first evaluate them and then decide if an alternative is available, or if it should be cut entirely from the event.
VIII. Allocate Responsibilities
Delegating tasks among the team members is at the heart of successful event management. Event management is all about teamwork. Each of your sub tasks should be grouped into some major task head. For instance, food and beverage is one major task that consists of several different sub heads such as service, buffet set up, menu selection, crockery & cutlery, etc.
IX. Communicate
Having open lines of communication with the attendees, your staff, and sponsors is incredibly valuable. For one, if you have a good understanding of your attendees’, sponsors, and staff’s expectations, it will be far easier to meet them. Furthermore, healthy communication helps to highlight issues early on when they are usually easiest to address.
X. Get Online
Events can be a great way to boost your social media presence. Have a custom hashtag for the event on Twitter (X.com) and encourage followers to post tweets about it. Similarly, create an event on Facebook and encourage followers to tag the event in relevant posts. Once the event is concluded, don’t forget to upload your photos and encourage users to tag themselves.
Successful event management is definitely not easy, but it becomes easier with experience. With more experience, you can intuitively recognise the core steps and critical tips discussed here. If you are a novice at event management, keeping calm and thinking like a seasoned professional will help ease the transition from beginner to expert.