Month: December 2022

Download Part 3 now using the button above to gain access to the final part of our EventMploy E-book for today’s Event Planners. Utilise all planning documents provided to get ahead for your next event.

Who are the right staff for your next event?

The Event Who is the plan about who you will use to help deliver the event.  For smaller events you may do all of the delivery yourself but even so it is likely you will still have suppliers that you will use.  Some of the other groups of people and suggestions about how to build relationships are listed below.

Volunteers

Volunteers are a tricky group to manage, because they are volunteers you may feel as though you don’t have the right to expect good performance, but you do!  This takes leadership skills though and an ability to influence people to get the outcome you need to achieve your vision.  

There are a lot of Apps that help you recruit and communicate with volunteers but they need more information than you think they do.  

The volunteer’s job may be fairly easy but for your event to be a success you will need to give them information about how to do that job well. Try to think about all the different questions attendees might ask them and give them enough information to be able to answer those questions confidently.  

For example, if your event is a community festival and you have volunteers selling ride tickets, create a “ready reckoner” for them so they know exactly what they are charging for two, four, six, eight tickets of whatever packages you have, give them some idea about the rules, can they give attendees a refund, if so under what circumstances?

f you have a number of volunteers filling shifts during the day make sure you have a system where the person off duty is to give the next person a briefing about what they need to do.  

It might seem like you are giving them too much information but if you don’t provide enough information, two things can happen – either they will feel that they are unable to contribute because they don’t have enough information and they may not want to volunteer again or they will make their own decisions that are not in line with the event values and this could damage the brand of the event.

Event Suppliers

Choose event suppliers carefully because they can make or break you event.  If possible ask around and get some recommendations for their services.  

Things to consider, 

• are they responsive to your queries?  
• If they get back to you in a reasonable time this may indicate that they will be reliable.  
• If they are providing additional information on top of what you have requested this is a good sign, as long as it is relevant, this will indicate to you that they know their business and they understand what you are trying achieve.  
• If they offer suggestions for how you might produce the same result or better results with a different approach once again this will help identify that they know their business and they really want to help you deliver a fantastic event.   

Use the table following to make notes about suppliers and services.  It’s handy to keep notes on supplier’s service and prices for future events.

Download the E-book now to access this table and our library of planning tools…

Use the above button to download our Event Planner Notebook Part 2 to access our EventMploy planning resources and tools for you to fill in as you plan. In Part 2 we cover the when, where, and how of planning your next event. Read our guidance on planning for event risks.

When should you stage your event?

There are a number of considerations when determining when to stage your event. These are just some examples…

• What else is happening – research other competing events or other events that may impact the staging of your event, for example if you need to hire marquees it is a good idea to make sure there is not another event in town on the same weekend hiring out all the good marquees.
• Review back to the event vision, when should the event take place to achieve the vision.
• Think about the lead time you have available.  Working out your event timeframe means having a clear idea of all of the tasks and activities needed to be completed. 
• Is your venue available.  Some events might not work if they are not in the right venue, a major sporting event needs a stadium, a couple might have a dream location in mind for their wedding or the event has capacity requirements that can only be met by a certain venue. In these situations the When of the event might be dictacted by venue availability.
• Sporting events might have to occur at a certain time of the year or part of the season.
• How complex the event is

To give you some idea a milestone birthday party can take around a month to organise.  A networking event, customer appreciation event, product launch somewhere between 3 to 6 months and a fundraising gala, trade show or a fete could take 6-12 months.

Finally think about your target market and determine an event time that is most likely to suit.  Family events during the day over a weekend but not too late on a Sunday for example.

Use the planner document in our E-book to determine the best time for your event.

Choosing a venue

Choosing a venue may be simple if you have a readymade venue at your fingertips like a school, however if the choice of venue is not forced upon you these are some of the things you need to think about when selecting the venue: 

• Does it fit with the event concept? 
• Will the venue hold the expected attendance?  
• If your event is a free event can the venue can cater if more than expected people turn up?
• Is the venue available when you need it?
• Does the venue have a good reputation among event managers and customers?  
• What are the technical capabilities of the building like free wifi, ability of the venue to support your audio-visual requirements?
• What does the venue provide, what facilities and amenities are available – parking, toilets, cloak rooms?
• What food and beverage facilities are available?  
• Do they have a licence to serve alcohol?  
• Does the venue provide event staff?  
• Does the venue have sustainable practices?  
• How safe is the venue, do they have an emergency management plan?  

Developing a checklist of these things will help ensure you have all of the potential issues covered, it’s really hard to remember everything so keeping a list like this will be invaluable. 

Accessibility and community impacts

Is the venue or your event easily accessible? Is there public transport nearby? Are there parking facilities? 

The time of your event will impact how people will travel.  An event finishing later in the night will have a higher number of event attendees looking to drive. If it is too hard or inconvenient to get to the venue your attendees just won’t come.  

Also remember that the customer experience includes the journey to the event.  The last thing you want are attendees turning up to the event in a bad mood because there was no parking or bad traffic management which created traffic jams and they were late for the start of the event.

Think about the impact of the event on the local community.  A heavy metal rock outdoor concert will have a higher impact on the community than a classical concert held in an auditorium.  

If you are holding an event on the weekend in a local community, you may need to talk to the local council about road closures and advise residents about the expected increase in pedestrian and vehicle traffic.

Download the E-book now to start using these planning tools and continue reading…

Download our Event Planner Notebook Part 1 using the above button to access our EventMploy tips and tricks to plan your next event. We have included planning resources and tools for you to fill in as you plan. This Three-Part Series will help you break down your Event planning tasks into digestible goals, and support you in brainstorming, contingency planning, and problem solving.

Throughout history our communities have come together to celebrate, to learn, to enjoy theatre, music or sport.  

Event management therefore is as old as civilised society however it remains a small industry of unique individuals who have a huge range of skills and who at times have to work under an enormous strain to ensure that the “show must go on”; people who forego their own weekends, nights and public holidays to ensure the enjoyment of others.   That said it is so much fun.   

Event management can be broken down into seven elements – why, what, when, where, how, who and how well.  Following this process can help what seems like an overwhelming list of things to do become more achievable.

The 7-steps

The 7-steps process while simple can really help identify what needs to be done in order to create and manage a great event.  It doesn’t matter if you are someone volunteering to run your first school fete or sporting club family day or your cousin’s wedding, a product launch or a conference by using the processes detailed in this book, the checklists and the suggested activities you will have all you need to manage your own event.

One of the most challenging elements of event management is focus!  Events are time specific therefore you don’t get the gift of time, all the way through the process you will choose to complete one activity over another competing activity.  Sometimes these will be choices you make and other times they will be forced upon you by suppliers or circumstance.  Using a tool like this book will help you keep on top of the huge number of decisions you must make and tasks you must complete or delegate.

Event managers need to be the calmest person in the room because things can and do go wrong, by planning and using the processes outlined here you will be in a much better position to deal with issues as they arise and still put on a fantastic event.

How this book works

The first section of the book combines information about the 7-step process along with tasks you need to complete.  The second section of the book has all the actionable items repeated so you can use these to manage another two events.

Before you start let’s get the creative juices flowing by thinking about events you may have been to in the past.

Let’s get started!

The 3 Best Events I Have Attended

Event 1 ____________________________

What made it great?

What would have made it greater?

Event 2 ____________________________

What made it great?

What would have made it greater?

Event 3 ____________________________

What made it great?

What would have made it greater?

Let’s talk about vision

Why are you running your event? 

Events are about make an emotional connection and you need to be very clear about what you are trying to achieve.  Is it to raise money, give back to the community or celebrate an important event in your life.   The Why is critical to the eventual outcome.  

People do and buy things that make them feel good.   Your event must tap into something special inside each of your attendees.  A good example of this is if you are running a school fete.  A great way to connect with the attendees is to get their kids involved.  Parents love seeing their kids in the spotlight!

A vision creates understanding about what you are trying to achieve, the purpose of the event and the principles that drive your decision making along the way.

Sometimes you will be the event manager not the event creator so if you are it is even more important to understand why the event exists, this understanding will drive everything you do and help you connect with volunteers, suppliers, customers and any other stakeholders.

It might seem a bit of an overkill to create a vision for your event, however, with all of the competing priorities you will face when creating and managing an event along with everything else in your work and personal life the vision will keep you anchored in what you want to achieve.  When you feel a little lost come back to the vision and remind yourself why you began the event in the first place.

Download the E-book now to learn how to write a vision, and more…