Planning an event is something that requires a lot of hard work and concentration, especially if it is your first time doing it.

We’ve experienced the pain that almost all of us will find in the event planning business, but then we found a great and simple solution.

To make an event stand out is hard, almost as being an apple in the supermarket and trying to stand out from the others in the same basket as you. So, before starting to search for a venue, find the people to help you out, reach out to partners and sponsors or to get volunteers, you should start with something easier.

In our 10 step guide it will all look easy to do and in no time, you’ll have your event set up.

Before we start I just want you to know that we have this guide in a Slideshare presentation. Just click here to see it.

1. Develop the event objectives

You should answer the following questions first, then you can answer to others. But these two first ones will help you define your mission and final objective that you want to with this event.

• Why am I doing this event?
• What I’m expecting to accomplish?

2. Write down everything that you’ll need

At this moment, you should not worry about your future budget. In many cases, you can reach a lots of those needs by doing partnerships.

Everything that you should take care right now is:

1. What will be the venue that you want for your event?
2. What will be the speakers that you would like to have? Organize the list by relevance.
3. What kind of activities and entertainment are you thinking of?
4. Are you going to advertise the event?
5. Do you have in mind what kind of partnerships and sponsorships you can make?
6. Volunteers? Yes or no?

3. Set a Schedule

If the event happens regularly you don’t have to think about that, but if it is a new event consider:

• 4 to 6 months of preparation
• Pay attention to statutory and religious holidays
• Avoid school holiday time periods
• Start calling soon to the major participants for your event to check availability

 

4. Event Branding

Go right after to ambitions and essence of the proposed event.

Develop the branding thinking about your style and vision. That is important to the audience feel you.

Names brainstorming: When you’re thinking on the name of your event consider:

1. How your event is different from the competition?
2. What you expect to achieve with this event?
3. Create a simple slogan example Youcanevent – “Easy event planning”
4. Design your logo

5. Define your plan with a notepad

This plan is not the same as the one mentioned on section 2. In here you must write down everything that will be essential for your event. Although you should always get an idea from what you have wrote on section 2.

You must include:

1. Venue, logistics & catering management (contracts, permits, insurance, etc.) b) Speakers/presenters (identifying, confirming, logistics & management)
2. Activities/entertainment
3. Publicity/promotion (online & off-line, e.g.: web page & online promotion; events calendars; printed programs; media relations; signage; social media, etc.)
4. Registration (online sign-up, payment and tracking; on-site sign-in, etc.) f) Sponsor/partner management
5. Volunteer management

 

Keep going you’re halfway there!

 

 

6. Define the Management or Managers of the event

In other words address people from your team to control the different processes during the event.

1. Are you going to handle the arrival of the guests or it will be somebody else?
2. Who will do the check in of the attendees?
3. Who is going to control the deliveries of the vendors?

 

7. Identify and establish partnerships and sponsorships

Are there organizations that you could partner with or call on for sponsorships to defray the costs and increase potential participation?

When you involve other people or groups in your event, they have a stake in helping spread the word and making the event a success.

You might want to consider:

1. Seeking corporate sponsors to fund a portion of the event. This can range from national organizations that might want to sponsor a dinner, offer a door prize or a key silent auction item, to local businesses that might be able to provide goods or services, such as flowers for the tables, gift bag items, etc
2. Partnering with community organizations who might be able to offer a venue and/or assistance with organizing or staffing an event

 

8. Creating an Advertisement Plan

The best way to advertise your event is:

1. Phone calls to the most important and influencers of the industry of your event
2. Advertisement in social media (facebook and if you have video Youtube works weel), with the creation of a facebook groups and events to add all the attendees and keeping them notified with latest improvements.
3. Graphics (flyers, posters and invitation cards) works very well to give a 1 to 1 relationship to the event
4. Creation of online tickets to control the average of attendees and forcing them to a call to action.
5. Find your key influencers and pay or ask them to talk about your event
6. Define a little number of Ambassadors (probably most of the time they came from key influencers) and give them the job of “Celebrity PR” (public relationship).

 

9. Now yes, set a budget!

You should consider all the topics mentioned on point 5 and 8. The partnerships and sponsorships mentioned on point 7. Can be very helpful to decrease the budget.

 

10. How will you define the success of your event?

How are you going to measure the success of your event? There are different metrics on events success evaluation, and you should only choose the ones that suits you best:

1. Number of attendees
2. Donations raised
3. Number of interactions after the event
4. Social media promotion (if the crowd attended to your hashtag for example) e) Number of sales generated after you offered coupons
5. Increasing awareness on the industry because of celebrities and key influencers presence on your event.

 

By following these 10 steps you will be ready to plan your event and make it memorable for everyone.

Do you have any kind of questions related with any section? You can always contact us to [email protected] or to +351 929 248 860. We will provide you Free Event Consultancy.