Regardless of how big an event will be, event planning and event management is always a rigorous process, for new event planners and professional event planners alike. You need to deal with a handful of people and logistics. Juggling with all these tasks might be overwhelming.
We created this event guide to help you in your planning journey. Let’s discover the steps and stages of the event planning process.
What is an event planning and why is it important?
Before we get into the steps and technicalities of organizing an event, let us first define what event planning is and why it is so important.
According to the US Department of Labor, event planning is defined as: “consists of coordinating every detail of meetings and conventions, from the speakers and meeting location to arranging for printed materials and audio-visual equipment.”
Having an event management plan is greatly important for a variety of reasons.
- Event Planning creates an outline and an overview of the whole event.
Event planning will allow you to visualize how you want your event to go or how you want it to look, or what experience you want your attendees to have. It simplifies the process and at the same time, helps you see the bigger picture.
- Event Planning ensures that you don’t miss preparing anything important.
Preparation is always the key to successful execution. When you have an intricate and detailed event plan, you will have a detailed list on which services and materials you’ll be needing. From the tiniest detail to the major ones, you are confident that everything is well-accounted for.
- Event planning allows you to stay on time and on budget.
You need to remember that preparing and hosting an event operates in a limited time and budget. You need to be wise and practical so that you won’t waste any time and money during preparation. Event planning will help you in doing so.
- Event Planning will help you foresee and anticipate any possible problems.
As you go through your planning, you will come to identify any possible loopholes and issues that might arise during the event. And as you identify these loopholes, you can make necessary changes and countermeasures.
Corporate event
Elements of event planning
Though one event varies from one another, the following are the major elements that you need to deal with during planning your event.
- Event budget
Your event budget should include expenses before, during, and after the event; must be as accurate as possible but should also give way to some minor flexibility along the way.
- Event Venue
This is the physical or virtual location where the event will take place. Some major considerations in deciding for the venue include the type of event, number of participants, nature of activities, and presence of any person needing special assistance/needs.
- Event Committee/volunteers
The Event Committees refer to the internal team of volunteers assigned to specific tasks like securing the venue, production, entertainment, food and beverage, equipment, guest services, ticketing, registration, check-in, security, etc.
- Event Marketing strategy
Your effective marketing strategy will help you reach your target audience and target number of people by getting the word out about your event.
- Event Keynote speakers/ guest speakers
These are the designated people who are responsible to deliver meaningful and relevant content and inspiration and leadership at the event.
- Event Sponsors
Event planning is very important in identifying and reaching out to potential sponsors. Whether they be an organization or individuals, sponsors help lower costs and benefit from associating with your attendees
- Event Production
This refers to the set up in light, music, video, and design, layout, equipment, etc.
- Event Technology
Event technology for registration, ticket sales, payments, live streaming, check-ins, and attendee engagement are essential because they help you be better organized and save you time and money.
- Event Content
An event is as good as its content. Whether the content is educational, inspirational, or technical, it should reflect your organization’s values and should serve the purpose of the event which is to support the attendees.
- Event Vendors
From the production teams to the catering services, and security, all commissioned help you are considered vendors.
- Event Participants or Attendees
They are the people who you are trying to reach using your event. They are also the same people you need to engage and connect with.
12 Stages of Event Planning
1. Start with your vision for the event.
Quickly define what you would like to see happen at the event, or the outcome of the event. This vision will help you articulate goals, and plans to be successful.
The second step in planning is establishing your event goals and objectives. This is how you define the event’s success and it will set the course and direction of the event planning.
So whether you are aiming to promote a new product or attract new customers, it’s very important to set specific goals that the whole team can follow. And it shouldn’t only be specific, it should also follow the SMART technique in creating goals.
Event Goals
2. Recruit volunteers and set up committees
After you have identified your objectives and goals, it’s time to take in volunteers. The importance of having a team can’t be undervalued. According to the legend, Michael Jordan, “Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence win championships.”
So if you want to win big in the championships of event planning, you need a solid team to back you up. As event planners, you can only be as effective as your team.
If you are planning for an upcoming fundraising event, recruiting volunteers is an effective way to cut down labor costs. You can find many people who are willing to lend a helping hand to a philanthropic cause.
You can assign these volunteers to manage registration and admissions, manage traffic and parking spaces, serve food and beverages, offer first aid services, and usher people.
In addition to these major responsibilities, some of the basic committees you need to create include the following: planning committee, production committee, program committee, registration committee, food committee, finance committee, etc.
Have a jumpstart in your event planning and preparation by knowing some important event planning logistics.
Volunteers on a fundraising committee
How many volunteers do I need?
So how many volunteers do you really need? Well, it depends on the number of participants and the existing workload. There are still restrictions on in-person attendance due to the ongoing pandemic, so having a standard number of volunteers is on a case-to-case basis. Will some of the work be handled by a vendor or contractor?
3. Research, research, and research!
You can never go wrong with research. There is a wide range of areas that you need to research. First of which is your target market. Who are those people you want to reach through your event? What are their needs? What interests them?
Research on potential venues and vendors. Another thing that you need to look upon is the details of the event. What is the ideal length for the talk or Q&A session? How many talks should you do? How often should you do breaks and where should you put them?
You should also check out your competitors to stay at the top of your game. What makes their recent events successful? How can I improve mine?
4. Come up with an event budget
Setting up the budget might be considered the most stressful stage in event planning. You need to be as accurate and as strict as possible since you’re dealing with money. However, it’s not as scary as you might think.
You need to start by asking for the overall budget allotted for the event. You may be hosting a conference with an overall budget of $75,000. Or you may be allowed to spend $10,000 for planning a class reunion. Keeping this in mind will help you budget accordingly.
After knowing the allotted budget, you can then start listing vendors and materials that you need to purchase. Some of the most common items are venue, decoration costs, production costs, food and beverages, and total expenses for speakers (talent fee, accommodations, transportation fees, etc.). If you’re planning a webinar and other virtual events, you will need special equipment for your AV production.
5. Set a date and pick a venue
The date of the event and the venue play major roles in determining the success of your event. In deciding when to hold the event, factors like availability of all stakeholders, duration of event preparation process, weather conditions, holidays, competitor’s events, and time differences between participants (virtual and on-site) should be considered.
Setting up the event date
The most suitable date is when the most important stakeholders and attendees are available. And if possible, avoid times that may have weather disturbance nor coincide with any major holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas where people are very busy.
You should also look out for any events hosted by your competitors.
Lastly, take note of the different time zones, especially for your virtual attendees. Place the sessions strategically where you are sure that your virtual participants are awake and active.
Pick the venue by keeping in mind the following considerations:
- Total number of attendees
- Nature of activities and sessions
- The ambiance of the place
- Venue’s capacity and accessibility (is it easy to get to or seclusive)
- Parking spaces of the venue
- Facilities in keeping with the mandated health guidelines
- Cancellation policies
6. Plan the event design
This stage of the planning process refers to the layout, decorations, lighting, style, and other visual details of the event. It should reflect and follow the decided theme and purpose of the event. If you’re doing a dinner gala with a masquerade party as the theme, then you can try to transform the venue into a ballroom. Additionally, you can ask the participants to wear gowns and suits.
An attractive and well-decorated venue will brighten up the mood of the participants. Furthermore, it alleviates excitement. Decorations are also necessary for creating a desired ambiance and atmosphere where attendees can comfortably interact and maneuver around.
7. Create compelling content
Bizzabo reports that “more than 72% of virtual event attendees say that learning is their primary goal with the virtual events they attend.” Some may want to expand their connections and networks. For others, their motivation may just simply be interacting with their peers.
No matter what the participants’ reasons are, it’s your job to meet their needs and expectations. And you can do this by crafting your content accordingly and strategically. More content marketers and organizations lean on significant issues like diversity, equity and inclusion.
Creating content that is relevant and addresses today’s leading issues will not only attract attendees but will leave a lasting impact on people. If you’re hosting events that are not for business purposes like planning a family reunion and fundraising events, your program should be engaging and entertaining enough.
8. Choose the speakers
Deciding who’ll be delivering the content is the next stage in event planning. Choose speakers that are not only knowledgeable enough but are good communicators. They should be able to effectively engage participants whether you plan on hosting an in-person event, online, or a mix of the two (hybrid).
9. Outsource vendors
The research phase should include vendor hunting. If you’ve been planning events for a while, you may already have a list of people that you have worked with in the past.
Your past working experience will help you evaluate which persons are fit for the job. Furthermore, your connections may help you get incentives like discounts.
If you’re a newbie event planner/organizer, outsourcing might be challenging but meeting new people will expand your network and connections. Ask your colleagues who are in the same business as you for any references.
Or, you can hit the internet for a thorough search. Research is very important so that you can have a reference on usual rates for services. In this way, you won’t fall for any tricks like overpriced costs.
You can also get a ton of reviews from the internet. This will help you decide on which services and event staff to choose.
10. Launch your marketing strategy
No matter how great your event plans are, if you don’t have an effective event marketing plan, everything will go to waste. Start your event promotion by creating an event website. You can post the details of your event here.
Utilize other marketing channels like social media and email marketing. Start your social media campaigns by posting teasers. You could also facilitate small games to build excitement. interact with your social media followers as early as possible.
Maximize offline publicity by giving fliers and supporting local businesses.
11. Set up the event registration and start selling tickets
After you have created a website for your event, it’s now time to accept registrations and sell tickets. An event management software like Event Smart allows you to accept online registrations for conferences or any other events.
The software will allow you to set up registration easily right at your event website. It will help you create customized registration forms. You can sell as many tickets as you like with no additional merchant fees. Every time an attendee pays, the fund will directly be reflected in your merchant account.
12. Evaluate and create post-event engagement
If you follow this guide, we bet that your event is a success! Kudos to the whole team for an excellent job. But before everyone gets carried away, it’s important to always have time for assessment and evaluation. This will help the team identify problems and issues encountered.
Upon assessment, list out the things that went right, what didn’t and how we can do more of what went right. You can do a post-survey to your event attendees and guests.
Evaluating your event after it is over will let you know what you can do better in your next event. You should not stop here. Post-event engagement is very important, especially in retaining new customers or new donors.
Post photos and videos of the event. Don’t forget to post a heartfelt thank you to everyone who participated and supported the event. Gratitude can go a long way.
How Event Smart Can Help You Plan Your Event
Event planning and event management can be more productive and enjoyable when you have a team that supports you. Event Smart has helped hundreds of event planners and organizations set up their events. We have helped them manage thousands of registrations and sell tickets.
Here’s what our customers say about us,
“ We used Event Smart for our Annual National Conference. It was easy to use and had all the features we needed for a multiple-day event with numerous concurrent sessions. It had multiple pricing levels and promo codes were easy to apply.”
From start to finish, we will be with you. We will make sure that you will have a successful event. Start our free trial and see for yourself.