Events do so much more than increase sales and attract customers. The greatest impact of events lies in their ability to foster an individual’s welfare and cultivate human relationships. To name a few, the positive effects of events include making people happier, building connections, promoting positive well-being, and providing the opportunity to relax and unwind.
However, only a well-hosted and well-planned event can achieve its desired results. That’s why today, we’re going to be diving into some simple yet powerful tips for hosting an event.
8 effective tips for hosting your upcoming event
1. Start with a SMART goal
Every event is birthed for a specific purpose. The goals serve as the “destination” of the whole experience. Following the SMART way of setting goals, you need to set SPECIFIC, MEASURABLE, ACHIEVABLE, RELEVANT and TIME-BOUND goals.
To make things clearer, we’ll take a look at some examples of common goals set for a fundraising event and narrow it down to detailed objectives. Let’s say that you want to raise money for the homeless in your local community. And you want to do that by selling tickets.
Specific and measurable
To make your objective specific, you might want to put it as “to be able to sell tickets in our talent show fundraising event.” Specific objectives are clear and quantifiable. Adding up the measurable aspect of it, you can say “to be able to sell 300 tickets in our talent show fundraising event.”
Achievable
Your objectives should also be achievable and reasonable. Selling 300 tickets in just a matter of days might be realistically impossible. So you can say that “to be able to sell 300 tickets in our talent show fundraising event and aim to sell at least 100 tickets per week.” To make your objectives achievable, you need to refer to past data to have a benchmark.
Relevant
A relevant objective always aligns with the general purpose of your organization. So your objective may go as “to be able to sell 300 tickets in our talent show fundraising event and aim to sell at least 100 tickets per week to feed homeless people in our community.”
Time-bound
Last but not the least, your objectives should include a specific time frame. Adding that up, your objective could look like this: “Within a month, we should be able to sell 300 tickets in our talent show fundraising event and aim to sell at least 100 tickets per week to feed homeless people in our community.”
When you start with SMART goals and objectives, your whole team can move forward with clear directions.
2. Know your audience well enough
In reference to the wise words of Peter F. Drucker, “The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sell itself.” In event marketing, knowing your audience is considered as a sacred creed; irrevocable and non-negotiable.
When you know your target market or audience well enough, selling your event will just naturally follow. How can you describe your post-pandemic audience today? They may be remote workers in their 40s. Or they could be working moms who are trying to juggle work and family life.
Knowing your prospects, on a personal level, will help you identify their needs and aspirations. And by identifying these, you can better relate and connect with them. These pieces of information are also necessary for deciding how your event will go, whether the situation is more appropriate to a virtual side or to an in-person event.
In addition to that, having an audience-centered content will ensure better engagement and comprehension.
3. Checklists will come in handy
With current situations changing from time to time, checklists are not only supplementary tools but they can be real event-savers. Checklists are important tools to keep every detail in check. They can also help you stay on schedule and help you track progress in your event planning or during execution.
The reality of events in 2022 is definitely just an extension of the past year with hybrids dominating the industry. Additional details for setting up your virtual space should be added to your usual planning checklists. AVR equipment such as high-quality microphones, cameras, webcams, speakers and mixers are necessary items on the list. A strong and reliable internet server, computer system, and streaming software are also important.
Incorporate these event planning logistics to your checklists. Planning to host a webinar? Check out the steps in hosting a webinar.
4. Schedule and make decisions ahead of time
The year ahead is still filled with uncertainties and surprises. That’s why you should make necessary decisions, like choosing your vendors, as early as possible. When things go into unexpected turns, you can make adjustments before the event starts.
Outsourcing your vendors in the post-pandemic world needs some important pointers. One thing you need to look out for is their contract flexibility when cancellations happen. You should also know their commitment to cleaning spaces since sanitation and safety is one of the deciding factors of people joining in person-gathering.
In line with venue hunting, you should take note if there are areas that are off-limits to people. Some venues today closed their public drinking water fountains as a way of complying with health protocols. This is an important detail that you need to deliver to your attendees who might be expecting free water.
Another factor you need to note is that there will be fewer staff available from your vendors. With this in mind, you could project the services you’ll be needing in response to the expected number of your attendees.
5. Create an easy-to-use registration and ticketing process
As an event planner, you want to provide your stakeholders convenience in every way possible. Registration can be considered as the initial contact point between you and your prospects. Their experience will set expectations for the rest of the event.
That’s why you need to create an easy-to-use registration method that will leave a positive impact on them and will encourage people to register. Event Smart is an event manager and ticketing software that will take care of your registration needs.
Event Smart solutions will streamline the work of setting up an event registration page, collecting information from attendees, collecting credit card payments, and sending tickets for in-person events or even virtual meeting links for online events.
Contactless technology like Event Smart makes it possible for safe and fast event management.
6. Encourage engagement through incentives
According to research done by Markletic, “49% of marketers say that audience engagement is the biggest contributing factor to having a successful event.” Keeping attendees engaged and connected is challenging in a virtual and hybrid environment.
However, there are definitely ways to achieve this. The same research states that “71% of marketers use polling to make sure that their audience doesn’t lose attention.” Furthermore, “61% of marketers use videos as an interactive element to keep people engaged.”
Event marketers also utilize Q&A sessions as opportunities for attendees, especially those attending online, to engage and voice their opinions and questions. In addition to this, you could also use the classic reward system to stir up some competition.
You can host playful games in between sessions. This will not only give people time for breaks but you can also use this to evaluate if they’ve learned something. One way to do this is to launch some sort of trivia game.
7. Health and safety are priorities
As safety becomes the top deciding factor of people joining live, it’s your priority to uphold the best hygiene and safety practices. To do this, you can create some safety guidelines and must-follow rules. Instill to your attendees that their safety is first and foremost their responsibility and not just yours.
Inform attendees of safety requirements ahead of time like proof of vaccinations, rapid test results, wearing of face masks and other coverings etc. Make sure that your venue is also thoroughly equipped with sanitation booths, place markers, rapid test areas, and temperature checks. Make sure that you prepare extra face masks.
As for food and beverages, you can serve them in packed meals. You can also encourage your live attendees to bring their own food and drinks.
8. Do a run-through of the event
Things will not go 100% as planned. There will be unexpected situations just popping out of nowhere. By doing a run-through, you can somehow anticipate any possible problem. This will help the team to prepare means to mitigate them.
A run-through is especially needed for a hybrid event where the platform is more complex and demanding. From testing that all equipment is working properly, to ensuring that all sessions are within the allotted time, there is much work to be done. Run-throughs also help speakers get used to the set up.
Wrapping up
2022 is definitely an exciting year for events. Event planning might be challenging. There might be setbacks and bumps along the way but just like the saying goes, “practice makes perfect.” Your experiences still remain as valuable assets you can use to move forward.
When you apply these hosting tips coupled with Event Smart, you’re bound to succeed. Take it from the honest words of our customer:
“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. The dashboard was a little complex but there was plenty of tutorials and their customer service was on top of it, very prompt in responses.”
See for yourself by starting your free trial today.