Tips On Planning Your Own Business Event

Most of us will have attended business events throughout our careers.  From large trade shows to conferences, seminars or roundtables, a well run event can spark your inspiration and energize you. 

With most of our communications happening online, getting together a group of your peers and industry influencers can be an extraordinary experience for those attending. 

If you are considering running your own events to build your business, here are a few things you’ll need to consider before you get started. 

# 1  Ask Yourself Why You Want To Run An Event

Have you identified a gap in the market for the event and is it a natural fit for your business model? If there are already a lot of high profile events in your sector, you may have trouble making an impact.  

Or maybe you’re in a state that doesn’t hold any events and you could target those in the sector who don’t necessarily want to travel cross-country every time they want to network with others. 

Good events can be expensive to run produce and even smaller ones require a lot of planning and Event production. 

Do you want to make money from people attending the event through ticket sales, or is the goal to generate business leads. 

#2 – Decide On The Scope Of The Event

Events are big business, with over $350 billion of direct spending being attributed to the meetings and events industry annually. 

Do you see your event as a large conference with keynote speakers, an industry panel or a hands-on workshop? Bigger isn’t always better.  

In a lot of cases, your available budget will be the deciding factor. If you’re bootstrapping the event, then don’t be afraid to start small. Will you be looking for sponsors or advertisers to offset the costs and drive interest? 

A well-planned event with 30 target attendees is better than 200 people who are unlikely to do business with you. 

#3 Plan, Plan, Plan

A well-run event takes a lot of planning and promotion, so the sooner you start planning it, the better. The bigger the event, the sooner you should start planning it.  

There are many logistical variables to take into account from venues to catering to speakers. 

#4 Be Creative With Your Choice Of Speakers

If you plan on having speakers at your event, then they need to know what they are talking about and be appealing to your target audience. A high-level keynote speaker can be very expensive so you’ll need to get creative.  

Look for people working at well-known companies or with a good online presence.   You’re looking for the hidden gems, that don’t often speak at these kinds of events. 

#5 Get On Top Of Your Marketing 

You’ll need to start promoting your event as soon as possible so that you can fill up the delegate spaces fast.  It can be extremely nervewracking to still be selling tickets in the days leading up to the event itself, so give yourself the best possible chance by developing a comprehensive marketing plan that incorporates: 

• PR 
• Blogging/guest blogging
• Email marketing
• Social Media 
• Paid Advertising
• Video