Your company has come up with a breakthrough new product. You want to promote it and allow some of the public to try it but you’re not sure how. Why not host a business event?
While this route can be a bit expensive you’ll make the money back with the number of sales you’ll get when your guests write reviews of your product.
Have you never hosted an event for one of your products before? Don’t worry we’ve got a basic idea for how you should handle it. Keep reading for a complete guide on how to host a business event.
1. Set a Goal
The first part of any good plan is to set a goal. What do you want out of this event? Do you want to sell a product or do you want to simply make more people aware of your business?
Both of these are real, tangible goals that are easy to plan an event around.
The Scope of the Event
Now that you have a goal in mind you can start planning your event around it. Do you want to serve refreshments? Will it be a social gathering or something more like a workshop seminar?
Whatever you do, if this is your first time planning an event, don't start off with an all-day party in a large hotel with over a hundred guests. You don't want to overwhelm yourself or set yourself up for failure.
2. Your Guests
The next thing you need to consider is your guests. How many do you want to have, how are you going to keep their attention during the event, and how are you going to let them know about it?
Keep Things Small
Even though you'll be tempted to invite everyone and anyone to your event, it's a better idea to keep things small. This will help everyone network with each other easier.
If you have a guest speaker of any kind, keeping things small also helps them engage with the audience on a deeper level.
Target Them
Many events go south because the host forgets this crucial part. You need to figure out what your target audience is so you can gear everything from the invitations to your theme around them.
If the event stops being interesting then your audience will stop listening and it will be harder to sell them on your product/service.
Communicate
Communication is key. Without it, your audience doesn't even know that you have an event going on. Send out your invitations and then set up a website for the event. You'll then use this site to post updates for your guests.
Read more and do your research so the website looks good and is easy to navigate. You may also want to set up an event page on social media so you can filter out the confirmed guests and send them reminders.
3. Timing
The next thing that you need to keep in mind before invitations go out is your timing. You don't want to have an event going on during a national holiday. Nobody will show up.
If you're holding your event at your office and have regular customers coming in throughout the day make sure you plan around that. Schedule your event to take place during one of your slow days that way you can attend to your guests and your customers.
Lastly, if this is your first event ever, give yourself months of wiggle room so you can take your planning at a comfortable pace.
4. Assemble Your Team
If you want to get this event together on time you're going to need to assemble a crew to help you do it. Choose yourself or one good employee to take control over the entire operation. From there you can put other employees on smaller tasks.
Partner with Other Businesses
If there is another business in your area that gets the same clientele but isn't a direct competitor, you should consider partnering up with them for the event. Not only will you have someone else helping you pay for everything but you'll also have an extra set of hands for planning.
5. Your Budget
As you start to gather stuff you need for the event you'll start to notice that it's getting expensive. This is when you should probably stop and revisit your budget. See if there is anything you could do without or go cheaper on.
If there is nothing that you can do without, then you may need to try and find another place where you can bring in income. Try and get some sort of sponsor or start selling tickets to the event early. Again, partnering with another business will also take away some of the financial burdens.
6. Location
Just because it's a business meeting doesn't mean that you have to have it in an office setting. If you're going to pick an alternate location make sure that it's appealing and easy to get to.
You should be able to get to it via main roads and major highways. If you're going to use any technology such as projectors and screens you should arrive ahead of time to make sure that it's working. Nothing can ruin a presentation quite like faulty tech.
How to Plan a Business Event that Nobody Will Ever Forget
Are you planning your first business event? It can be a lot of running around and stress but if you follow the tips that we've given you here, it should go off without too many hitches. Create an event that nobody will ever forget.
Did what you read here today help you with your office event? Glad to hear it! Check out the other areas of our blog for even more business tips.
