Originally posted on Achieve.
I have had the great pleasure of working on MCON since its founding in 2011 and have learned A LOT over the years about event planning. From the experience design to logistics to technology to coordinating with speakers, sponsors, partners, media … so many details are involved, which can make an event a huge time suck if you let it.
Part of what I’ve been (slowly) learning is how to pull off a good event without letting it exhaust the team (or me).
Give Your Promotional Partners Effective Collateral
Your reach can only go so far, so it’s common knowledge that you need help from other organizations to promote your event. However, your promotional partners don’t often have what they need to accurately talk about the purpose of your event. For MCON, here are the steps we take to secure and effectively use our promotional partners to further the event:
- Make a list of who we want as promotional partners.
- Draft an agreement with expectations of what each party will do.
- Contact those on your list.
- Finalize the agreement.
- Schedule a phone call to talk about the promotional partner’s audience.
- Provide copy and graphics they can use to promote the event.
- Send updated graphics as event details become firm.
When we give our promotional partners graphics, we have already discussed who the partner’s audience is and what they will find valuable at our event. That way, we know we are marketing the right information based on the audience.
Here are some examples of what we provide:
Set Expectations with Your Speakers
If you aren’t providing amazing content via your speakers, then you might as well not be doing an event at all. We go through extensive due diligence process to select speakers for MCON and make sure they are high-quality presenters who will inspire our audience in an unexpected way. Part of that process is setting expectations with speakers on what we want to see from them. A few key things we include in our guidelines are:
- Description of the event and theme.
- Who the audience is.
- Description of the stage, technology and how their slides will be presented.
- Slide guidelines, including size, style (full images, minimal text), no animation, videos specs and due date.
- Rehearsal time and who will be there.
- An example of strong slides from past MCONs.
- Videos examples of featured speakers from past MCONs.
Invest in Video and Photography
You can certainly find places to cut costs at your event; however, high-quality photos and videos of the experience are imperative. This is one of the best investments you can make because they give you all the pieces you need to promote your event in the future. Don’t you want hundreds (or thousands) of people to see how awesome your event is and how much fun everyone has so they want to attend this time?
Even if event planning isn’t the only thing in your job description, heeding these tips will help your event run smoothly and look professional. What have you learned about planning a great event?