Good resolutions for event planners

New year, new res­o­lu­tions. We don’t always keep them, but they are here to help us get a good start and remind us of areas of improve­ments as well as good prac­tices… Here are the good res­o­lu­tions of the event plan­ner to pre­pare for the year in the best con­di­tions.

1. Stick to your plan

It may be the ulti­mate res­o­lu­tion — one that is nev­er com­plete­ly kept despite all pos­si­ble efforts! Organ­is­ing an event is always filled with unex­pect­ed cir­cum­stances and set­backs. It is there­fore essen­tial to make a detailed plan in order to give your­self the best chances to stick to it, to pre­pare and spread out the work­load, to antic­i­pate major con­cerns, to pri­ori­tise and to del­e­gate cer­tain tasks.

2. Check out what others do

When think­ing about your event, it’s impor­tant to check out what’s hap­pen­ing else­where, around you. Part­ly not to repeat what has already been done (and did not work) but also to under­stand how you can stand out, what were the expe­ri­ences the atten­dees liked, and draw both good and poor prac­tices. It is also an oppor­tu­ni­ty to find new ser­vice providers or cre­ative ideas.

3. Delegate and manage your team well

Man­ag­ing a team is not always easy, this is true whether you are deal­ing with 2 peo­ple or 20. Add the unavoid­able time con­straints per­va­sive to the event indus­try, and you real­ly need to know you can rely on your peo­ple and trust them. Once you have allo­cat­ed tasks, it is impor­tant to fol­low-up and have a strong com­mu­ni­ca­tion to ensure the smooth run­ning of your event while giv­ing the nec­es­sary inde­pen­dence to each per­son so that they can ful­fil their role.

4. Know how to take the time, even under pressure

In the rush of the organ­i­sa­tion, espe­cial­ly a few weeks before the event it is impor­tant to take time to breathe. This allows you to take a step back and see things clear­ly, to make the right deci­sions and know how to bounce back (we’re talk­ing about it below). And quite sim­ply, it will pre­vent ten­sions in the team, with your ser­vice providers, or guests on D‑Day.

5. Sell your tickets yourself!

(Re)gain con­trol of your event and choose to use an online tick­et­ing solu­tion for your event. Inte­grate it to your web­site or use a mini-site to col­lect data about your audi­ence, cre­ate your cus­tom forms and many oth­er fea­tures!

6. (Really) Know your audience

Get to know your audi­ence by col­lect­ing the data that inter­ests you. Who are they? Where do they come from? How did they hear about your event? Etc. This infor­ma­tion will allow you to adjust your event so that it meets their expec­ta­tions and sur­pris­es them. Analysing some of the data, you’ll be able to know where to focus your efforts and invest­ments, which com­mu­ni­ca­tions chan­nels work best, what mes­sages are most appeal­ing, …

7. Build loyalty

Once the data is col­lect­ed, you’ll have a bet­ter under­stand­ing of your atten­dees so you can reach them using the right mes­sage, the right tone of voice. Retain your par­tic­i­pants by keep­ing in touch with them, have them be part of the event by offer­ing them an unex­pect­ed and suc­cess­ful expe­ri­ence and ask­ing for their opin­ion. Cre­ate a mail­ing cam­paign with a sat­is­fac­tion sur­vey, encour­age them to share their com­ments on social media and their expe­ri­ence dur­ing the event! This allows you to have con­tent from them and good vis­i­bil­i­ty.

8. Know how to bounce back on the day and be flexible

Always think about plan B and even plans C and D, it allows you to keep your cool and antic­i­pate prob­lems to avoid stress and ten­sions before and dur­ing your event. Organ­is­ing an event requires a lot of fore­sight and the abil­i­ty to adapt to any sit­u­a­tion. This job is full of sur­pris­es and will require think­ing on your feet, great organ­i­sa­tion skills and an A‑team on which to rely.

9. Congratulate yourselves!

We some­times for­get, once the stress has sub­sided and the event is over, to con­grat­u­late our­selves and take the time to gath­er togeth­er to cel­e­brate the suc­cess of the event. Plan­ning an event can only be done with the help of a team, ser­vice providers and part­ners, loved ones … it is impor­tant to thank and con­grat­u­late every­one who helped make your event a suc­cess. At the end of your event or a few days lat­er take the time to thank, write a thank-you note, go for a drink or gath­er togeth­er to thank all those who con­tributed to the organ­i­sa­tion and sup­port­ed you.

We will not end on a round num­ber on prin­ci­ple! It’s up to you now to con­tin­ue this list, to keep only the areas on which you must work, those you should pay more atten­tion to. The pur­pose of good res­o­lu­tions is to guide us all towards improve­ment how­ev­er small.

This makes you want to organ­ise an event? Start right now:

Plan an event