Top 10 Commonly Missed Elements When Organizing An In-Person Event
Event planning is a lengthy process with many steps that you must remember in order for your event to run smoothly. Even if you are experienced at event planning and know how to plan an event it can be easy to forget crucial steps that should be on your event planning checklist. Continue reading for event planning ideas that can be easily missed, to ensure that you don’t make the same mistake!
Event Planning Guide:
- Book an Event Photographer
- Check the Wi-Fi Stability and Internet Speed
- Check the Venue’s Music Permit
- Provide Refreshments for Event Attendees and Your Staff
- Market Your Event on Social Media
- Ensure You Have Enough Staff
- Remember to Stick to Your Budget
- Signpost Your Event Effectively
- Remember an Emergency Kit
- Create Name Badges for Attendees
Event Planning Checklist
1. Book an Event Photographer
Granted you will want to have photos of your event to show for all your hard work. Doing all the event photography yourself is time consuming and requires a member of staff to be allocated the role of looking out for the best candid moments to capture and ensuring no key moments are missed. You can make your life so much easier by adding booking a professional event photographer to your event planning checklist. Not only will this save you a lot of time but it will also mean you have better photos to use in your future event marketing.
2. Check the Wi-Fi Stability and Internet Speed
In this day and age, it is highly likely that for any event you host there is going to be a reliance on the internet. We all know how unreliable the internet can be at times, but the amount of people trying to access the internet at your event can also interfere with the stability of your connection. The last thing you want is for the Wi-Fi to become unstable when all the attendees of your event try to access it at once! To prevent this from happening test the Wi-Fi at your venue during a busy period beforehand as a trial run.
3. Check the Venue’s Music Permit
If you are planning on playing music at your event it is a legal requirement that your venue has the appropriate permit. Add querying the music permissions of your venue to your event planning checklist to avoid breaking any essential regulations.
4. Provide Refreshments for Event Attendees and Your Staff
Depending on the type of event that you are hosting there will be varying expectations on the amount of food and drink you provide – some conferences offer a networking lunch as part of the experience, for instance, but otherwise light refreshments would suffice. That being said, food and drink are still an element of your event that needs arranging, whether that be checking if your venue offers refreshments as a package with your booking, arranging a caterer, or sorting the food and drink yourself.
5. Market Your Event on Social Media
Social media is THE place to create hype around your event. Be sure to regularly post exciting information about your event with a sign-up link each time to make registering for your event simple and tempting. You might want to create infographics for your event using Adobe or Canva as they are great for picture-heavy medias like Instagram but will also stand out on text saturated platforms like Twitter. It can be difficult to remember to be persistent with this, so we recommend having your social media posts scheduled at regular intervals to ensure frequent updates for attendees and potential attendees.
6. Ensure You Have Enough Staff
Once you have numbers for event attendees it is important to double check that you have enough staff present at your event and all the tasks required have been delegated accordingly. This will help the event run much more smoothly than if these roles were not pre-assigned.
7. Remember to Stick to Your Budget
Your starting point when planning an event should always be to do your research and set a budget for your event accordingly. Depending on the scale of the event you should also set individual budgets for every aspect of the event, for instance a budget for event photography and a budget for food. Once your budget has been set it is important to keep referring to it so that you keep on top of your finances.
8. Signpost Your Event Effectively
On the day of the event, you need to remember to signpost your venue effectively so that your attendees can successfully navigate your event. In order to make this an easier experience when your event rolls around you can help yourself by attending the venue ahead of time and planning where signposts will be needed to ease your attendees’ direction.
9. Remember an Emergency Kit
Many resources that you find you need will be available at your venue, but it is always beneficial not to be overly reliant. If you suddenly need a pair of scissors or pen and do not know how to locate these items quickly then this can hold up your event running as smoothly as you might wish.
10. Create Name Badges for Attendees
In order to ease the networking section of your event name badges are important so that your attendees can all easily identify each other, and their introductions run smoothly. When it comes to your event planning it is important to consider the materials that you are going to need to create the name badges on the scale that you expect. If you do not want a staff member frantically writing out name badges, and want a more professional look, consider purchasing badge templates that you can print names onto ahead of time.
Wrapping up
If you follow this event marketing and event planning guide, then you should have your event running smoothly in no time!
We mentioned the importance of booking a professional event photographer earlier, and we are here to point you in just the right direction.
About the Author / Akeem Okunola
