When to hold you event

The time of the year, week and day may be quite flexible, so how do you choose when to hold you event? Well, there are a couple of factors to think about, both from the perspective of you, the organiser and your delegates. Do you have a limited budget? If so, you could think about holding your events in January, February or August, typically quieter months to potentially secure deals that may not be available during busier periods.

And from your delegates’ perspective, think about the timings and their potential availability to attend.

• Are they usually more available on a Monday or Friday, for example, when they are less likely to have meetings in the diary?
• How far will they be travelling? Starting a meeting at 8.30am for example could mean that delegates have a very early start if they have to travel further than usual, so why not start at 9.30 or even later to encourage people to travel cheaper by train.
• It’s also key from a sustainability perspective to encourage your delegates to either car share or use public transport, and Rothamsted, we are all about helping our clients to make their events more sustainable, to help them to meet their sustainability objectives.

Who is attending?

It takes a lot of work to plan an event, and you will want to make sure as many people attend as possible. So it’s worth thinking about whether your event is compulsory to attend, or if not, how you are going to promote it and incentivise attendance.

• For compulsory business events, team meetings, etc., with plenty of notice, you can be pretty certain that people will be able to attend.
• But keep in mind flexible working schedules and make provision for these.
• Provide conferencing facilities for example, or avoid Mondays and Fridays if team members aren’t always available on those days.

Make sure you also take sufficient details from delegates at the time of booking too – don’t forget to ask for dietary requirements if you will be serving food or drinks!

Promote the event to the public or special interest groups

If you need to attract people to the event, promote it at least 6 weeks before the event date for public and invitation-only events and remember there are times of the year to avoid to ensure people are available. These include annual company events, public holidays, etc.

If you are looking to attract members of the public, or a specific audience to your event, make sure you give people plenty of notice and create some marketing materials using online tools, e.g. Canva has templates for a wide range of events to help make the event look as professional and attractive as possible.

There are lots of online event management tools available to manage bookings and payments, if necessary, such as Eventbrite. Many are free or take a percentage of ticket sales and create an easy way to share the event details in emails and social media. Also think about local or relevant interest groups where you can promote the event, and make sure you include your contact details everywhere, so potential delegates always know how to reach you.

Planning schedule

Running a successful event takes time and planning, so the first thing to do is devise a plan and work backwards to make sure you’re meeting deadlines. Gantt charts are a great way to do this as they are very visual and easy to update. No special tools are necessary, just use MS Excel or Google Sheets and create a list of all the steps or milestones down the side, and a timeline across the top.

It’s very important to finalise numbers with the venue at least 2 weeks before the event in order to give you the best value as possible. You want to avoid paying for delegates who are no longer attending, and two weeks is the minimum time for most venues to guarantee this.

Think about the physical materials needed for the event too, will you need to design and print literature? Don’t put unnecessary pressure on yourself, your marketing team or your printers if you can produce content in advance. Two weeks’ notice minimum is probably a good guide for any literature or signage.

Read Part 2 for on the day tips for making sure your delegates leave the event having had a great experience.