Small Business Event Planning Guide-III



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Get local bloggers involved.

Be smart with bloggers. Involving local bloggers to participate at the event is usually a great strategy to gain audience before, during and after the event. Bloggers usually count on a wide reach and do not usually follow traditional media rules.

Leverage event registration platforms like Meetup.

Use existing platforms. Use online registration. The easier way to scare people away is by having analog registration (faxes, bank draft or at the door only). Offer online registration to secure as many attendees as soon as possible, that will help to forecast numbers and release budget soon.

Get listed on sites catering to your group.

Once you know who you want to attend, the next step is to put yourself in front of them. There are websites that specialize in listing events nationally and locally so start there and research which are the most appropriate to get listed on.

Offer local partners incentives to promote you.

Press releases sent to the relevant media outlets will help generate news buzz and you could look at getting media (online and offline) involved as partners. They get exposure at your event in return for publicizing it. If they don’t want to get involved at that level, approach them with the idea of running a competition for their readers to win tickets.

Make it easy on your speakers to publicize to their followers.

If you have any experts/speakers attending,  encourage them to publicize their attendance to their social media followers/email subscribers.

Give early bird incentives.

Early bird tickets at a cheaper rate are a great way to get early sign ups by giving people an incentive to act now rather than wait and forget.

Delegate responsibilities.

No matter the size of your business, always try to delegate responsibilities. Having one person in charge of every detail typically doesn’t work out well. Whenever possible, let people take control of the areas they most enjoy.

Follow up – and follow up again.

Check in early and often. Though no one wants to be micromanaged, make sure that employees and vendors are on track with their event duties. As long as people know you expect updates from time to time, they are less likely to become frustrated when you call or email for one.

Sponsors are royalty – make sure they feel like it.

 If you have sponsors — treat them like kings. They fund your event and enable you to do it (if that’s your business model). Be very clear before the event what they will get as sponsors

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