If you’ve thought about expanding your business, one great way to do this is by planning a corporate event.
Corporate events are shown to increase a company’s value and potential for investment. But while we all love attending such events, planning a complex and memorable company event is a major challenge.
This event planning guide will show you how to plan a great business event to increase brand awareness.
Here’s what you need to know:
Get Branded Material
Before you even start thinking about your corporate event, you must ensure you have an abundant supply of branded material.
For example, you can click for tablecloths with logos. This lets you promote your brand while your guests are enjoying your meals. Likewise, consider getting branded material for your invitations, gift bags, gifts, etc.
Here’s a scenario to imagine: suppose someone from outside your company walks past the event venue.
With a furtive glance, they should know who the host is. This is how to present your company’s logo must be for the event.
Choosing the Event Venue
The next step is to decide where you’ll host the event. You want to first decide on how many guests you wish to invite. You’ll then have to decide the type of event.
Let’s say you wish to invite 100 guests for dinner. You’ll need a large banquet hall to accommodate this event. You’ll also need enough tables for lunch or dinner.
What if you want the corporate event to be a bit more lively? You might need a larger banquet hall that has a dance floor. Perhaps you want to choose a room that extends to a large balcony.
If you choose an event venue in a hotel, how far do you want to be from the hotel’s amenities?
For example, do you want your guests to be able to access the pool? Should they be able to have quick access to the hotel lobby? This lets you decide whether you want to book an event venue on the first floor or at the Penthouse!
Decide the Objectives for Your Corporate Event
Next, you want to decide what the main objectives for your corporate event will be.
For example, are you hoping to fundraise for your business? Do you wish to hire new employees? Are you looking to onboard new clients?
These objectives will help you design the itinerary for your corporate event. It’ll help you plan your events and what activities you’ll want to plan for them.
Write down your objectives so that you have a clear idea of what you want to achieve from your corporate event. This will help you create a blueprint of how you’ll plan your event.
Make a Plan
Now you’re ready to make a plan on how you’ll operate your corporate event.
Here are some of the things you’ll have to include in your plan:
- How will you invite attendees?
- Who are the specific attendees whom you’ll want to invite?
- How do you market the event to your potential attendees?
- Planning your budget
- Raising extra funds if necessary
- Logistics for the event
- Assigning roles to the event team
This blueprint can be edited whenever needed. However, it’s important to have a blueprint in advance so you know how to move forward with event planning.
Outsource Certain Tasks to Professionals
There might be certain tasks for your corporate event that are better served by third-party professionals.
For example, let’s say you want a panel discussion for your corporate event. Or perhaps you want to show a visual presentation to your guests. You want to hire an audiovisual expert to help you set this up.
Likewise, make sure you hire a professional catering service for your corporate event. You’ll want to ask about food preferences and potential food allergies ahead of time.
You must always have a variety of beverages available at your event as well. Make sure you have lots of water for your guests. It’s also ideal to have a healthy mix of soft drinks and alcoholic drinks.
You should also hire cleaning staff before, during, and after the event. They’ll make sure the atmosphere is pleasant for your guests at all times.
If you opt to use a hotel banquet room for your event venue, you might be able to hire the hotel cleaning staff.
Best Practices
Let’s end by looking at a few best practices on how you can succeed in planning your corporate event.
Make sure that everyone on the team has a copy of any important documents. This can range from the invoice for the event venue to the itinerary.
You also have to assign one person to the team to make executive decisions. If you want, you can serve in this role.
You can expect things to go wrong or last-minute issues to arise on the day of the event.
In such a scenario, you need a firm leader to make decisions for the rest of the team. If you delegate this role, make sure you assign someone whom you can trust.
You want to also collect feedback from your guests. Collect their emails when they RSVP for the event.
After the event, send everyone a “thank you” email. You want to use this email to send a survey to your guests as well.
Make sure you meet with your team in about a week or two after the event ends. Review your feedback and survey responses together to help you improve upon any future corporate events.
See You At the Event
Now you know how to plan a successful corporate event to push your brand’s image.
Start by getting branded material for your event. This ensures that your brand’s image gets stuck in your guests’ minds.
You want to also take your time to consider how you’ll choose an event venue. Follow our steps to prepare your event objectives and make a plan for your event. If you follow our best practices you’ll have no problem hosting a great event.
You can find more great business tips on our website.
