How to Produce a Boffo Event

First of a series to provide the key elements of event production

The first item of event production is to determine why people will be getting together.  This is often easy for personal events, like weddings and milestone birthdays.  For the corporate or non-profit event, it isn’t as clear. What do you hope to achieve as a result of the event?

The corporate event should be tied to the company’s integrated marketing plan.  As with any market plan, a well-designed event plan will answer the following questions: who is on target guest list (based on target segment), how will we promote the event (traditional and social media tactics), what is the event “product” (the structure of the event), what is our budget, who will produce the event, what is the time frame for the event and what are the objectives and metrics for the event.  The messaging of the event will tie-in with the overall branding objectives of the organization.

The nonprofit event will require a similar thought and planning process. 

Once the basics are determined, then the creativity begins!

A Lovely Read

The Art of Fielding is my favorite read for 2011. Written by Chad Harbach and a first novel, Art uses baseball and a shortstop as the foundation of the book.  I love the characters, the story and the writing.  "She's gotten so far ahead of the curve that the curve becomes a circle, and now she was way behind."  Beautifully written. If you hate baseball, don't bother, as you probably won't appreciate the book's/game's prose.

 On the other hand, I tried starting the Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon. Highly recommended by Anna and Kath, I tried, I really did.  But I'm not a fan of romance novels or historic novels from the eighteenth century that involve time travel or that are 600+ pages long!  And there are seven of these!  Ugh.

So when my new John Sandford novel, Shock Wave showed up at my front door, I immediately ditched Outlander and devoured Virgil Flowers in all his finest.  No way I'm going back to the Outlander series. Done.