There are 5 event factors that determine your guest’s feelings about an event at the end of the night.  This is the core of my event philosophy and will be going more in depth with each factor over the course of this blog.

1 Guests and Their Immediate Company

The greatest factor and yet you only have indirect control over using the other 4 factors.  Most of the time it is safe to assume a guest is motivated to be at your event because they were attracted by what you have to offer.  Sometimes because of trouble at home or because the guest felt dragged out to your event nothing you can do will make them happy. Other times your guest is with a special group of friends that can never have a bad time together.

2 Marketing and Promotions of an Event

This is the factor that gets people in the door and into your event.  This includes any communication with potential guests in any media.  Your target market for an event might be as small as a few family and friends for an intimate wedding to everyone in a regional area for a national touring act, and you must be able to cater your marketing and promotions plans accordingly.  Also, in either case the marketing and promotions of an event can help set the mindset of your guests to expect what you’re offering at an event.

3 Venue and Environment

The venue is where you’re inviting your guests and the enviroment is everything a guest will be interacting with. While both terms are almost enterchangeable, I use both to help plan an event.  Choosing a venue involves questions like, what is their capacity?, status with guests? and how much parking is availble? Manipulating the enviroment is for getting people to act in a certain way. Do you want people to stay hovering around a silent auction table? To stay in a certain area for a certain time, to mingle, or to sit down and listen to a speaker? This can all be accomplished, no matter to the venue,  with strageic placing of chairs, dividers, decorations, and other environmental modifications.

4 Staff and Entertainment

It’s easy to think that events are outside the customer service industry because event planners think on the macro level till the day of the event.  I have seen many people give off the attitude unintentionally that attendees should “bask in the glory of my production values.”  Even if a guest is in their favorite venue seeing their favorite artist, a bad experience with staff or an unprofessional performance from the night’s entertainment will often result in bad PR.  I often recommend doing a site check like a secret shopper when choosing a venue.  You may discover that you would want more of your own staff handling the guests or that you can pull resources elsewhere without worry.

5 Security

Security is a precarious balancing act between  guests feeling safe to feeling uneasy about security, to actually safety of guests, and keeping people out of your event that are uninvited.  For example, some people may seek out seedy looking bars in search of adding a little edginess to their night but in reality are actually still in a very safe neighborhood.  One time while doing sound for a formal charity event we were attacked by event crashers.  Sometimes, a venue may have their own security concerns that you have to adress for them as it is not taken care of in house.  If not well thought out in advance security issues can quickly eat your event budget or bring it to a screeching halt.

Over the life of this blog I’ll be covering these 5 event factors extensively.  If you have any questions about any of them please leave a comment below!