Is This One Live Event Mistake Costing You Thousands…Or More?
September 17th, 2012 by Diane Conklin under Event Planning & Marketing. No Comments.
Are you making this big mistake at your live events?
At a recent event, where I was the event planner, the promoter asked me, and the audio visual crew, to make sure the music was really cranked up loud during all the breaks. So, as the breaks started, the music would get turned up really loud, and the attendees repeatedly asked us to turn it down.
The problem with allowing the break music to be so loud is that there are people mingling in the room trying to talk, trying to network. But more importantly, if you have a back table with your programs and courses that you’re trying to sell at your event, and you want people to go back there and look at them, ask questions, invest their money and buy them, it’s very difficult to carry on a conversation. It’s difficult for people to ask questions of your staff if the music is so loud that they can’t hear themselves think.
It’s okay to have the fun upbeat, keep everybody going, kind of music, but this particular event promoter wanted the music so loud that people were complaining. They couldn’t talk, they couldn’t hear themselves, and it was giving them headaches, so they simply decided to leave the room.
There is nothing for your event attendees to invest in in the hallway. They can network, that’s great, but if you keep them in the room, especially if you have event speakers who are there, you want them in the back of the room whether it’s a bookstore or just a sales table area, so you can help people make good decisions and answer their questions.
So, when you are running your own events, or even when you’re attending an event, you might want to think about things from the perspective of the attendees. Make your decisions based, not on what you think is going to keep a better energy in the room, or what’s going to keep people excited, but make your decisions based on how you can walk out of your event with the most positive impact on the attendees and with the highest ROI (Return On Investment) you possibly can.
Remember, you’ve got a huge investment with the hotel, your audio visual team, an event planner, the marketing you did to put the butts in the seats, food and beverage, and the list goes on and on. You make a big investment putting on events, and when you walk out of that event you want to have done everything you could have possibly done to maximize your investment.
Sometimes it’s the little things, actually it’s almost always the little things that can make a difference, a big difference, one way or the other.
Make sure you take the time to think about all of these details when you’re running your events, when you’re planning your events, when you’re at your events. It’s great to have fun, upbeat music, it’s great to be dancing, and for people to be having fun.
But, it’s really important to make sure they have the opportunity to go to that back sales table and ask more questions and invest more money in you and your business.
