In your company, are you responsible for booking venues, facilities, restaurants and organizing transportation for meetings and events?
| Employing the Best for Successful Events |
With so much to think about and do to make an event come to perfection, organization and attention to every detail is the key. With a plan and budget in place and intense focus and care to bring it to fruition, your event can be a stunning success.
how can a corporate event planner help you?
For anyone, even when you are a professional event planner, organizing an event can and will be stressful and intense. Corporate events present a unique set of challenges for planners because often they are on a large scale, which means many people are involved and millions of tiny details need to be addressed within a finite amount of time on a specific budget. Plus, anything can and will go wrong if it’s not controlled and managed in every aspect.
To execute the perfect corporate event and keep your own stress levels in check, you need the help of someone who is passionate, creative, organized and attentive to every single detail while being wholly interpersonal and professional in their communications. That’s where corporate event planners come in.
Although they are called many things—event planner, event coordinator, event manager—they all have the same objective: to produce an event that exceeds client and guest expectations by not only delivering what the client wants and needs, but also doing everything possible to go beyond those expectations to create a truly amazing and memorable experience for all.
Corporate event planners bring with them invaluable experience and are experts at multitasking and time management. They coordinate every little detail to make sure everything is addressed and executed in a timely and efficient manner, and they do so with professionalism and care. Plus, with their experience, they already know the dos and don’ts of staging an event so it is easier for them to avoid mistakes and possible issues that could ruin the event. Even so, these professionals always expect the unexpected and have built-in safeguards for issues that commonly arise and likely have alternative solutions in place.
When you hire a corporate event planner, they are working for you, for your event and within your budget. In an initial brainstorming session, they discuss with you all of the needs and wants you have for your event, from purpose to type to number of attendees to desired location to food and beverage and any other wish-list details you share. After that, they work to bring your vision to life as an enjoyable event with less stress for everyone involved. It is their job to suggest venues, negotiate contracts, organize all of the details, arrange everything based on needs and a timeline, manage staff and vendors, oversee delivery and ensure that the quality and quantity of everything meets your needs.
Moreover, these professionals are perfectly poised to find you the best venues, services and deals for your needs and your budget. They already know the market and have a network of contacts and relationships already formed with industry partners of all kinds, including venue managers, service providers and supply vendors, which ultimately will save you time and money. In addition, the performance of their vendors reflects directly on the corporate planner’s reputation. If they don’t produce, the planner’s reputation is at jeopardy, so they only work with trusted people that provide the best quality for the best value. Plus, these planners are more likely to know of new and “unknown” venues that can create a stunning and unique opportunity for your event.
It commonly is thought that hiring a corporate event planner cannot fit into a modest budget because they can do so much in all aspects of your event, but actually the reverse is most often true. Some charge for their services with a flat fee, some by the hour and some by percentage of the booking fee. Whichever the method of compensation, in the long run, hiring an event planner can be the more cost-effective option, particularly if you are coming to Houston as a destination and are unfamiliar with the area.
Their industry interconnectivity not only gets the event planners in the door but speeds up the process and often gets them better price. For example, suppose an event venue rental would cost $3,000 if you booked it yourself. With their connections, industry reputation or history of planning events at that location, successful planners may be able to work out a much better deal, perhaps as low as $2,000. Even if the planner charges a 20-percent fee on the booking, it amounts to only $400, so you’ve already saved $600 by not doing it yourself. Although the numbers here are arbitrary, the concept and principle of it holds true for facility rental as well as many services the planner coordinates, including group hotel accommodations and transportation, entertainment, florists and caterers, lighting design and décor.
Although corporate event planners specialize in large, corporate events, they also effectively can help plan small meetings and everything else in between. So the next time you start to feel overwhelmed with the details of planning an important event for your company and want to take the ordinary to the extraordinary for a real impact, hiring a dedicated corporate event planner may just be the best option for the best results.
great ways to entertain your guests
One of the misconceptions about planning corporate special events is that because they are officially sanctioned by the company, they have to be strict and formal. On the contrary, it is essential to add a touch of fun or some entertaining activity to a corporate event. It not only breaks up the monotony of the serious tasks of everyday, it also works to make the event something special and memorable. Following are some ideas about how you can ramp up the fun or entertain guests at your event.
how can a corporate event planner help you?
For anyone, even when you are a professional event planner, organizing an event can and will be stressful and intense. Corporate events present a unique set of challenges for planners because often they are on a large scale, which means many people are involved and millions of tiny details need to be addressed within a finite amount of time on a specific budget. Plus, anything can and will go wrong if it’s not controlled and managed in every aspect.
To execute the perfect corporate event and keep your own stress levels in check, you need the help of someone who is passionate, creative, organized and attentive to every single detail while being wholly interpersonal and professional in their communications. That’s where corporate event planners come in.
Although they are called many things—event planner, event coordinator, event manager—they all have the same objective: to produce an event that exceeds client and guest expectations by not only delivering what the client wants and needs, but also doing everything possible to go beyond those expectations to create a truly amazing and memorable experience for all.
Corporate event planners bring with them invaluable experience and are experts at multitasking and time management. They coordinate every little detail to make sure everything is addressed and executed in a timely and efficient manner, and they do so with professionalism and care. Plus, with their experience, they already know the dos and don’ts of staging an event so it is easier for them to avoid mistakes and possible issues that could ruin the event. Even so, these professionals always expect the unexpected and have built-in safeguards for issues that commonly arise and likely have alternative solutions in place.
When you hire a corporate event planner, they are working for you, for your event and within your budget. In an initial brainstorming session, they discuss with you all of the needs and wants you have for your event, from purpose to type to number of attendees to desired location to food and beverage and any other wish-list details you share. After that, they work to bring your vision to life as an enjoyable event with less stress for everyone involved. It is their job to suggest venues, negotiate contracts, organize all of the details, arrange everything based on needs and a timeline, manage staff and vendors, oversee delivery and ensure that the quality and quantity of everything meets your needs.
Moreover, these professionals are perfectly poised to find you the best venues, services and deals for your needs and your budget. They already know the market and have a network of contacts and relationships already formed with industry partners of all kinds, including venue managers, service providers and supply vendors, which ultimately will save you time and money. In addition, the performance of their vendors reflects directly on the corporate planner’s reputation. If they don’t produce, the planner’s reputation is at jeopardy, so they only work with trusted people that provide the best quality for the best value. Plus, these planners are more likely to know of new and “unknown” venues that can create a stunning and unique opportunity for your event.
It commonly is thought that hiring a corporate event planner cannot fit into a modest budget because they can do so much in all aspects of your event, but actually the reverse is most often true. Some charge for their services with a flat fee, some by the hour and some by percentage of the booking fee. Whichever the method of compensation, in the long run, hiring an event planner can be the more cost-effective option, particularly if you are coming to Houston as a destination and are unfamiliar with the area.
Their industry interconnectivity not only gets the event planners in the door but speeds up the process and often gets them better price. For example, suppose an event venue rental would cost $3,000 if you booked it yourself. With their connections, industry reputation or history of planning events at that location, successful planners may be able to work out a much better deal, perhaps as low as $2,000. Even if the planner charges a 20-percent fee on the booking, it amounts to only $400, so you’ve already saved $600 by not doing it yourself. Although the numbers here are arbitrary, the concept and principle of it holds true for facility rental as well as many services the planner coordinates, including group hotel accommodations and transportation, entertainment, florists and caterers, lighting design and décor.
Although corporate event planners specialize in large, corporate events, they also effectively can help plan small meetings and everything else in between. So the next time you start to feel overwhelmed with the details of planning an important event for your company and want to take the ordinary to the extraordinary for a real impact, hiring a dedicated corporate event planner may just be the best option for the best results.
great ways to entertain your guests
One of the misconceptions about planning corporate special events is that because they are officially sanctioned by the company, they have to be strict and formal. On the contrary, it is essential to add a touch of fun or some entertaining activity to a corporate event. It not only breaks up the monotony of the serious tasks of everyday, it also works to make the event something special and memorable. Following are some ideas about how you can ramp up the fun or entertain guests at your event.
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Send submissions to
editorial@MeetingPlannerResources.org. We will contact you if your submission is chosen.
If accepted, your submission will be edited for length and clarity. There is no monetary payment if your item is used; instead, you can publicize yourself through a five-line biography with your contact information that will appear at the end of the article.
Send submissions to
editorial@MeetingPlannerResources.org. We will contact you if your submission is chosen.