Developed by @Wendy (Wendy Parsley), executive producer and founder of Quint and the Campus Crew
The content below is mainly for offline events — Conferences, Roadshows, etc., but some can be used for Zoom – Online events.
Some suggestions
- Have a well-thought out plan with key milestones
- Leverage Google Sheets, Airtable or even Google Table (in beta) to track progress
- Create assets that you can share with customers, speakers, partners, etc.
- Have several check ins with your cross-functional team — meet several times a week.
- Have a clear project owner, but also have leaders or captions of different areas, such as who is managing speakers, who is managing logistics at the venue
- Know that you will get sign ups closer to the event (especially if you offer discounts closer to the date)
Before you start
- Create a list of potential registrants so will be prepared to reach out to them and invite them.
- Create a place — your CRM – where you can track all registrants
Getting people to register
- Highlight your speakers: Think about your audience and line up relevant speakers that your audience will want to see? Highlight their areas of expertise. Be clear in how you present their topics to your audience.
- Offer early bird pricing: Offer discounted prices for attendees who register early. This will encourage people to register early.
- Offer group discounts: Offer team discounts — the more people who attend from a specific company, the deeper the discount
- Create ‘selling points’ note for senior management: To help people convince management to pay for the conference, create an email and other info they can share internally.
- Well-Thought out Social Media Campaign: Figure out what social media platforms your audience uses and create a content calendar for when you will highlight the event on these platforms.
- Ongoing-Email Campaign: Provide weekly updates about the event, leading up to the event. Then a week or so before the event starts, send updates 2-3 times a week.
- Work with your venue and hotels: See if they can offer additional discounts or local deals — discount on city tours, for example.
- Partner with your partners: Get your partners and sponsors involved in promoting the event. Maybe even give them discounts
- Provide social media cards and email templates for your speakers, advocates, key customers, influencers, etc. to share on their key networks.
- Make sure to have a landing page: Update your site and key landing pages about the events. Keep the content ever green.
- Take advantage of videos. Have your team post videos on social media about why they are excited for the event — then reach out to your speakers, sponsors, and exhibitors. Get them all involved in creating buzz for the event.Show them why they need to attend.
- Create FOMO: Create a little FOMO with pictures and content on your event website, social media posts, and email campaigns.Obviously there is a lot to getting people to register for an event.
Let us know what’s missing and we can add items.