With corporate events being an integral part of the company's success, managing them requires a diligent approach. Unless you have a sizable event management team, delegating the tasks to experts can save you valuable time and resources.
A corporate event management company can either turn your events to gold or leave you picking up the pieces. Knowing what to look for in such a partner can maximize the ROI of the collaboration and keep your corporate events at the highest levels.
Let's take a closer look at three key aspects to look for when selecting a corporate event management company.
How to Select a Corporate Event Management Company
When choosing a partner to help you manage corporate events, it's important to explore its approach to event management. These three services are a must-have for a successful event partnership.
Agenda Design & Management
The event agenda is a roadmap that needs to be optimized for engagement and experience. It allows you to track the entire event from planning to feedback. Designing event agenda includes:
- Identifying and cementing the main goals of the event.
- Determining the type of content needed for the event.
- Working with various internal contributors to develop necessary content.
- Discussing and researching relevant event speakers.
- Communicating with speakers to make sure you are on the same page about the event agenda design.
- Analyzing local and industry-specific events that may interfere with yours.
- Making sure that event start and end times are suitable for your target audience.
- Exploring the interests of the potential audience by setting up pre-event surveys.
- Adding Q&A sections to the agenda.
- Designing the agenda to ensure attendees have an unparalleled experience.
- Exploring breakout sessions.
- Ensuring the agenda is available to all the parties involved.
- Exploring different agenda sharing options both online and offline (website, app, etc.).
Once the agenda is ready, the event manager continues working to ensure its proper execution. Many aspects of the event agenda have to be adjusted in the process, depending on the company's, attendees', and speakers' needs. The corporate management company should always be "on-call" to keep the agenda working for you.
A strong event agenda design requires industry-specific knowledge and experience to bring in the right audience and spark sufficient interest. A corporate event management company has to optimize the agenda for both the attendee experience and the outcomes you expect.
High-Touch Event Management
Any corporate event consists of a huge variety of small details. Be it a one-day product launch or a week-long conference, you have to think through numerous elements.
A corporate event management company should be able to take care of all event management aspects, keeping organizational details under control while always being ready to implement plan B.
High-touch events prioritize personalized attendee experience, requiring more attention than other event types. A reliable event partner knows how to manage a high-quality audience and ensure an engaging experience for all parties involved.
High-touch event management includes:
- Analyzing potential participants and exploring their needs.
- Establishing event activities that can keep high-quality audiences engaged.
- Determining the best timing and schedule for the event.
- Designing a plan B for volatile aspects of the event (speaker didn't show, the possibility of shifting the event to the digital format, etc.).
- Collecting all available data from the participants for further analysis.
Once the event is over, the event manager uses the available information to analyze the event’s success. The data collected during the event coupled with the attendees' feedback helps the corporate event management partner to gain insight into what can work for the audience during the next event.
High-touch events are more complex than many:many events. In order to meet the desired corporate and collaboration goals, they require close attention from the event manager. A corporate event management partner should have experience in both high-touch events and many:many events to have a good perspective of both.
Speaker Strategy & Sourcing
With speakers being the backbone of many events, a high-quality speaker strategy is essential to their success. A top-notch corporate event management company should be able to handle the speaker strategy in the most efficient way possible. Its responsibilities should include:
- Arranging attendee surveys to get an idea of what the target audience needs and expects.
- Exploring and evaluating internal members, sponsors, and partners for speaking opportunities.
- Working with speaker lists and databases (e.g. National Speaker Association) to find the best available options for the event.
- Studying social media and publications to ensure the best choice for your attendees.
- Collaborating with speaker bureaus.
- Figuring out what value the speaker can get from participating in your event.
- Determining speaker travel and accommodation costs.
- Arranging all speaker-related logistics (transportation, technology).
- Handling all pre-event communications, deadlines, and approvals.
- Communicating all event details to the speaker.
An experienced event manager knows the most prominent speakers in each industry. They can make valuable recommendations and share points of contact to help you invite the perfect speaker for your event.
Sourcing and selecting the right speakers for your event are two of the most important elements of event management. Ensuring a fruitful collaboration with a speaker can affect the productivity and efficiency of your event while creating an opportunity for new partnerships.
Streamline Corporate Event Management with Impact Point Group
When selecting a corporate event management company, it's imperative to understand the variety and depth of its services. Arranging and managing corporate events requires close attention to detail, valuable connections in the industry, experience with all types of events, and much more.
A company that offers the above-mentioned services is likely to arrange a highly successful event while allowing you to focus on more pressing issues.
At Impact Point Group, we have decades of experience with corporate event management. We can help you design and manage the agenda, source the right speaker, and arrange high-touch events. Contact us today to discuss your next corporate event strategy.