Events 101 — The “How” of event running

This post is my view on how to put on good events. What format should your event take? (tip: a 10 person panel isn’t for the faint-hearted) What’s a good split between content and discussion? How do you choose the right venue, plus a whole host of other questions and considerations!

Event Format

The main factor that will inform your event format is the event’s purpose, which will usually be one or more of the following;

• Education
• Discussion
• Creation
• Networking/Socialising
• Fundraising/Dealflow
• Awareness/Promotion/Recognition

Your purpose influences how you put on your event, for example, if you’re looking to stimulate discussion around a topic, then a 2 hour keynote probably isn’t the best route!

The usual event formats are:

• Panel discussion/Interviews
• Talks/Keynotes
• Hackathon
• Demos/Pitches
• Social gathering
• Matchmaking/Mentoring (speed dating format/office hours etc etc)

Taking a panel discussion as an example, it’s important to consider your audience. Particularly in the tech/startup community, people have a lot of questions and don’t generally do too well with much over an hour of uninterrupted listening!

It’s important with any event to pay attention to the mood, don’t just run it to the timetable you decided beforehand, if you think a talk is going on too long and the audience are getting restless, break it up with an impromptu Q&A.

Having run a lot of community events and being a people focussed kind of guy, I’d recommend having a part of your event that helps with socialising and/or networking. If you think about it, people are gathered at specific events as they are interested in the event, this means that they have something in common with the other attendees already, so striking up a conversation is already a little easier than it would be usually. People do generally find it hard to talk to people they don’t know though, so anything you can do to help that should be done (i.e. name badges, introductions, being around/hosting etc).

Event Breaks

Breaks in events get a special mention: this is not a break for you! I’ve been to too many events where people either use the break to make an early exit (a really bad sign), or they’re really tough to get to quieten down or get back into the main event room (this means that the attendees at the event are more interesting than the content).

If people are leaving during your breaks, your event is too long or your content isn’t interesting enough. Pay attention to what happens during any breaks in your events, you can’t afford to take a break yourself! Use the time to ask people how they are finding the event and continue the hosting as you (hopefully) did when you opened the doors.

Event Logistics

The logistics of an event aren’t really that difficult, but you do need to be methodical in your consideration of what you need and when you need it. Have a plan, but know that things will not go to plan (and be prepared for that).

The biggest consideration for your event logistics is the venue. There are a huge number of venues in London* that are available, some will even let you use their space for free. Their location and facilities will need to be right for your event format.

Run through your event in your head and write down all the things you’ll need and the considerations you need to make, this will help you decide on the best venue and generally plan for the event. Here’s a list of questions that might help:

Access: If you’re ticketing your event, how can you control access to the event and check people in? Does the venue have mutiple entrances/exits? Do your attendees potentially have access to restricted areas in the venue and how can you monitor this?

Catering: Always ask if there are exclusive caterers for a venue, there often are and they will be much more expensive than supplying the food yourself. They will also charge you corkage on any drinks you may want to bring in.

AV: Is the AV system closed, or can you add more mics if required? Are there enough mics that work if it is closed? Are the batteries charged? Will there be a venue technician on hand? Is there someone to run around with the Q&A mic for the audience and can you access most areas of the audience? If you have a compact audience, you might like to consider something like a Micball.

Wifi: People will ask for wifi. Make sure you have it and it works, or worst case there’s a good 3G/4G signal.

Furniture: Are there enough chairs for the panel and moderator? Are there enough chairs for the audience? Do they need to be moved to make room for standing/talking before the event, or is there a separate area for that?

Refreshments: Is there somewhere to serve from? Is it self service or do you need people to serve? Are there bins around? Do you need to manage quantities (one food/drink each etc), if so, how are you doing that? When will refreshments be available from/to? Do you allow serving during the content of the event(if there is content)? What dietary requirements do you cover and how?

Video/Photos: Do you need/want/have a photographer/videographer? Can they plug into the soundboard/AV if required? What space will they need? Are people going to be walking through their shot?

Signage: Do you need to direct people around the venue and to/from the facilities? How are you going to do this? At a minimum, you should probably have A4 paper, a sharpie and blu-tac to hand!

As you can see, there are a lot of considerations, but everything is solvable with a little forethought and a can-do attitude.

We once had a power failure at a Digital Sizzle event, which put paid to several of the features of the event, half the bar (draught pumps) and most of the food! However, with a lot of hustle, some goodwill from the attendees and back-up bottled beers, we got the party back on track and it turned out really well!

Summary

There’s an infinite amount of detail I could go into, but aim to cover the basics for your first few events and look to learn and get better with each event. Here’s the important parts:

• Always use the event’s aim and purpose to inform how you set it up, returning to your goal to make sure that’s where you’re headed.
• Run through being an attendee of your event in your head, how you’d like it to run and what you’d like to get from it. Consider all the things you’ve spotted at other events (the good and the bad).
• Listen to your attendees, both directly (ask them for feedback) and indirectly (judge the mood in the room) to improve your event.
• Lastly, try to enjoy it, the more you can do that, the easier the event will be to work on and the better the event will become.

If you missed the first two posts of Events 101, you can find them here:

• Events 101 — Where to start & the “Why”?
• Events 101 — Who do you need to run a successful event?

And if you’d like more information on the London Startup Scene, you could do worse than to take a look here.

*There’s a handy London venues public google doc here.