Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Top Tips to Organise the Best Event

By nature most of us are social animals who like to be stimulated by interesting surroundings, great conversations, fine food and drink and a lovely environment. When it comes to organising an event these are the most important ingredients to take into account. Firstly to put together the best event you need to analyse the target market honestly regardless of what the occasion. Next give yourself plenty of time to plan as well as a realistic budget throw these together with some creativity but don’t forget the necessities such as event insurance.

Who is your target market?
This may sound like an extreme term but actually any group of event goers are best seen as a target market as this means that you will have really thought about them as an overall group dynamic and not just a random bunch of party goers. This puts you in the driving seat at the beginning and can even help out a lot with savings on the event budget. Naturally some target markets seem more difficult to categorise perhaps with different age groups from generations of a widespread family being one example of this.

This leads onto to the next event organisational tip of lateral thinking.
The most creative and positively talked about events come from organisation based on lateral thinking and then drilled down into a huge amount of attention to detail. To take the family example one way to apply both this target market with lateral thinking is to consider a family tree theme. Since the census information went online this is a huge trend in the UK so therefore likely to be well received by family members.

Even if you don’t have a huge budget this is an easy theme to work with but you will need to do some research first but then you could have paper placemats with the family tree printed on them or menus which people can take home afterwards.
Depending on the budget you can take this further and send family members out a predecessors name and description prior to the event and request that they come in fancy dress according to the character and time period. This will lead to a great mix of costumes, fun and at the same time people getting to know something more about their ancestors. Remember it was unlikely that your ancestors had mobile phones or cheap event insurance in their days, so leave the mobile at home or hide it well turned on vibrating somewhere inside your costume!

With events which have a well defined target market then you have lots of scope. If you do not come up with a creative idea which excites you at first then brainstorm with a select few and after a session you are sure to have come up with a stylish but memorable theme which is fitting to the target market. Now remember to always go deep into the details as this really will impress your event goers, even if done on a cheap budget it is this level of thought which makes an event special. Lots of people with money can lay on a lavish event but this does not mean it has the class and style of a well developed event concept.

Whatever the event once you have the concept that you know people will love then you will be naturally passionate about organising it. This takes away an element of the hard work involved as you will feel driven by the excitement.

For the event concept sketch out on paper or do a document on your computer which is like a brainstorming document. It can work out from a circle which is the main theme then with various smaller circles coming out which are the ingredients bouncing out from the theme. Include as much detail as possible and when you are 100% finished transform this into a list so that you can categorise what you need to do such as decorations, food, drink, fancy dress, guest list, event insurance, transport organisation and so on.

Whenever budget allows consider transport or if it is a bigger budget than of course overnight accommodation, but at least transport so that people have the chance to enjoy themselves knowing that they can take a drink and get home safely at the end of the event. If the budget does not allow for minibuses or some form of transport then supply the guests with numbers of taxi firms when they are not familiar with the area.

Do not underestimate the amount of work involved and be sure to delegate some tasks in the early stages so as not to panic towards the end. Of course you can oversee everything yourself but be realistic about how many hours there are in a day!

Last but not least is the timing of an event, as they say timing is everything. So make sure that the timing is suitable for the event goers but at the same time gives you plenty of time to organise the best event. Throughout all of the time spent planning refer back to your checklist keeping it up to date and tick off the vital tasks such as event insurance in the early stages so they are never overlooked.

Friday, June 26, 2009

The Importance of Event Insurance even for Private Parties

Are you caught up in the excitement and rushed off your feet organising a celebration? Have you had the best ever idea for a cool theme for your partnr's 40th and now you're running around covering every little detail that enters your mind, to make it the most amazing party every? Some people are born organisers and a celebration like this can be made into a great talking point for years to come. But even the born organisers may overlook a necessity such as event insurance, as not being a professional event organiser this is an easy thing to do. However as the organiser of a private event or party you must protect yourself with suitable special event insurance, in case of anything going wrong.

In reality you will be doing yourself and those around you a favour, as actually a celebration insurance policy can cover cancellation for organisers of private parties, as well as cover for the property and legal liability protection. The nature of events is that they tend to differ in various ways depending on the occasion, the location, the people organising the event, the amount of people who will attend the event, what kind of party props and catering may be involved in a celebration, and the list of possibilities across private and public events is almost never-ending.

If you are organising the local village fair, there will be hopefully plenty of people attending and lots of activities as part of the fair. Or if a person is organising corporate hospitality this will include detailed organisation also and indeed can be a large financial investment. But these two events although quite different have the same thing in common as your private celebration or wedding would have. All events aim to be as successful and enjoyable as possible, while also being safe and problem free.

For peace of mind you will want to ensure that you have good cover for your event. From this point of view you may want to consider and search for specialist information, and make a checklist to assure yourself that the policy is perfect for your event. Should your event insurance policy include public liability, employers' liability, property and equipment cover, cancellation etc.

If you are an exhibitor or stall holder at a show, you will want to have cover for compensation against you and claimants' costs and legal expenses, in the case of injury or damage. Additionally look for cover for loss or damage of event equipment and naturally for cancellation.

If it is a wedding that you are organising and you want the day to go smoothly, there are special wedding event insurance packages that cover lots of possible things that can go wrong! Even though it is so well thought out considering so many possible issues this wedding package with a good insurance company can be quite economical.

The list of event types is long;
but across the board everyone wants their event to go perfectly. Spending some time and a little before the event on a suitable policy is far better than picking up the pieces after some mishap after the event!