[How To] Plan Events From A Different City - Part 1

Photo courtesy of mediabistro.com.

For some time now, I’ve been planing cocktail events across the country for my company, and I thought it’d be neat if I shared my experiences on planning a successful party in another city. I’ve got 6 events lined up this year-4 in NYC, 1 in Chicago, 1 in San Francisco.

Learn more after the jump.

What I found difficult about planning events on the other side of the country is that you’re not there to check things out. I’ve had an experience where the venue was a disaster when I came to check it out the night before the party. Thankfully, we fixed it last minute and the event was a hit.

So in this series, I’ll be documenting the process of an event I’m currently planning in NYC (I’m based in San Francisco). The purpose of these gatherings are to network with people in our industry, and possibly win them over as clients. The standards are as follows: 50 people in attendance, open premium bar, and passed and stationary hors d’oeuvres. I’ve got about a month to plan the party, so here’s my schedule:

Here’s what’s going on so far:

List creation

I have 2 researchers accumulating a list of 500 names within our target market in the Tri-state Area for the invite list. From past experience, 40% of the invite list RSVPs, while 20% actually attends. Figuring out how to get the people that RSVP to actually attend is the part I have yet to figure out.

Stay tuned to see what happens next!

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