An event business plan is a useful document to help you focus your efforts as an event organiser. Nevertheless, it’s also an exceptional tool to sell your event idea to potential investors.
Read this guide to discover the different sections you should include in your event business plan to make it useful and competitive.
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Your team and business’s organisation are vital in convincing your investors. It doesn’t matter how exceptional your event offer is if there is no team to make it happen.
Here is what you should include in your business structure description:
Yourself and your role as an event organiser
The event staff you hired (with titles and job descriptions)
What kind of company you manage (sole trader, partnership, or limited company)
With which suppliers and vendors you are planning to work with
Your company history and its past results
Suggestion: if your business structure is more complicated than the above, use this guide as a support to write the description.
2. The event description
The event description is the meaty part of the event business plan. That’s where you try to sell the concept to potential investors. Make sure you include as many details as possible.
Here’s what you should talk about in the event description:
The Event Mission: describe the aim of the event, what you are hoping to achieve before, during and post-event.
Goals and timeline: explain the objectives, when they should happen, who should do them, and how will they develop to reach the aim of the event.
Target audience: let your investors know what target audience you want to reach (include your ideal client, why he or she should be interested in your event and how you are planning to advertise it)
Stakeholders: include any interested key investor for the event, how they are involved and what benefits they will bring
You can also include some history about the event if you organised anything similar in the past. Include all positive outcomes, in addition to future projects to increase them.
3. Development plan
The event description should convince all potential investors to finance the event. Expand it with a development plan for the future and make your investors’ eyes shine, looking for more income.
Future vision: share the big picture to describe your event future vision. Will it be bigger next year? Will it expand in other countries?
Demonstrate you have a future vision
Strategic development: underline how you intend to realise your future vision, with a clear timeline and how will be involved
SWOT Analysis: prove to your investors that you thought about everything, including strengths and weaknesses in your vision
Use the event requirements to underline what you need to make the event happen. This strategy will give your investors a clear picture of how many resources you need, and it will make you accurate.
Here’s something you will need for your event.
Venue and site facilities: include the event venue, catering, travel, accommodation, electricity and WiFi
Equipment: include AV, lights and stage for artists, speakers and presenters.
Hiring COVID-19 Trained Event Staff: describe the event staff, security, entertainment and first aid team for your event. The responsible thing to do is to hire only certified COVID-19 trained event staff, so you are guaranteed to work with event professionals that perfectly know how to keep themselves, your clients and event attendees safe from COVID-19 associated risks.
Legal matters: present all permits and insurance that you need for your event.
Budget: include an estimate of how much all the above will cost.
The event should not be sold to investors only. Also, your target audience should be aware of it. Investors will want to know how you are planning to spread the word.
Here’s what you should consider when setting your marketing plan:
Positioning: define your USPs and how your event will place on the competition
Event pricing: share the ticket price and how you intend to supply them.
Advertising: define what channels (like email, text, SEM and social media) you will use to use to promote your event and reach your target audience
PR: identify the media you will contact and how you will convince them to publish your event.
Budget: estimate how much advertising your event will cost.
6. Financial plan
You need money to make money; however, anyone that would invest in your event will want to know if you can manage it properly. Write a financial plan on how you are planning to manage your event budget.
Highlight potential event profit sources:
Show investors, you can manage a budgetSuggestion: read our guide on how to hire COVID-19 trained event staff like a pro to help you keep yourself, your clients, your event staff and event attendees safe from COVID-19 associated risks.
7. Conclusion
Now that you talked about all the essential aspects of your event business plan, it’s time to conclude and make it shine.
Here’s what to include before, during and after each section we discussed above:
Front cover: include the name of the event and its logo, the event business plan title and contact details
Table of Content: create a content index to highlight each event business plan section
Executive summary: write the whole event business plan in review to read in a few minutes.
Appendix: it includes appendix at the back in case of additional notes, reports or research that complete your event business plan.
It will take time to structure your business plan; however, you will be happy once completed. It won’t be useful to investors only, but to you and your team as well.
Remember that your event business plan has to be alive. Update it every time there are some updates.
Download Our Event Business Plan Checklist
To recap, download our Event Business Plan Checklist below, which includes everything you need to write in your event business plan.
Here’s what you should consider when setting your marketing plan:
