A successful event is as much an art as it is a science. Art – it requires your expressive and visionary aspect to attract the present audience. Science – it needs a calculative and keen eye to pull things off on budget, yet keeping the success formula intact.

Planning a productive event is certainly not a cakewalk as it requires months of planning, days of patience and last minute flexibility to add or remove things from the to-do list. At the heart of a breathing and alive event there lies a stated objective and losing sight of which, success is a far-off entity. Therefore, to deliver a successful event, you require an acute organization and constant attention to detail.

Here are some winning tips to carry out a successful event:

1. Set a budget and stick to it

While organizing a successful event, budget is the most important resource at every moment or process. Therefore, setting a budget and sticking to it is very important to start with. Plus, it also allows creativity to take the center stage; you can use your creative side to make up for what only big money pulls off. Sticking to your budget makes you prepared for the last minutes costs that you probably couldn’t foresee. You also need to determine how your fixed costs and your variable costs are adding up.

2. Choose a perfect venue

Picking a perfect venue for your event is the key because location, decor, and ambiance speak volume about its success. It should be convenient and easily accessible because your main invitees can reach there and depart on time. For that reason, central areas are always popular choices for events. You should consider a few things before finalizing the venue such as parking, capacity, services, and amenities. Choosing an ideal venue, therefore, can help craft the perfect event experience for you and your guests.

3. Assemble a dedicated team

Organizing a successful event is not an easy thing, and surely not a one person’s job. It needs a careful planning and well-execution of various processes. A dedicated team not just saves you from a great deal of stress, but their inputs can be extremely helpful for you. One way for selecting the best team is to look at their recent history, which they have done something similar. They will more likely to do same thing for you. They should be able to do everything from managing to administer the basic services to your guests.

4. Determine your objectives

You must have a clear business purpose for holding any such function. In order to know whether you have made the right moves, you need to have clear cut objectives. What is going to be the main draw? Will you invite a guest speaker or provide educational training? What are the key takeaways for the attendees? Setting objectives will help you measure your effectiveness after the event.

5. Marketing and promotion

Figure out how you are going to best promote your upcoming event. There are various ways to do that – email, direct mail, social media, print media, flyers, postcards, local TV ads, so on and so forth. One innovative way to promote the event is to create personalized labels for water bottles and distributing them to people who you want to come. You can also create a Facebook page for the event and a Twitter handle. Create a custom hashtag for the event and encourage attendees to tweet about it.

6. Make it a fun experience

It’s important to encourage your volunteers to have fun because their attitude and excitement set the tone for the whole event. When it comes to your audience and guests, encourage them to have fun and get involved in the proceedings. Make the session highly interactive where people can feel very relaxed. To further make the moments lighter and funnier, you can organize certain events in between such as karaoke, stand-up, talent show, etc. Also, to make the event more attractive and enjoyable, you can add a theme to it.

7. Negotiate with vendors

Negotiation is very important because it can make a huge difference in terms of budget at the end of the event. As a matter of fact, everything is negotiable, even when your vendors tell you it is not. A good ice-breaker is to make a list of everything you need from them, determine your budget and then give them a number that is 5 – 10% lower. It is possible that there are unforeseen costs, so allow yourself a space to maneuver.

8. Have a backup plan

It is rarely seen that an event has been successfully completed without a single issue. On the other hand, it is often observed that some important things/persons were not turned up. So it is possible that certain things will be late, certain other things won’t arrive at all. Assess the most important assets your event will have, and create a backup plan for each. Keeping a watch on the time is also very crucial here, which will give you leverage to exercise your plan B.