Challenges Event Managers Face and How to Avoid Them

Event management is not for the faint-hearted and can often feel like a minefield if you’re not an experienced event manager.

When planning an event there are so many things to consider and plan there are lots of opportunities for things to go wrong if you don’t have a good plan in place.

As an event management company, we are well versed in event planning and management and are able to quickly spot a potential issue before it takes place, allowing us to find a solution before a problem occurs. However, this comes with hard work, knowledge and years of industry experience!

In this blog, our event management team want to impart their knowledge on the challenges you may face when planning an event and how to avoid them.

---

Challenges Faced When Managing An Event

There are all kinds of challenges event managers face when running and managing an event, below we have listed the 7 reasons why your event may not perform well and how to ensure you put a plan in place to ensure this doesn’t disrupt your next event.

1. Insufficient Data

By not collecting enough data about your event you’re setting yourself up to lose.

Collecting data is crucial to the success of your event. As an event management company, we collect as much data and information as possible before planning events to ensure that they are a success.

By collecting data about clients’ goals, expectations and ROIs we can ensure that the event we plan for them is a complete success. We also spend time getting a clear understanding of what our client’s key spending areas are and how that translates to their budget. Therefore, maximising the impact of the event we’re organising.

Additionally, we spend time collecting data after the event. For example how many bottles of wine were drunk? How many attendees? How did entertainment go down? And so on.

By collecting this information post-event, you set yourself up for an even bigger success next time you run a similar event. This is by understanding where you could cut and spend next time around.

---

2. Lack Of Time

Even the most basic of events have multiple different components that need careful planning. To prevent running out of time or feeling that last-minute panic, ensure you have written a comprehensive list of tasks needed to organize and manage your events.

This needs to be functional, not one that sits in a pretty notebook never to be looked at again. You need to write a list of everything that needs completion, then set out an action plan and deadlines accordingly.

As an event manager, it will be your job to delegate tasks and brief people. Therefore, we suggest amending your event plan the night before the event to account for any last-minute changes. You then need to call a meeting in the morning on the day of your event to brief staff and hand out the agenda, this will allow you to answer any questions and clearly mark out your expectations of your team.

One of our top tips as successful event managers is to get a crack team together and BUILD YOUR NETWORK. Ensure you have a team of people you know and trust who will go above and beyond. This will ensure that even if you have a client approach you with a less-than-ideal time frame, you will have the right team on hand to pull off an exceptional event.

---

3. Not enough people in attendance

When organising your event, the last thing you want is minimal attendance. Therefore, it is important to effectively market your event to ensure maximum attendance of the RIGHT kind of client. There’s no point in hosting an event about your new product launch to people who aren’t in the industry or have no interest in your product.

An effective way to do this is by utilising marketing platforms. These will help you take advantage of personalised email marketing. Additionally, you want to take time to research exactly the calibre of guests to invite and give them a really good reason to attend.

As event managers, we are able to utilise our extensive list of industry contacts. Ensuring the best of the best are in attendance at your event.

---

4. Entertainment cancellation

As an event manager, there is always a risk when running live events that your entertainment may cancel last minute.

Whether it’s a speaker, performer or DJ. If they cancel without a contingency plan this can be a big issue. Therefore, when planning your event you need to ensure that you have a backup plan should any of your performers pull out last-minute.

The best way to do this is by building your network and having entertainers you know personally who can jump in last-minute should something go wrong. Alternatively, if you are new to event management and don’t have this network, you can sub-hire an entertainment agency that provides a replacement supplier as part of their contract agreement with you if there is a need for a replacement.

Additionally, as an event organiser, you should always have a plan B in regard to your catering and venue. If, for example, it is an outdoor event and there is inclement weather you must have a backup plan.

As an experienced event management company with a strong network, we have a whole host of contacts in the industry. Which, at the last minute, we can contact to ensure your guests are none the wiser of any potential setbacks.

---

5. Inadequate budget

The worst thing to do when organising an event is to insufficiently plan your budget. Many event managers simply track their spend per item or service as they go along. This is a big no-no.

It is crucial when planning to set out a realistic budget for your event at the very beginning of the event planning process. This should be based on your research and understanding of what the costs will be, rather than a guestimation of what you think they might be. Additionally, it is important to allocate a set spend per service to ensure you are not overspending and identify the big budget items early on.

By having a basic budget framework you should be able to monitor and stay on top of your expenditure, without overspending and getting any unexpected nasty surprises!

---

6. Unorganised registration

One of the worst things to experience as a guest at any event is messy and unorganised registration. It is frustrating for both staff and clients and can make your event and company look rather unprofessional. The best way to avoid this scenario is by lots of pre-planning.

Whether you’re planning an in-person, virtual or hybrid event, entry into an event should be smooth and as contactless as possible. Therefore when organising your event make it so that guests can register or buy tickets online and generate QR codes as a way of them entering the venue. This will ensure a seamless and smooth entrance into your event.

With pre-registration, it not only makes the entrance into the event smooth. But it also allows you to get a really realistic understanding of who and how many guests are attending. This is a really good way of then tracking statics and analysing data post-event.

---

7. Travel and Hotels

If you’re organising an international event this is something that needs to have a serious amount of consideration put in. Especially now that Virtual and Hybrid events are growing in popularity.

One of the most effective ways to minimise the stress of having to fly in and accommodate international guests is to turn your event digital and make the most of Hybrid technology. This allows for your guests to attend your event without the stress, cost and risk of travelling.

Post-Covid, many clients have opted to continue with hybrid events as it combines the best of both worlds. They are still able to have the physical effect of a live and in-person event, whilst also allowing guests from further afield to tune in online to minimise cost and time spent travelling.

---

Event Management Summary

Planning, organising and managing an event can be daunting. However, by having an eye on the common problems we’ve identified in this article it should ensure that your event runs smoothly and you avoid any rooky errors.

However, if you’d like to plan an event but don’t want to be in charge of the organisation aspect that’s what hiring an event management company is for. We deal with all of this and more and we guarantee a smooth and seamless event. Therefore if you’d like to have a chat today about your event get in touch, we’d love to hear from you!