4 Tips for Choosing the Perfect Entertainment for Your Corporate Event
If you're in charge of choosing the entertainment for your next corporate party, these tips will help you book the right talent for your event.
A recent survey polled business owners and executives about their party habits. Turns out that 73% of those surveyed reported that their company would hold at least one corporate event during the year. That's a lot of party planning!
Most companies won't utilize the services of a professional party planner for their company party. Usually, the planning tasks are turned over to employee volunteers. But unless you plan parties for a living there are a lot of rookie mistakes that can trip up your event, ruining your opportunity to build community and reward achievement. At Dancebands.com, we have a lot of experience booking event entertainment. Here are some tips from our experts on how you can make sure that your event is a smash.
Know the Why
Did you know that most corporate parties wind up costing the company about $75 per person. If a business is going to spend that kind of money, they're going to expect some kind of return on the investment. As a result, you should start your party planning by asking about the objective for the party. The first mistake most amateur planners make is to just assume that the purpose of a party is to have fun. But that's not the main purpose of a company party. If it's a client event, then obviously the company is hoping to gain new business by building client relationships. However, if it's an in-house event then its more likely that the company wants to build morale and establish a sense of corporate culture. So how can you establish the purpose for your party? Start by talking to business owners and executives to find out what they want to gain from the party. Once you know that, you can start brainstorming entertainment ideas that actually make sense for your goals.
Know Your Crowd Size
Have you ever been to an event where it's really obvious that the entertainment has been mismatched to the crowd? If you book talent that's too small for your crowd, then you have long lines or people can't hear. If the talent you book is too large for your crowd, then it makes the event seem small (and not in a good way.) Either way that mismatch will undermine or even wreck the goals for your event. So it's important that you have a good estimate of the number of people you expect to attend.
Don't be fooled into planning for the number of people you're inviting. You'll get a much more accurate picture of how many people will attend if you do some research. If you've done a similar event in the past, then find out how many people came to last year's party. Or you can survey your invite list before you start planning to get a tally on who is likely to attend. If all else fails and you're still not sure how to get a good count then party planning experts suggest estimating that about two-thirds of your invite list will turn up (and only about 30% of those will RSVP.)
Know Your Budget
While it's important to know the total dollar amount budgeted for your celebration, you'll be able to do a better job of planning if you look at your budget as a per person expenditure. (Take the total dollar amount allocated for the event and then divide it by the number of people you’re estimating will attend.) In some ways, it's easier to estimate what kind of party you'll be able to throw using a per person amount. For example, if your budget works out to $20 per person you can easily imagine how far that’s going to go (or not go) in covering things like food and drinks.
Know How Much Movement You Want
Since you know the why, you know the crowd size, and you know your budget you're ready to start considering the kind of event entertainment to book. But once you start looking around you may feel a bit overwhelmed by all the options available. A great way to narrow your choices is to consider how much movement you envision your guests making. Will this be a party where everyone is seated upon arrival for dinner and a show. Or do you want it to be a party where people move and mingle?
Figuring out how much movement you want really comes back to your goals for the party. If you want to do a big presentation, then seating your guests to start will make it much easier to get their attention at the appropriate time. However, if your want to encourage networking and morale building then you want people on their feet and moving around.