7 Tips for Planning, Executing and Increasing Attendance at Your Entrepreneurship Event

Written by Jennifer Bennett, Ed.D., Communication and Program Director

The Wake Forest University Center for Entrepreneurship just wrapped up #Entrepalooza19; our annual 2-day event where we celebrate entrepreneurship. In our second year of hosting this event, we tripled our attendance and created a buzz that students, faculty, staff and community members are still talking about.

Planning, organizing and executing an event like this is not for the faint of heart, but it can be one of the best things your department implements every year. Why? It helps create excitement around entrepreneurship and allows you to showcase the accomplishments of your students- something that stakeholders would love to see and experience. Further, it gives on-campus students the opportunity to see and experience entrepreneurship. Countless students have shared with me about their enjoyment of seeing and being a part of the excitement as their peers pitch their startups. For many students additionally, this is their first “entrepreneurial experience” which has caused them to think and ask themselves, “why not me?”

Here are some of my top marketing tips for creating an unforgettable entrepreneurship event that gets people talking and gets them excited to attend, year after year:

1. Choose your leader. I recommend that you have one lead person on your team who leads the planning, organization, and execution of your event. This individual holds the responsibility of gathering a team around them that will bring the event together. Appointing a lead is a vital first step. Why? There needs to be a leader. Without a leader, no one will know what’s happening, who’s doing what, and who to go to.
2. Start planning early. I recommend that you begin the planning one-year in advance. This gives you ample time to reserve the rooms on campus that you need for your event (which as you know, can be hard to come by due to other on-campus events, classes, etc.), hire a keynote speaker, decide what “activities” you want to offer during your event, and get on the calendar of those key leaders on campus who would like to attend (President, Provost, Dean, etc.). You can never start planning too early.
3. Know your budget. Your budget will help you decide and differentiate the needs from the wants. How much do you want to spend on a keynote speaker? How much do you want to spend on decorations and food? How much do you want to spend on photography, videos, etc.? How much do you want to spend on marketing the event?
4. Brainstorm your marketing ideas. Marketing is a crucial component of a successful event. This is one of the reasons why we were able to triple our attendance this year. Here’s how we did it:

   – Create a recognizable “logo” for your event, especially if you plan on hosting this event yearly. You want that visual representation to become associated with your event, and this is the visual representation that you will use on all of your marketing.

   – We created banners, yard signs and table tents that were scattered all around campus. Our goal? To make sure that the campus of Wake Forest University knew about the event. And the good news is, that they did. I consistently heard from others how much they enjoyed seeing our banners and signage all around campus.

   – We also created a banner that was hung on a busy overpass in the city of Winston-Salem. This event was open to the public, and we wanted the public to know. The city banner created awareness about our event and our center.

   – Create a list of must invites and then, invite them. Once we created our list, we then set-up an email schedule to reach out to them regularly, before the event. This list received invites from our center and then also, personal invites from people on our team who had a personal connection with them. Our invitees included:  our advisory council, faculty, staff, students, community leaders, professionals from other universities, entrepreneurs, alumni, VC’s, etc. We even had a group of third graders attend out event! How? Our Executive Director went and shared about entrepreneurship with them, and they decided, that they wanted to come to the event! It was great having them there, and they really enjoyed the shout out that was given to them from the main stage and the reserved seating we had for them (we wanted to make sure they felt extra special).

   – Create a registration page. Why? This will give you an idea of how many people plan on attending. The key here is that you create a URL that is easy to remember. This URL will be placed on all of your marketing materials, so it needs to be super easy to remember (remember that banner in the city? Yes, we needed a quick and secure URL that passersby would remember).

   – Connect with the university’s communication department. This is super important. By connecting with a leader from the communication department, you can work together to generate media mentions for your event. By partnering with our Associate Director in News and Communications, we were able to share our event with the community.

   – Create teaser videos. We had our Demo Day students create 30-second teaser videos that we then shared on social media. The goal? To pique the curiosity of our online audience about the event. The teasers were used to introduce our Demo Day students and allowed our students to share these videos with their peers, their online audience.

   – Connect with the University’s Director of Social Media. This will help you create a partnership that will allow your event to get in front of the eyes of the university’s online audience. Additionally, which was a pleasant surprise for us, the Director of Social Media sent out a graduate student to the event who then created a 1-minute recap video of Entrepalooza that was shared on a variety of online platforms.

   – Livestream your event. This helps generate excitement around your event to those who can’t attend. And once those online viewers catch a glimpse of your event, they will save the date to participate next year in-person.

   

5. Create a checklist. This is super important because you will never remember all the details. This checklist will help you know what still needs to be done and what has been accomplished.
6. Create a run of show. There are so many details to putting on an event like this, that a run of show is vitally important. Knowing who is speaking when and at what time, the order of teams that are presenting, when the keynote speaker is arriving, when the audio team will be ready for students to come and rehearse, etc., a run of show is a lifesaver, and it helps keep everyone on track. More importantly, you’re not left wondering on the day of the event, who is doing what and when.
7. Breathe. On the day of the event, just breathe. Take it all in. Allow yourself to enjoy the moment. Thank your team for all they did to make this possible. Your reward will be a great event that is enjoyed by all, which will be apparent with the many smiles you’ll see.

I’m a firm believer that creating an event like this, will create a buzz like no other on campus. It will generate excitement and interest around entrepreneurship that will spread!