An event starts when the invitation lands
Guests decide what kind of event it is weeks before the doors open. Most of that decision is made by an email.
Event budgets go to the venue, the stage and the catering. Attention goes to the day itself. Yet the first experience any guest has of your event is an invitation, and the last is whatever arrives in their inbox afterwards, or the silence if nothing does.
Before: the invitation is the first act
- Say who it is for and what they will leave with, before the date and the venue.
- Make registration a single short form. Every extra field loses guests.
- Send a confirmation that answers the practical questions: where to park, when to arrive, who to call.
- Send one reminder with something new in it, such as a speaker or the agenda. A reminder that only repeats the date is noise.
During: one visual language
The invitation, the signage, the badges, the slides and the merchandise should look like one event. When the same team designs the print and plans the day, they do. When they are bought from four suppliers, the seams show. At the exhibition we organised for artist Nina Kovacheva, the posters, invitations, signage and merchandise were designed together with the running of the day; it is in the case study.
After: the part most events skip
- Thank guests within two days, with the photos or slides they were promised.
- Ask one question about the event, not twenty.
- Tell the people who could not come what they missed and when the next one is.
- Write down what you would change while you still remember.
Whose guest list is it?
If an agency runs registration for you, you remain responsible for the guest data and the agency processes it on your instructions. Agree in writing what is collected, who can see it and when it is deleted. We spell out that split in our privacy policy, and it is part of how we run event management.
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