When you think of the events industry, Murphy's Law probably comes to mind 'anything that can go wrong will go wrong'. Everyone knows events are magic and somehow everything comes into place last minute, but that isn't without bumps along the road; one of those bumps being over spending.
Most planners have probably had an event or two where they are up all night missing key meetings and beauty sleep because they need to find out how they ended up 25% over budget on day two of their event. This can involve rummaging through paper work, scanning your inbox for order forms, making calls to venues and suppliers, and chasing down your team for answers.
However, it doesn't have to be that way. There is an easier way to keep your budget in check and open communication with your venue and suppliers. Get a few pro tips to properly managing your budget on site.
Set up a communication plan for onsite changes ahead of time. Make it clear who is involved in this plan and a summary or example of what goes in the plan.
Make sure your team members and the venue understand how the communication plan will work. This will keep you from paying for costly last minute changes that were not authorized and will keep everyone friends when the bill comes due.
Leverage the cloud; data on laptops is frequently lost which makes collaboration difficult and potentially exposes you to security risks. Use an online platform like Google docs or DropBox to share common files. There is nothing worse than opening up an office file and finding out its not compatible!
Go to the platform! Give visibility to all changes and your event by using etouches' event management pro modules including:
- eProject - Project planning inside your event
- eScheduler - Make easy work of building your next Event Specification Guide
- eBudget - Understand what you spend on your events every year
- eWiki - Share documents and edits to your event sites and documentation.
In those tools, changes can be viewed in real time and shared with your team and your venue.
No one wants to miss out on new networking or business opportunities at events because you had to sit in your room and reevaluate your budget. Utilize some or all of the tips above to ensure that you remain the Master of the Universe when it comes to your event!
