business plan for event organizer

Event Planning Company Business Plan

Written by Dave Lavinsky

Event Planning Business Plan

You’ve come to the right place to create your event planning business plan.

We have helped over 10,000 entrepreneurs and business owners create business plans and many have used them to start or grow their event planning companies

Below is an event planning business plan sample to help you create each section of your Event Planning business plan.

Executive Summary

Business overview.

Special Occasions Event Planning is a startup event planning business located in Des Moines, Iowa. The Company is founded by Jennifer Brown, an experienced event planner who has been planning themed weddings and birthday parties as the manager of a local event venue for the past ten years. Now that Jennifer has gained valuable experience managing an event venue and planning special events of various sizes and styles, she is ready to start her own event planning company, Special Occasions Event Planning. Jennifer is confident that her event planning skills, combined with her understanding of business management, will enable her to run a profitable event planning company of her own. Jennifer is recruiting a team of highly qualified professionals to help manage the day-to-day complexities of running an event planning business – sales and marketing, supply sourcing and procurement, customer relationship management, budgeting, financial reporting, and vendor relationship management. 

Special Occasions Event Planning will provide customized event planning services for special occasions big and small. Special Occasions will specialize in themed birthday parties, but will provide planning services for other types of events such as weddings, parties, and corporate gatherings upon request. The Company will be the ultimate choice for unique and memorable themed birthday parties for clients of all ages. 

Product Offering

The following are the event planning products and services that Special Occasions Event Planning will provide:

• Venue Sourcing 
• Tables & Chairs
• Dinnerware & Utensils
• Caterer Coordination
• Entertainment
• Party Favors
• Photography/Videography
• Lighting/Sound
• Bartending/Liquor 
• Set-up/Clean up

Customer Focus

Special Occasions Event Planning will target individuals, families, and social groups in Des Moines, Iowa. The Company will target people looking to plan a one-of-a-kind birthday party for their child, significant other, friend, or other relative. No matter the customer, Special Occasions Event Planning will deliver the best communication, service, and attention to detail. 

Management Team

Special Occasions Event Planning will be owned and operated by Jennifer Brown. Jennifer is a graduate of Iowa University with a degree in Business Management. She has over ten years of experience working as an event planner for another local venue. Jennifer will be the Company’s Chief Executive Officer and the Head Event Planner. She will lead the more complex events and oversee the event planning staff. 

Jennifer has recruited an experienced administrative assistant, Patricia Smith, to help manage the day-to-day business operations. Patricia has been an administrative assistant in the event planning industry for more than 15 years. Jennifer relies on Patricia’s organization, attention to detail, and punctuality when organizing her schedule, managing clients, and maintaining her files. 

Jennifer and Patricia have recruited an experienced marketing director, John Jones, to become a member of the Special Occasions Event Planning management team. John is a graduate of the University of Iowa with a Bachelor’s degree in Marketing. Jennifer and Patricia rely on John’s expertise to execute the Company’s marketing plan and advertising strategies.  

Success Factors

Special Occasions Event Planning will be able to achieve success by offering the following competitive advantages:

• Skilled team of event planners who will ensure every client receives exceptional customer service and that all reasonable requests are met. 
• Special Occasions Event Planning’s leadership team has established relationships with local venues, vendors, and entertainers, thus providing customers with a wide selection of options to choose from when planning their special event. 
• The Company specializes in the themed birthday party niche and is well-versed in the latest trends in the industry. 

Financial Highlights

Special Occasions Event Planning is seeking $200,000 in debt financing to launch its event planning business. The funding will be dedicated towards securing an office space and purchasing equipment and supplies. Funding will also be dedicated towards three months of overhead costs to include payroll of the staff and marketing expenses. The breakout of the funding is below:

• Office lease and renovation: $80,000
• Office equipment, supplies, and materials: $20,000
• Three months of overhead expenses (payroll, utilities): $90,000
• Marketing costs: $10,000
• Working capital: $10,000

The following graph below outlines the pro forma financial projections for Special Occasions Event Planning.

Company Overview

Who is special occasions event planning .

Special Occasions Event Planning is a newly established event planning company based in Des Moines, Iowa. Special Occasions will be the first choice for unique themed birthday parties for people of all ages in Des Moines and the surrounding communities. The company will provide customized event planning services for parties large and small. 

Special Occasions Event Planning will be able to provide all the essentials for any special event from highly rated caterers to the hottest entertainment due to the Company’s existing relationships with industry professionals and vendors. The Company’s team of highly qualified event planning professionals will manage the entire planning process from ideation to execution. Special Occasions even provides clean-up services. Clients can opt for full-service event planning services or purchase specific aspects (such as decor or catering) a la carte. 

Special Occasions Event Planning History

Special Occasions Event Planning is owned and operated by Jennifer Brown, an experienced event planner who has been planning themed weddings and birthday parties as the manager of a local event venue for the past ten years. Now that Jennifer has experienced managing an event venue and planning special events of various sizes and styles, she is ready to start her own event planning company. Jennifer is confident that her event planning skills, combined with her understanding of business management, will enable her to run a profitable event planning company of her own. Jennifer is recruiting a team of highly qualified professionals to help manage the day-to-day complexities of running an event planning business – sales and marketing, supply sourcing and procurement, customer relationship management, budgeting, financial reporting, and vendor relationship management. 

Since incorporation, Special Occasions Event Planning has achieved the following milestones:

• Registered Special Occasions Event Planning, LLC to transact business in the state of Iowa. 
• Has signed a contract to lease the office space. 
• Reached out to numerous contacts to include local venues, catering companies, entertainers, and decor suppliers to spread the word about her new business opportunities. 
• Began recruiting a staff of accountants, event planners, sales and marketing associates, and office staff to work at Special Occasions Event Planning Services.

Special Occasions Event Planning Services

Industry analysis.

The Party and Event Planning industry in the United States is valued at approximately $4B, with 70,000 businesses in operation, and over 82,000 employees. The market for event planning services is expected to grow over the next several years due to an aging baby boomer population, many of whom have children and grandchildren who will have weddings, birthday parties, graduations, anniversaries, and other special events in the coming years. Additionally, the corporate event planning segment is expected to grow due to more companies pursuing team building opportunities and hosting events that can serve as marketing for the business. 

The event planning market is split into two broad segments: corporate and social. Corporate events such as holiday parties, meetings, trade shows, conventions, fundraisers, and receptions are just some of the events included in this segment. Corporate customers include companies, non-profit organizations, and charities. The social segment includes a wide range of special occasions such as weddings, bridal showers, birthday parties, anniversary parties, reunions, and more. The largest and most lucrative category in the social event planning segment is wedding planning. 

Industry operators can specialize in one or two niches such as wedding planners or corporate planners. Alternatively, industry operators can provide planning services for a wide range of events. Industry operators that specialize in a specific niche and even narrow their niche to a specific type of event, such as “kids’ parties” or “fashion shows” may have more success because they can become an expert in one area and target a highly specific customer segment. Industry operators who provide a broad range of services to a variety of customers can be successful if they provide high levels of organization, customer service, and unique or highly customized services. 

Customer Analysis

Demographic profile of target market.

Special Occasions Event Planning will target individuals, families, and social groups in Des Moines, Iowa. The Company will target people looking to plan a one-of-a-kind birthday party for their child, significant other, friend, or other relative. Special Occasions Event Planning will also target young adults looking to plan a memorable, themed 21st birthday party. No matter the customer, Special Occasions Event Planning will deliver the best communication, service, and attention to detail. 

The precise demographics for Des Moines, Iowa are:

Customer Segmentation

Special Occasions will primarily target the following customer profiles:

• Millennials
• Individuals with disposable income
• Families with children and disposable income

Competitive Analysis

Direct and indirect competitors.

Special Occasions Event Planning will face competition from other companies with similar business profiles. A description of each competitor company is below.

Emily’s Event Planning

Established in 2017, Emily’s Event Planning is now a well-known event planner in the Des Moines, Iowa area. The company provides event planning services for large corporate events, weddings, and birthday parties. Emily’s Event Planning is most well-known for its picturesque venue choices. The company has relationships with some of the most in-demand venues in the area. Emily’s Event Planning provides an all-inclusive event planning and management service with packages that include venue rental, decor, entertainment, food, and clean-up services. 

While Emily’s Event Planning has an established reputation in the market for quality event planning services, it has a list of predefined event packages and does not customize its services or take unique requests from customers. 

Fancy Event Planner

Fancy Event Planner has been operating in the state of Iowa since 1982. This company is a small business run by a husband and wife team that specializes in event planning and catering services for weddings, birthday parties, and other special occasions. Fancy Event Planner provides decor, venue coordination, and food service for events of up to 100 guests. The company specializes in providing gourmet dinners, desserts, and appetizers. Additionally, Fancy Event Planner provides hand crafted decor and floral arrangements for weddings and parties. Fancy Event Planner is for customers looking for an elegant presentation in a traditional setting. 

Fancy Event Planner has a limited selection of services and does not offer entertainment, set-up/clean-up, lighting/sound, or liquor accommodations. 

Wonderfully Perfect Event Planning Services

Wonderfully Perfect Event Planning Services is a new Des Moines, Iowa-based event planner that provides superior service to its customers. The company is managed by an experienced entrepreneur who has been working in the hospitality industry for over 20 years. She opened Wonderfully Perfect Event Planning Services in 2019 when she discovered a lack of options for themed party planning in the area. The company provides customized planning services for any event and will strive to ensure all customer requests are met to ensure a perfect event experience every time. 

The company does not have established relationships with vendors, venues, or entertainment in the area and as such, trails behind Special Occasions Event Planning in this area. 

Competitive Advantage

Special Occasions Event Planning will be able to offer the following advantages over the competition:

• Skilled team of experienced event planners who are able to provide customized planning services and fulfill any reasonable request. 
• Special Occasions Event Planning’s management team has long-standing relationships with industry professionals and is able to provide customers with a wide selection of options when it comes to venues, entertainment, and catering.  
• The Company specializes in themed birthday parties and keeps up on the latest trends in the industry. 

Marketing Plan

Brand & value proposition.

Special Occasions Event Planning will offer the unique value proposition to its clientele:

• Special Occasions Event Planning provides full-services event planning from ideation to execution. 
• The Company’s wide selection of options allows each customer to create their dream event.  

Promotions Strategy 

The promotions strategy for Special Occasions Event Planning is as follows:

Social Media Marketing

The Company’s marketing director will create accounts on social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and YouTube. He will ensure Special Occasions maintains an active social media presence with regular daily updates and fun content to get customers excited about using the Company’s event planning services. 

Professional Associations and Networking

Special Occasions Event Planning will become a member of professional associations such as the Event Planners’ Association, American Party Planning Society, and the Iowa Special Event Association. The leadership team will focus their networking efforts on expanding the Company’s vendor and client network. 

Print Advertising

Special Occasions Event Planning will invest in professionally designed print ads to display in programs or flyers at industry networking events. The Company will also send direct mailers to local businesses with employees who are in the target market. 

Website/SEO Marketing

Special Occasions Event Planning will utilize its in-house marketing director that designed the print ads to also design the Company’s website. The website will be well organized, informative, and list all the services that Special Occasions is able to provide. The website will also list information on the Company’s events and promotions. 

The marketing director will also manage the Company’s website presence with SEO marketing tactics so that when someone types in a search engine “Des Moines Event Planner” or “Event Planner near me”, Special Occasions Event Planning will be listed at the top of the search results.

The pricing of Special Occasions Event Planning will be premium due to the high level of customization and hands-on planning services involved. Customers will feel they receive great value when purchasing the Company’s services.  

Operations Plan

The following will be the operations plan for Special Occasions Event Planning.

Operation Functions:

• Jennifer Brown will be the CEO and Head Event Planner. She will lead the more complex events and oversee the event planning staff. Jennifer has spent the past year recruiting the following staff:
• Patricia Smith – Administrative Assistant who will manage the budgeting, vendor relationships, and logistics.
• Sam Johnson – Accountant/Bookkeeper who will provide all accounting, tax payments, and monthly financial reporting.
• John Jones – Marketing Director who will oversee all marketing strategies for the Company and manage the website, social media, and outreach. 
• Michelle Garcia – Customer Success Officer who will oversee customer relationships. 

Milestones:

Special Occasions Event Planning will have the following milestones complete in the next six months.

11/1/2022 – Finalize contract to lease the office space. 

11/15/2022 – Finalize employment contracts for the Special Occasions Event Planning management team.

12/1/2022 – Begin renovations on the office and purchase office equipment and supplies. 

12/15/2022 – Begin networking at industry events and implement the marketing plan. 

1/15/2023 – Begin recruiting and training office staff and event planners. 

2/15/2023 – Special Occasions Event Planning officially opens for business. 

Financial Plan

Key revenue & costs.

The revenue drivers for Special Occasions Event Planning are the fees charged to customers in exchange for the Company’s event planning services. Customers will be able to purchase full-service, customizable packages or select specific aspects (such as entertainment or catering) a la carte. 

The cost drivers will be the overhead costs required in order to staff an event planning business. The expenses will be the payroll cost, utilities, party supplies, and marketing materials.

Funding Requirements and Use of Funds

Key assumptions.

The following outlines the key assumptions required in order to achieve the revenue and cost numbers in the financials and in order to pay off the startup business loan.

• Average number of events per month: 4 
• Average fees per month: $20,000
• Overhead costs per year: $360,000

Financial Projections

Income statement.

Balance Sheet

Cash Flow Statement

Event Planning Company Business Plan FAQs

What is an event planning company business plan.

An e vent planning company business plan is a plan to start and/or grow your event planning company business. Among other things, it outlines your business concept, identifies your target customers, presents your marketing plan and details your financial projections.

You can easily complete your event planning company business plan using our Event Planning Company Business Plan Template here .

What are the Main Types of Event Planning Companies?

There are a number of different kinds of event planning companies , some examples include: Corporate Events, Social Events, and Niche Events Planning.

How Do You Get Funding for Your Event Planning Company Business Plan?

Event planning companies are often funded through small business loans. Personal savings, credit card financing and angel investors are also popular forms of funding. This is true for an event business plan or an event management business plan.

What are the Steps To Start an Event Planning Business?

Starting an event planning business can be an exciting endeavor. Having a clear roadmap of the steps to start a business will help you stay focused on your goals and get started faster.

1. Develop An Event Planning Company Business Plan - The first step in starting a business is to create a detailed event planning company business plan that outlines all aspects of the venture. This should include potential market size and target customers, the services or products you will offer, pricing strategies and a detailed financial forecast.  

2. Choose Your Legal Structure - It's important to select an appropriate legal entity for your event planning business. This could be a limited liability company (LLC), corporation, partnership, or sole proprietorship. Each type has its own benefits and drawbacks so it’s important to do research and choose wisely so that your event planning business is in compliance with local laws.

3. Register Your Event Planning Business - Once you have chosen a legal structure, the next step is to register your event planning business with the government or state where you’re operating from. This includes obtaining licenses and permits as required by federal, state, and local laws. 

4. Identify Financing Options - It’s likely that you’ll need some capital to start your event planning business, so take some time to identify what financing options are available such as bank loans, investor funding, grants, or crowdfunding platforms. 

5. Choose a Location - Whether you plan on operating out of a physical location or not, you should always have an idea of where you’ll be based should it become necessary in the future as well as what kind of space would be suitable for your operations. 

6. Hire Employees - There are several ways to find qualified employees including job boards like LinkedIn or Indeed as well as hiring agencies if needed – depending on what type of employees you need it might also be more effective to reach out directly through networking events. 

7. Acquire Necessary Event Planning Company Equipment & Supplies - In order to start your event planning business, you'll need to purchase all of the necessary equipment and supplies to run a successful operation. 

8. Market & Promote Your Business - Once you have all the necessary pieces in place, it’s time to start promoting and marketing your event planning business. This includes creating a website, utilizing social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter, and having an effective Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy. You should also consider traditional marketing techniques such as radio or print advertising. 

Learn more about how to start a successful event planning business:

• How to Start an Event Planning Business

Other Helpful Business Plan Templates

Photography Business Plan Template Event Venue Business Plan Template Catering Business Plan Template

How to Write an Event Organiser Business Plan (With Examples)

If you’re looking to turn your event into a viable and profitable enterprise, you’ll need to devise a solid business plan. Whether your aim is making more money, securing investment and partners, or simply keeping up with your commercial goals, an event business plan is the launchpad of a successful business.

A well-written plan can be an invaluable resource for you, your team , and your event – but writing one need not be difficult. Our systematic and straightforward event business plan step-by-step guide will show you how to create one, while providing you with useful examples for budgeting and promotion that you can adapt for your particular market.

How do you write a business plan as an event planner?

From coming up with your blue-sky mission statement to the nitty-gritty details of hosting your event, there are several steps to creating a great event business plan. Read on to get our in-depth tips and examples and to find out exactly what should go into your plan.

In this article, our tips for writing an event business plan are broken down into eight sections. We’ll show you how to:

• Begin your event business plan with a mission statement
• Describe your greater vision with a vision statement
• List the key objectives you want to track
• Enhance your event business plan with storytelling
• Detail an event marketing strategy
• Outline your event’s operational requirements
• Crunch the numbers for your event budget
• Nail SWOT analysis with this business plan event example

1. Begin your event business plan with a mission statement

Your mission statement describes your event in a short sentence or two. It helps to sell your event to important stakeholders and forms the foundation of your marketing. In fact, it’ll also help to keep you focused since every decision you make will ultimately trace back to your mission.

Mercato Metropolitano (MM), a sprawling community market and event space with good food at its core, is just one example of how a simple mission statement turned into a successful real-life venture.

Andrea Rasca of MM has a simple philosophy based on food being a human right that’s part of an adequate standard of living according to the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It sums up how MM operates as well as what it stands for:

“Adequate means food needs to be accessible to all people, at all times, and in any circumstances. It has to be nutritious – to enrich you – and it has to be locally or culturally compatible.”

This high-level mission statement sells the spirit of MM succinctly. Make yours equally inspiring, and keep it as short as possible to make it easy to keep your mission in mind. The Waste Not Supper Club , for example, summed up their mission statement – “Waste Not” – in just two words and integrated it into the name of their event.

Following a UN report urging a move to more sustainable diets, the Umbrella Cafe in Kent started running the Waste Not Supper Club to use up not only their leftover food but other people’s as well. Guests receive a three-course vegan or vegetarian evening meal at a pay-as-you-feel price. All the dishes are made from unwanted ingredients sourced by FareShare Kent , an organisation that teams up with supermarkets and local farmers to make use of their “wonky” veg and overstocked food.

2. Describe your greater vision with a vision statement

While a mission statement says what your event is about, a vision statement describes what you hope your event brand will become . It could also be known as your Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal (your BHAG ).

The Susan G. Komen Foundation uses the mission statement “Save lives by meeting the most critical needs in our communities and investing in breakthrough research to prevent and cure breast cancer.”

But the foundation’s vision is even more aspirational:

A world without breast cancer.

What’s your blue-sky vision? You might not cure cancer, but perhaps you want to eventually turn your foodie pop-up into a nationwide series of “locavore” festivals. Perhaps you want to introduce attendees to a new style of dance? Or bring art into the homes of the nation?

Brevity and clarity are also key in this section of your business plan, so you should be able to sum up your vision statement in one short sentence. For example, a lot of businesses these days want their activities to produce no carbon emissions whatsoever, so they might use a vision statement like “net-zero by 2050”.

A good way to come up with your vision statement is to ask yourself what effect you eventually want your event to have more widely. Be as imaginative as you can and also think about why you created your event in the first place. This will help you to produce evocative language, which will have a greater effect on your audience.

3. List the key objectives you want to track

Your key objectives convert your mission statement into on-the-ground action. They are realistic goals that you can achieve in the short term and in the future. Examples might include:

• Gaining a set number of followers on social media
• Expanding your event to a different area
• Pinning down a special guest to make an appearance
• Selling a certain amount of tickets for each event

Make a list of the key tasks and deliverables integral to your event. In the foodie pop-up example above, a few key objectives might be to:

• Host three foodie pop-ups in your local area this year
• Find at least ten sponsors
• – local food purveyors or restaurants
• Acquire 10,000 followers on Instagram

Make your objectives aspirational but achievable – and definitely measurable . Make records of where you currently are in regard to achieving these goals and attach metrics to each one. Eventbrite offers useful analytic data, which can be used to help you track your return on investment (ROI) and more.

4. Enhance your event business plan with storytelling

Here’s the heart of your business plan: a tangible description of your event. This is important because not only does it tell potential investors what they’re being asked to buy into but it’s also often the first (and only) chance you’ll get to grab a potential attendee’s attention online.

The key here is to provide a text that’s as informative as it is readable. Strike a balance between providing the reader with all the essential details they need, without overwhelming them with information.

Define what makes your event unique and sell your audience on your vision with data that grounds it in reality. For example, if you’ve had a high demand for tickets in the past, let the reader know how many tickets you’ve sold for your events to date.

Craft a succinct event story with our event business plan checklist:

• Describe your target audience, with research into the market
• List potential or actual sponsors, investors, and partners who will support and influence your event
• Lay out the team structure you intend to build – who will get what done?

Your job here is to convince the reader that your event will be successful. Give proof that you can back up your ideas with business acumen.

5. Detail an event marketing strategy

Word of mouth is a timeless marketing channel, but most events don’t sell themselves right away. You’ve already described your mission, your vision, and the event itself, so now you can use this content in your marketing strategy and include additional information:

How will you price your event?

Will you use a flat rate or provide an early bird option at a discount? While the latter might prove a great idea for festivals and conferences, recurring events like workshops would benefit from a different marketing approach. For example, consider providing tiered ticketing options for regular events, giving guests a choice of a standard or VIP ticket with added extras. This can create a buzz of prestige around your event.

What’s your promotion budget?

Knowing what resources you have is integral to marketing your event effectively and securing a good ROI.

Which marketing channels will you use?

Your target audience will determine the direction of your marketing channels. This includes which social media platform you choose to market your event on. For example, if your arts event caters to twenty-somethings, the highly visual environment that Instagram provides will often be a better marketing match than LinkedIn , which is more suited for specialist industry lectures and business networking events.

Making the right choice of channel means that half your work is done because your event will get more exposure to people who are already interested in your sector, generating a higher lead-to-conversion rate.

6. Outline your event’s operational requirements

There are countless logistics that go into even the smallest event. Break your needs into categories: facilities, services, staffing , production, technology, legal, and insurance – just as a starting point!

Then start to anticipate what the real implications are for your event with reference to each of these categories. Depending on your specific event, facilities might include setting up a cloakroom or the hire of portaloos, shower cubicles, or charging points. Services might include anything from catering, rubbish disposal, cleaning, or the cost of basic utilities if they aren’t included in the venue hire. Production might cover contracting performers, printing tickets or wristbands, and transport of sound equipment.

Don’t leave anything out. This exercise will help you with the next step – assigning a cost to each aspect of your event.

7. Crunch the numbers for your event budget

Financial forecasts are essential to showing whether the event will be profitable – and to making your plan a business plan. It’s common to include both an overview of your numbers as well as a full budget spreadsheet, usually as part of an appendix.

Identify all potential income streams, like ticket sales , exhibition space sales, food, or merchandise. If you have funding secured or capital saved, include that as well.

You’ll also need to tally all expenditures , including your operational and promotional costs. These might include venue and equipment hire, paying staff working at the event, and the cost of targeted ads.

Your business plan might serve as a way to win over potential investors. For instance, if your idea for a national yoga teachers’ conference will require an initial cash infusion to get it off the ground, show how it will pay for itself in a matter of years in your budget. You should go into detail about cover prices, including any deals you’ve been able to get with suppliers or the venue.

Make sure to illustrate your event’s projected earnings in a simple graph, such as a bar or pie chart. This is an effective and simple of way communicating how you’re making your budget work for you.

8. Conduct a SWOT analysis for your event

SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. This assessment is important because every event carries inherent risks, and it’s a liability to ignore them. You’ll want to identify and acknowledge any risks, and then provide solutions. Let’s take a look at this concept using the example of a fundraising triathlon.

You’ve sold many tickets so far.

You’ve planned the event for the mildest time of year.

You’ve got catastrophe insurance.

There’s high competition from other similar events.

Opportunities

Extra funds can be raised with a cold drinks stall.

The triathlon may need to be called off in the event of bad weather, e.g. a thunderstorm.

Event business plan FAQs

How do i start an event organising business.

You could start by writing an event management business plan. See the above section, “Outline your event’s operational requirements,” to get an idea of what managing an event involves.

What is a business plan in event management?

A business plan is where you convince investors that your idea for turning your event into a business is not only viable but profitable. This will include presenting the necessary figures detailing why your business will offer a good ROI. Check out the sections “Enhance your event business plan with storytelling” and “Crunch the numbers for your event budget” for more tips on how to write an event planning business plan.

How do you write a business plan for an event?

The above steps in this article explain how, but try looking for an event business plan example online if you’d like to see how it’s done.

What is an event planning proposal?

A proposal is a resumé of how you plan to execute your event, written with key stakeholders as the audience.

Set your event business plan in motion

To dive deep into the details of creating an event business plan, and to learn how to compile these sections into an effective document, download our free Event Plan Template .

Plan and host your events with Eventbrite.

• WAS THIS ARTICLE HELPFUL?

SPREAD THE WORD

about the author

Hannah Phelvin-Hartley

Hannah Phelvin-Hartley specialises in producing content for the lifestyle, education, engineering and automotive, politics, human rights and legal sectors. She can translate from Italian, Spanish and French into English. In her free time, Hannah can usually be found cooking, reading, practising Yoga and dancing.

You might also like these

Event Planning Business Plan Template

Written by Dave Lavinsky

Event Planning Business Plan

Over the past 20+ years, we have helped over 5,000 entrepreneurs and business owners create business plans to start and grow their event planning businesses. On this page, we will first give you some background information with regards to the importance of business planning. We will then go through an event planning business plan step-by-step so you can create your plan today.

Download our Ultimate Business Plan Template here >

What is an Event Planning Business Plan?

A business plan provides a snapshot of your own event planning business as it stands today, and lays out your growth plan for the next five years. It explains your business goals and your strategy for reaching them. It also includes research to support your plans.

Why You Need a Business Plan for Your Event Planning Company

If you’re looking to start an event planner business or grow your existing one you need a business plan. A business plan will help you raise funding, if needed, and plan out the growth of your event planning business to improve your chances of success. Your event planning business plan is a living document that should be updated annually as your company grows and changes.

Source of Funding for Event Planning Businesses

With regards to funding, the main sources of secure funding for an event planning business are bank loans, personal funding, credit cards, and angel investors. With regards to bank loans, banks will want to review your business plan and gain confidence that you will be able to repay your loan and interest. To acquire this confidence, the loan officer will not only want to confirm that your financials are reasonable. But they will want to see a professional plan. Such a plan will give them the confidence that you can successfully and professionally operate a business.

Another common form of secure funding for an event planning business is angel investors. Angel investors are wealthy individuals who will write you a check. They will either take equity in return for their funding or, like a bank, they will give you a loan. Venture capitalists will not fund an event planning business.

Finish Your Business Plan Today!

How to write a business plan for event planning.

When you write a business plan, you should include the following 10 key aspects:

Executive Summary

Your executive summary provides an introduction to your business plan, but it is normally the last section you write because it provides a summary of each important component of your plan.

The goal of your Executive Summary is to quickly engage the reader. Explain to them the type of event planning business you are operating and the status; for example, are you a startup, do you have an event planning business that you would like to grow, or are you operating a chain of businesses.

Next, provide an overview of each of the subsequent sections of your plan. For example, give a brief overview of the event planning business industry. Discuss the type of business you are operating. Detail your direct competitors. Give an overview of your target audience. Provide a snapshot of your marketing strategy and plan. Identify the key members of your team. And offer an overview of your financial plan.  

Company Analysis

In your company analysis, you will detail the type of business you are operating.

For example, you might operate one of the following types:

• Corporate Events : this type of event planning business caters to businesses, charities, nonprofit organizations, and the like to plan fundraisers, receptions, conventions, trade shows, competitions, award ceremonies, product launches, and other types of meetings.
• Social Events : this type of event planning business targets middle- to upper-income individuals and families to plan events such as weddings, birthdays, reunions, and other types of celebrations.
• Niche Events : some event planners specialize in just one of the above event types.

In addition to explaining the type of event planning business you operate, the Company Analysis section of your business plan needs to provide background on the business.

Include answers to questions such as:

• When and why did you start the business?
• What milestones have you achieved to date? Milestones could include sales goals you’ve reached, new contracts, etc.
• Your legal structure. Are you incorporated as an S-Corp? An LLC? A sole proprietorship? Explain your business structure here.

Industry Analysis

In your industry analysis, you need to provide an overview of the event planning business.

While this may seem unnecessary, it serves multiple purposes.

First, researching the industry educates you. It helps you understand the target market in which you are operating. 

Secondly, market research can improve your strategy particularly if your research identifies market trends. For example, if there was a trend towards events that adhere to social distancing guidelines, it would be helpful to ensure your plan details what approach you would take (suggested venues, creative solutions for inclusion, etc.).

The third reason for market research is to prove to readers that you are an expert in your industry. By conducting the research and presenting it in your plan, you achieve just that.

The following questions should be answered in the industry analysis section:

• How big is the event planning industry (in dollars)?
• Is the market declining or increasing?
• Who are the key competitors in the market?
• Who are the key suppliers in the market?
• What trends are affecting the industry?
• What is the industry’s growth forecast over the next 5 – 10 years?
• What is the relevant market size? That is, how big is the potential market for your business. You can extrapolate such a figure by assessing the size of the market in the entire country and then applying that figure to your local population.

Customer Analysis

The customer analysis section must detail the clientele you serve and/or expect to serve.

The following are examples of customer segments: private and corporate clients, high-income households, medium-income households, engaged couples, etc.

As you can imagine, the customer segment(s) you choose will have a great impact on the type of event planning company you operate and the event services you offer. Clearly, businesses would want a different atmosphere, pricing, and product options, and would respond to different marketing promotions than engaged couples.

Try to break out your target customers in terms of their demographic and psychographic profiles. With regards to demographics, including a discussion of the age groups, genders, locations, and income levels of the customers you seek to serve. Because most event planning companies primarily serve customers living in the same city or town, such demographic information is easy to find on government websites.

Psychographic profiles explain the wants and needs of your target market. The more you can understand and define these needs, the better you will do to attract customers and retain your existing customers.

With Growthink’s Ultimate Business Plan Template you can finish your plan in just 8 hours or less!

Competitive Analysis

Your competitive analysis should identify the indirect and direct competitors your business faces and then focus on the latter.

Direct competitors are other planners and businesses that offer event planning services.

Indirect competitors are other options that customers have to purchase from you that aren’t direct competitors. This includes caterers, venues, and customers planning events on their own. You need to mention such competition to show you understand that not everyone who throws a party hires an event planner each time.

With regards to direct competition, you want to detail the other businesses with which you compete. Most likely, your direct competitors will be other businesses that offer event planning services very close to your site.

For each such competitor, provide an overview of their businesses and document their strengths and weaknesses. Unless you once worked at your competitors’ businesses, it will be impossible to know everything about them. But you should be able to find out key things about them such as:

• What types of customers do they serve?
• What planning services do they offer (wedding planning, baby showers, birthday parties, social events, etc.)?
• What is their pricing (premium, low, etc.)?
• What are they good at?
• What are their weaknesses?

With regards to the last two questions, think about your answers from the customers’ perspective. 

The final part of your competitive analysis section is to document your areas of competitive advantage. For example:

• Will you provide superior event management options (e.g., more cuisine types, better venue options, etc.)?
• Will you provide event options that your competitors don’t offer?
• Will you make it easier or faster for customers to book your services (e.g., utilizing event planning software, etc.)?
• Will you provide better customer service?
• Will you offer better pricing?

Think about ways you will outperform your competition and document them in this section of your plan.

Marketing Plan

Traditionally, a marketing plan includes the four P’s: Product, Price, Place, and Promotion. For an event management business plan, your marketing strategy should include the following:

In the product section, you should reiterate the type of business that you documented in your Company Analysis. Then, detail the specific products/services you will be offering. For example, in addition to designing the event, locating the venue, arranging vendors, coordinating personnel, and supervising the event, will you offer services such as catering, decor, and entertainment?

In this section, document the prices you will offer and how they compare to your competitors. Essentially in the product and price sub-sections, you are presenting the services you offer and their prices.

Place refers to the location of your event management business, conference centers, and/or venues in which you own and/or have a relationship. Document your location and mention how the location will impact your success.

The final part of your event planning business marketing plan is the promotions section. Here you will document how you will drive customers to your site. The following are some promotional methods you might consider:

• Social media marketing
• Advertising in local papers and magazines
• Reaching out to local bloggers and websites 
• Partnerships with local organizations (e.g., getting on the list of recommended vendors with local venues)
• Local radio advertising
• Banner ads at local venues

Operations Plan

While the earlier sections of your event planner business plan explained your goals, your operations plan describes how you will meet them. Your operations plan should have two distinct sections as follows.

Everyday short-term processes include all of the tasks involved in running your event planning business such as interviewing clients, making arrangements, keeping the store/studio clean, etc.

Long-term goals are the milestones you hope to achieve. These could include the dates when you expect to serve your 100th customer, or when you hope to reach $X in total sales. It could also be when you expect to hire your Xth employee or launch in a new market.

Management Team

To demonstrate your own event planning business’ ability to succeed as a business, a strong management team is essential. Highlight your key players’ backgrounds, emphasizing those skills and experiences that prove their ability to grow a company. 

Ideally, you and/or your team members have direct experience as event planners or in the industry. If so, highlight this experience and expertise. But also highlight any experience that you think will help your business succeed.

If your team is lacking, consider assembling an advisory board. An advisory board would include 2 to 8 individuals who would act as mentors to your business. They would help answer questions and provide strategic guidance. If needed, look for advisory board members with experience in event planning and/or successfully running small businesses.  

Financial Plan

Your financial plan should include your 5-year financial statement broken out both monthly or quarterly for the first year and then annually. Your financial statements include your income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow statements.

Income Statement : an income statement is more commonly called a Profit and Loss statement or P&L. It shows your revenues and then subtracts your costs to show whether you turned a profit or not.

In developing your income statement, you need to devise assumptions. For example, will you plan one event per week or several events? And will sales grow by 2% or 10% per year? As you can imagine, your choice of assumptions will greatly impact the financial forecasts for your business. As much as possible, conduct research to try to root your assumptions in reality.

Balance Sheets : While balance sheets include much information, to simplify them to the key items you need to know about, balance sheets show your assets and liabilities. For instance, if you spend $100,000 on building out your business, that will not give you immediate profits. Rather it is an asset that will hopefully help you generate profits for years to come. Likewise, if a bank writes you a check for $100.000, you don’t need to pay it back immediately. Rather, that is a liability you will pay back over time.

Cash Flow Statement : Your cash flow statement will help determine how much money you need to start or grow your business and make sure you never run out of money. What most entrepreneurs and business owners don’t realize is that you can turn a profit but run out of money and go bankrupt. For example, let’s say a company approached you with a massive $100,000 event contract, that would cost you $50,000 to fulfill. Well, in most cases, you would have to pay that $50,000 now for supplies, equipment rentals, employee salaries, etc. But let’s say the company didn’t pay you for 180 days. During those 180 days, you could run out of money.

In developing your Income Statement and Balance Sheets be sure to include several of the key startup costs needed in starting or growing your business:

• Location build-out including design fees, construction, etc.
• The total cost of equipment and furnishings like decor, sound systems, etc.
• Cost of maintaining an adequate amount of supplies
• Payroll or salaries paid to staff
• Business insurance
• Taxes and permits
• Legal expenses

Attach your full financial projections in the appendix of your plan along with any supporting documents that make your plan more compelling. For example, you might include your store design blueprint or location lease.

  Event Planning Summary Putting together your own event planner business plan is a worthwhile endeavor. If you follow the event planning sample template above, by the time you are done, you will truly be an expert. You will really understand the business, your competition, and your customers. You will have developed a marketing plan and will really understand what it takes to launch and grow a successful event planning business.

  OR, Let Us Develop Your Plan For You Since 1999, Growthink has developed business plans for thousands of companies who have gone on to achieve tremendous success.

Click here to see how Growthink’s business plan consulting services can create your business plan for you.   Other Helpful Business Plan Articles & Templates

• Business plans

Event Planning Business Plan 

Used 4,872 times

Prepare your event planning business for success with our ready-to-fill and easily downloadable event planning business plan template.

e-Sign with PandaDoc

Event Planning Business Plan

Created by:

​ [Sender.FirstName] [Sender.LastName] ​

​ [Sender.Company] ​

Business Plan for (Insert Your Business Name)

Prepared for:

​ [Recipient.FirstName] [Recipient.LastName]

​ [Recipient.Company] ​

Executive Summary

Company name.

​ [Sender.StreetAddress] , [Sender.City] , [Sender.State] , [Sender.PostalCode] ​

Mission Statement

​ [Sender.Company] is dedicated to transforming ordinary occasions into extraordinary experiences. Our mission is to create memorable and seamless events that exceed our clients' expectations, leaving a lasting impression.

​ [Sender.Company] is a premier events planning company based in [Sender.StreetAddress] [Sender.City] [Sender.State] [Sender.PostalCode] , with a proven track record of success in orchestrating a wide range of events, from corporate conferences to weddings and private parties.

Market Opportunity

The events planning industry is thriving, with a projected annual growth rate of (Enter Growth Rate). [Sender.Company] is strategically positioned to capture this market, with a focus on the corporate sector, targeting companies seeking innovative and flawlessly executed events.

Financial Projections

Our conservative financial projections estimate a revenue of (Enter Amount) in (Enter Timeline), with a steady increase to (Enter Amount and Timeline for Milestone)

Funding Request

We are seeking a (Enter Funding Request Amount) investment to fund initial operations, marketing, and expansion.

Our Services

Event conceptualization and design.

(Service description)

Vendor sourcing and management

Budgeting and financial management, legal compliance, risk management, event logistics and execution, event types.

​ [Sender.Company] specializes in planning and coordinating a diverse range of events, including but not limited to

corporate conferences

social gatherings

product launches

charitable fundraisers.

Market Analysis

Market size and growth potential.

The event planning industry has demonstrated consistent growth over the past several years (Enter Growth Rate).

This is driven by factors such as (Outline Driving Factors).

The event planning industry was estimated to be valued at (Insert value) and projected to experience an annual compound growth rate of (Insert percentage) over the next (Insert Timeline).

Target Market

​ [Sender.Company] aims to serve a diverse client base, including (Mention Target Clients e.g., corporations, non-profit organizations, and individuals).

Market Trends

Virtual and hybrid events.

The rise of virtual and hybrid events, necessitated by global circumstances, has altered the event planning landscape. [Sender.Company] is equipped to provide both in-person and virtual event planning services in alignment with current market dynamics.

Sustainability and green practices

Increasing environmental consciousness has led to a demand for sustainable event planning solutions. [Sender.Company] is committed to incorporating eco-friendly practices into our event planning services in accordance with applicable laws and regulations.

Customization and personalization

Clients increasingly seek tailored event experiences that reflect their unique vision and brand. [Sender.Company] specializes in creating bespoke event solutions for our clients.

Competitive Analysis

Notable competitors include (List Competitor Names), which are known for their (Competitor Strengths).

Regulatory Environment

​ [Sender.Company] operates within a regulatory framework that governs event planning activities, including but not limited to permits, licensing, safety standards, and liability considerations.

Barriers to Entry

The event planning industry presents several substantial barriers to entry that potential competitors must contend with (List Key Challenges).

Operations Plan

Business structure and ownership.

​ [Sender.Company] is organized as a (legal structure, e.g., Corporation, LLC) under the laws of (State). The company is owned by (Owner(s) Name(s)), who hold (percentage)% of the ownership interest.

​ [Sender.Company] principal place of business is located at (Physical Address), which is in full compliance with zoning and licensing requirements imposed by the relevant local and state authorities.

Business Hours

​ [Sender.Company] shall operate during regular business hours from (Opening Time) to (Closing Time) on (Days of Operation).

​ [Sender.Company] shall be led by a team of experienced professionals in the field of event planning. Each management team member is duly qualified for their respective roles and responsibilities. [Sender.Company] shall maintain a roster of trained and qualified event planners, coordinators, and support staff. All staff members shall be hired in compliance with applicable labor laws and regulations.

Inventory and Equipment

​ [Sender.Company] shall maintain an inventory of event planning materials, supplies, and equipment necessary for the execution of events. This includes but is not limited to (List Essential Company Equipment).

To mitigate operational risks, [Sender.Company] shall maintain appropriate insurance coverage, including general liability insurance and professional liability insurance. Compliance with insurance requirements is regularly reviewed to ensure ongoing protection and adherence to applicable laws and regulations.

Quality Control and Customer Service

​ [Sender.Company] is committed to delivering its clients the highest quality of service. Quality control measures are in place to ensure the seamless execution of events and to address any customer concerns or complaints in accordance with applicable consumer protection laws.

Financial Breakdown

The financial projections for [Sender.Company] have been meticulously prepared based on comprehensive market research and analysis. It is anticipated that the [Sender.Company] will achieve the following revenue milestones:

Year 1: (Year 1 Revenue Projection)

Year 2: (Year 2 Revenue Projection)

Year 3: (Year 3 Revenue Projection)

These projections take into account anticipated revenue streams from various event planning services, including but not limited to corporate events, weddings, social gatherings, and virtual events.

Expense Projections

​ [Sender.Company] estimates to spend as stipulated below in fulfilling its obligations.

Funding Requirements

​ [Sender.Company] have been assessed with regard to its projected growth and operational needs. [Sender.Company] seeks (Enter Funding Request).

The company will seek funding through legal means, such as loans, investments, or grants, as needed, in accordance with applicable financial regulations and contractual agreements.

Confidentiality Agreement

The recipient of this business plan hereby acknowledges and agrees that this document and its contents are confidential and proprietary to [Sender.Company] . The recipient shall not, without the express written consent of [Sender.Company] , share, disseminate, or disclose any part of this event planning business plan , in whole or in part, to any third party, including but not limited to competitors, potential investors, or any unauthorized persons. Any breach of this confidentiality and non-share clause shall result in legal consequences and remedies as provided by applicable laws.

​ [Recipient.FirstName] [Recipient.LastName] ​

Care to rate this template?

Your rating will help others.

Thanks for your rate!

Useful resources

• Featured Templates
• Sales Proposals
• NDA Agreements
• Operating Agreements
• Service Agreements
• Sales Documents
• Marketing Proposals
• Rental and Lease Agreements
• Quote Templates
• Business Proposals
• Agreement Templates
• Purchase Agreements
• Contract Templates

How To Write a Successful Event Planning Business Plan + Template

Creating a business plan is essential for any business, but it can be especially helpful for event planning businesses that want to improve their strategy and/or raise funding.

A well-crafted business plan not only outlines the vision for your company, but also documents a step-by-step roadmap of how you are going to accomplish it. In order to create an effective business plan, you must first understand the components that are essential to its success.

This article provides an overview of the key elements that every event planning business owner should include in their business plan.

Download the Ultimate Business Plan Template

What is an Event Planning Business Plan?

An event planning business plan is a formal written document that describes your company’s business strategy and its feasibility. It documents the reasons you will be successful, your areas of competitive advantage, and it includes information about your team members. Your business plan is a key document that will convince investors and lenders (if needed) that you are positioned to become a successful venture.

Why Write an Event Planning Business Plan?

An event planning business plan is required for banks and investors. The document is a clear and concise guide of your business idea and the steps you will take to make it profitable.

Entrepreneurs can also use this as a roadmap when starting their new company or venture, especially if they are inexperienced in starting a business.

Writing an Effective Event Planning Business Plan

The following are the key components of a successful event planning business plan:

Executive Summary

The executive summary of an event planning business plan is a one to two page overview of your entire business plan. It should summarize the main points, which will be presented in full in the rest of your business plan.

• Start with a one-line description of your event planning company
• Provide a short summary of the key points in each section of your business plan, which includes information about your company’s management team, industry analysis, competitive analysis, and financial forecast among others.

Company Description

This section should include a brief history of your company. Include a short description of how your company started, and provide a timeline of milestones your company has achieved.

If you are just starting your event planning business, you may not have a long company history. Instead, you can include information about your professional experience in this industry and how and why you conceived your new venture. If you have worked for a similar company before or have been involved in an entrepreneurial venture before starting your event planning firm, mention this.

You will also include information about your chosen event planning business model and how, if applicable, it is different from other companies in your industry.

Industry Analysis

The industry or market analysis is an important component of an event planning business plan. Conduct thorough market research to determine industry trends and document the size of your market. 

Questions to answer include:

• What part of the event planning industry are you targeting?
• How big is the market?
• What trends are happening in the industry right now (and if applicable, how do these trends support the success of your company)?

You should also include sources for the information you provide, such as published research reports and expert opinions.

Customer Analysis

This section should include a list of your target audience(s) with demographic and psychographic profiles (e.g., age, gender, income level, profession, job titles, interests). You will need to provide a profile of each customer segment separately, including their needs and wants.

For example, the customers of an event planning business may include:

• Wedding planners needing help with transportation logistics
• Conference organizers wanting assistance with on-site registration
• Caterers in need of assistance to manage the timing of service delivery

You can include information about how your customers make the decision to buy from you as well as what keeps them buying from you.

Develop a strategy for targeting those customers who are most likely to buy from you, as well as those that might be influenced to buy your products or event planning services with the right marketing.

Competitive Analysis

The competitive analysis helps you determine how your product or service will be different from competitors, and what your unique selling proposition (USP) might be that will set you apart in this industry.

For each competitor, list their strengths and weaknesses. Next, determine your areas of competitive differentiation and/or advantage; that is, in what ways are you different from and ideally better than your competitors.

Below are sample competitive advantages your event planning business may have:

• You are the only event planner in your city with an events app that allows customers to book and manage their event logistics in one place.
• You have a team of experienced event planners who specialize in military funerals, which is a niche market.
• Your company is the go-to choice for conference organizers looking for assistance with on-site registration and event management.

This is not an exhaustive list, but it gives you an idea of the types of competitive advantages you may have.

Marketing Plan

This part of the business plan is where you determine and document your marketing plan. . Your plan should be clearly laid out, including the following 4 Ps.

• Product/Service : Detail your product/service offerings here. Document their features and benefits.
• Price : Document your pricing strategy here. In addition to stating the prices for your products/services, mention how your pricing compares to your competition.
• Place : Where will your customers find you? What channels of distribution (e.g., partnerships) will you use to reach them if applicable?
• Promotion : How will you reach your target customers? For example, you may use social media, write blog posts, create an email marketing campaign, use pay-per-click advertising, launch a direct mail campaign. Or, you may promote your event planning business via a combination of these channels.

Operations Plan

This part of your event planning business plan should include the following information:

• How will you deliver your product/service to customers? For example, will you do it in person or over the phone only?
• What infrastructure, equipment, and resources are needed to operate successfully? How can you meet those requirements within budget constraints?

The operations plan is where you also need to include your company’s business policies. You will want to establish policies related to everything from customer service to pricing, to the overall brand image you are trying to present.

Finally, and most importantly, in your Operations Plan, you will lay out the milestones your company hopes to achieve within the next five years. Create a chart that shows the key milestone(s) you hope to achieve each quarter for the next four quarters, and then each year for the following four years. Examples of milestones for an event planning business include reaching $X in sales. Other examples include launching a new product/service, expanding to a new market, or hiring key personnel.

Management Team

List your team members here including their names and titles, as well as their expertise and experience relevant to your specific event planning industry. Include brief biography sketches for each team member.

Particularly if you are seeking funding, the goal of this section is to convince investors and lenders that your team has the expertise and experience to execute on your plan. If you are missing key team members, document the roles and responsibilities you plan to hire for in the future.

Financial Plan

Here you will include a summary of your complete and detailed financial plan (your full financial projections go in the Appendix). 

This includes the following three financial statements:

Income Statement

Your income statement should include:

• Revenue : how much revenue you generate.
• Cost of Goods Sold : These are your direct costs associated with generating revenue. This includes labor costs, as well as the cost of any equipment and supplies used to deliver the product/service offering.
• Net Income (or loss) : Once expenses and revenue are totaled and deducted from each other, this is the net income or loss.

Sample Income Statement for a Startup Event Planning Business

Balance Sheet

Include a balance sheet that shows your assets, liabilities, and equity. Your balance sheet should include:

• Assets : All of the things you own (including cash).
• Liabilities : This is what you owe against your company’s assets, such as accounts payable or loans.
• Equity : The worth of your business after all liabilities and assets are totaled and deducted from each other.

Sample Balance Sheet for a Startup Event Planning Business

Cash Flow Statement

Include a cash flow statement showing how much cash comes in, how much cash goes out and a net cash flow for each year. The cash flow statement should include:

• Cash Flow From Operations
• Cash Flow From Investments
• Cash Flow From Financing

Below is a sample of a projected cash flow statement for a startup event planning business.

Sample Cash Flow Statement for a Startup Event Planning Business

You will also want to include an appendix section which will include:

• Your complete financial projections
• A complete list of your company’s business policies and procedures related to the rest of the business plan (marketing, operations, etc.)
• Any other documentation which supports what you included in the body of your business plan.

Writing a good business plan gives you the advantage of being fully prepared to launch and/or grow your event planning company. It not only outlines your business vision but also provides a step-by-step process of how you are going to accomplish it.

A well-written business plan is an essential tool for any event planning company. If you are seeking funding from investors or lenders, it’s important to have a polished and professional business plan. Use the outline above as a guide as you write your own event planning business plan.   

Finish Your Event Planning Business Plan in 1 Day!

Other helpful articles.

How To Write a Successful Party Planner Business Plan + Template

How To Write a Successful Wedding Planner Business Plan + Template

How To Develop a Financial Plan For An Event Planning Business

• Starting a Business
• Growing a Business
• Small Business Guide
• Business News
• Science & Technology
• Money & Finance
• For Subscribers
• Write for Entrepreneur
• Tips White Papers
• Entrepreneur Store
• United States
• Asia Pacific
• Middle East
• South Africa

Copyright © 2024 Entrepreneur Media, LLC All rights reserved. Entrepreneur® and its related marks are registered trademarks of Entrepreneur Media LLC

How to Start an Event Planning Business: Your Comprehensive Guide Not sure how to become an event planner? Use this step-by-step guide to launch your event planning business from scratch.

By Laura Tiffany Edited by Brittany Robins May 21, 2024

Key Takeaways

• Event planning can be a great business if you have the right skills.
• People need help executing personal and professional events of all sizes.
• Based on how you structure your business, your startup costs will vary.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Some people have a special ability to plan parties — whether they be weddings, large corporate events or smaller gatherings. If you have a knack for tackling complex problems and making big days run smoothly, you might have a future as a professional event planner. Whether you choose to work alone or with a team, starting an event planning service is no small task. Here are some important questions to consider before launching an event planning business, and a step-by-step guide to starting and scaling your business.

Related: Find Your Event-Planning Niche

What is an event planning business?

Event planning is the art and science of ideation, planning, coordination and operation. When a major event needs to run smoothly — whether it's a trade show, nonprofit gala or a major anniversary — people will enlist an event planning service or coordinator. Event planners are key service providers who ensure event production and execution goes off without a hitch , most often used for purposes like:

• Corporate events, like after-work cocktail hours and galas.
• Educational conventions, like graduations or conferences.
• Major promotional events including product launches and fashion shows.
• Celebrations and social events including parades, weddings, birthdays and reunions.

The primary duties of full-time or part-time on-site event planners include:

• Researching venues and vendors prior to the event.
• Selecting the appropriate site for the event.
• Event design and team-building for project management.
• Creating budgets and running fundraisers if necessary.
• Coordinating decor, entertainment and food for the event.
• Sending invitations to attendees.
• Coordinating transportation for attendees to and from the event.
• Arranging accommodations, including seating charts and place settings.
• Coordinating tasks for onsite event personnel, including caterers or entertainers.
• Being on call for any questions or problems that arise in the event-planning process.
• Supervising activities at the event site.

Why do people hire event planning services?

People primarily hire event planning services for two reasons: So that hosts and guests don't have to focus on the inner workings of the event, and so that the event runs smoothly from beginning to end.

Consider a wedding. Many engaged couples hire event planners or event planning services to coordinate, organize and carry out their wedding plans. This helps the couple enjoy their special day and gives them the freedom to focus on getting married rather than worrying about details like catering, parking or the timeline.

Some events are so complex — particularly those with hundreds of guests or more — that it's almost impossible to properly plan and organize them without the help of a specialist. Knowledgeable, experienced event planners know how to organize groups of people, how much food to provide and other details that can make or break an important event.

Related: The Price Is Right: Turning a Profit in the Event Planning Business

Who should become an event planner?

You might consider becoming an event planner if you're organized, love hosting parties and find the challenge of coordinating large events to be thrilling. Planners handle many moving parts at once, some of which require overseeing chaotic work and competing agendas. Event planners also often work weekends and holidays since these are the days when most people schedule events.

Many event planners have backgrounds as managers or coordinators in other industries. The events industry, both for wedding planning and other events, requires excellent communication skills. Obtaining a bachelor's degree in public relations , marketing or related fields can be helpful but is not required. You should also consider acquiring certification for your event planning service, as it can help you cultivate relevant professional skills and attract more job opportunities. Meeting Professionals International (MPI) offers a list of degrees and certificates from various colleges and universities.

You can also become a Certified Special Events Professional or Certified Meeting Planner , both of which are offered by the MPI or the International Live Events Association (ILEA). By earning these certifications , potential clients will know you have the training and experience necessary to take on a complex event.

How to start an event planning business

Step 1: form your company.

To get your event planning business off the ground, you must first form a company, file the right paperwork and create a business plan — which should include the following details:

• The business's name.
• The business's tax structure (Sole proprietorship, LLC, S corp etc.).
• What services you'll provide.
• Market research .
• A management plan.
• Financial factors, including how you'll turn a profit.

Related: Check out these business plan templates to get started.

You'll also want to apply for an employer identification number (EIN), which is essentially a social security number for your business assigned to you by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). This will allow you to operate your business independently of your personal affairs, help you hire employees and make it easier to file taxes quarterly.

Step 2: Choose your target market

Building on the research you performed to create your business plan, it's essential to find the right market for your services. For instance, if you want to primarily work with weddings, you need to determine how many other planners are in your area, how much you should charge for your services and what offerings you'll need to be competitive.

By doing enough research ahead of time, you'll know exactly what kind of clients to target and what their expectations will be. This will help you advertise your event planning service to be competitive relative to other local planners.

Step 3: Make a financial plan

When you start an event planning business, you'll have to consider not only startup costs but also how the enterprise will grow and how many clients you'll need in order to be profitable. For instance, working from home and primarily by yourself will keep costs low. But if you hire employees, rent office space, or expand to new markets, your monthly expenses will significantly increase – all of these things can add up.

You can always scale your business after acquiring steady work. You may start off as a one-person event planning service that only takes on small events. As you earn money from successful jobs, you can hire employees and rent a warehouse for your equipment, like cameras, chairs and more. You don't have to have all of the growth questions answered when you launch your business, but you should at least have them in mind.

Step 4: Understand the work involved and consider hiring employees

For your event planning service to be successful , you need to fully grasp the nature of each job and determine if — or when — it's time to hire employees. This will vary event to event, so you'll need to determine how much work each event will require. Even the smallest event demands careful attention to detail and advance planning, but as you acquire experience you'll become more adept at forecasting how much help you'll need, if any. For instance, you might hire two or three people to be on-site for a specific event, just to make sure things run smoothly.

Related: The Event Planning Recipe for Success

Step 5: Settle on a price structure and fee basis

How you price your event planning offerings will impact how much business you attract. You can determine your pricing structure and fee basis by things like:

• The market segment you serve: For instance, nonprofit events may have different fee structures than weddings or corporate events. By understanding your event type, you'll know how much to charge and how to structure your fees.
• Your location: If you live in a place with a higher cost of living or a competitive events market, you'll need to price your services accordingly.
• Your reputation: As your business gains a reputation for success — and especially if you're so busy clients are competing for your services — you'll be able to charge a higher premium.

Step 6: Start marketing your event planning service

Once you know how much to charge your clients, it's time to start marketing your event planning service. Consider using tools like Google ads, social media profiles and other digital marketing efforts like email to get the word out about your business. You may even consider newspaper ads, flyers in public buildings or other traditional low-cost marketing tactics . As your business grows, so too will your reputation, meaning you'll likely have to spend less on marketing once you're known. Before you get there, though, it's important to dedicate significant time and resources to marketing your services (learn more here about the tools and strategies that should be part of creating your marketing plan).

Related: 8 Savvy Ways to Promote Your Event Planning Business

Costs of starting an event planning business

The costs of launching your business will vary greatly based on where you live, what kind of clients you work with and how large you intend to scale your operation. At a minimum, you'll need to pay fees to incorporate your business , purchase basic technology like a computer, buy business insurance and spend money advertising. But there are many other potential costs, including certification programs, hiring additional employees , renting office space and more. Here's a breakdown of common expenses associated with event planning, as well as a range of what it might take to get your enterprise off the ground.

Consider Startup Costs

As with any business, the startup costs for event planning vary by the region, the size of your operation and the type of clients you attract. Below are estimates that will help you determine what you can expect to spend in your first year.

*All figures are estimates and subject to change based on factors including location, business size and clientele.

Check out Entrepreneur's other guides and resources today.

Want to be an Entrepreneur Leadership Network contributor? Apply now to join.

Editor's Pick Red Arrow

• Lock How to Design a Work Session That Tricks Your Brain Into Peak Performance, According to a Neuroscientist
• She Launched Her Black-Owned Beauty Brand with $1,500 in Her Pockets — Now Her Products Are on Sephora's Shelves
• No One Explained a 401(k) Until He Reached the NFL. So He Started Putting His Money to Work — and Helping Others Do the Same .
• Lock How to Land Your Next Job Without Sending a Single Resume
• Kevin O'Leary Says This Is the One Skill He Looks For in a Leader — But It's 'Almost Impossible to Find'
• Food Franchisees Are Shifting to Non-Food Investments — And You Should, Too

Most Popular Red Arrow

How to start a multi-million dollar company, according to an ibm engineer turned founder.

Leah Solivan took her company from idea to Ikea acquisition.

UK Tech Magnate Mike Lynch Missing After Yacht Sinks Off Italian Coast

One person has died and six people are missing, including four Americans, after the Bayesian superyacht sank off the coast of Sicily.

The Largest Franchise Operator in the U.S. Owns 2,800 Locations — And He Just Added 83 Wendy's to His Portfolio

Greg Flynn of The Flynn Group already operates restaurants under brands including Applebee's, Arby's, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut and Wendy's.

General Motors Announces Over 1,000 Job Cuts in Major Software Division Overhaul

Around 600 cut roles are from GM's technology campus in Warren, Michigan.

63 Small Business Ideas to Start in 2024

We put together a list of the best, most profitable small business ideas for entrepreneurs to pursue in 2024.

Alarming New Data: 75% of Workers Say AI Is Hurting Productivity. Here's Why and What to Do About It.

Four simple future-orientated solutions for leveraging AI to its full capacity without experiencing burnout.

Successfully copied link

See how Cvent can solve your biggest event challenges. Watch a 30-minute demo.

• Request demo
• Find event venues

How to Start an Event Planning Business: The Ultimate Guide

It's no surprise that starting an event planning business involves many moving parts. It can feel overwhelming, from identifying your unique selling proposition and having all the key skills to executing flawless events to getting all the required compliances. But not anymore. 

In this guide, we'll discuss everything about  event planning  and provide a step-by-step guide on how to start your own event-planning business. This post covers everything from determining profitability to understanding the skills you need to run a successful business.   

But before you dive headfirst into how to start an event planning business, let's take a step back and understand the basics. 

What is Event Planning in Business?

If you plan to start your event planning business, you probably know the answer to this question. Event planning involves managing the details of large or small events, including meetings, conferences, or parties. This business is typically utilized for: 

• Large educational meetings, such as graduations or conferences.
• Major promotions, including marketing events, product launches, and fashion shows.
• Corporate events , like after-work cocktail hours, trade shows, galas, and more.
• Celebrations and social events like parades, weddings, birthdays, reunions, and more. 

What Do Event Planning Businesses Provide?

As an event planner, you are expected to work with clients to understand their requirements and goals and then provide end-to-end event planning and execution services to ensure the seamless and successful execution of in-person or virtual events . 

Some of the services you must include are:

• Event management and coordination
• Theming, décor, and styling
• Conferencing and exhibitions
• Signage and branding
• Entertainment and talent management
• Venue sourcing and management
• Catering and food & beverage management
• Audio-visual production and management
• Logistics and transportation management
• Budgeting and financial management
• Marketing and promotion
• Security and risk management
• Registration and guest management
• Post-event evaluation and reporting 

Why Do People Hire Event Planning Businesses?

There are two primary reasons why people hire event planning services: 

• To allow event attendees and guests of honor to thoroughly enjoy themselves without worrying about event logistics. 
• To ensure that the event runs without any glitches. 

Consider a typical corporate conference, for example. 

A business may hire your services to create a stellar multi-day conference while their employees and attendees can focus on networking or learning. This way, they don’t have to worry about details like catering, keynote speakers, registration, and managing the event schedule. 

Advantages and Disadvantages of Starting an Event Planning Business

As with everything, the event planning business also has advantages and disadvantages. Some of them are: 

• Enjoy the freedom to choose who you work with, where you work, and how you manage your schedule.
• Pull off a showstopping event, and chances are your clients will return repeatedly, thus building loyalty.
• Event planning business lets you unleash your creativity as you get to design events that are unique and unforgettable for your clients. 
• Establishing relationships with reliable vendors takes time, especially in a crowded market.
• Growing your business needs adding resources or raising prices, which can be tricky.
• Most of the time, although the planning takes place in advance, you must ensure your presence in the field during the event—meaning long working hours, even on evenings and weekends. 

How to Start an Event Planning Business

Here are some steps to help you start an event planning business: 

Evaluate your  event planning skills.

Event planning involves many tasks beyond the glamor of parties and events. To be successful, you must be able to handle various responsibilities. After all, successful event planners are masters of multitasking, with a talent for keeping calm under pressure. 

For example, you’ll need to create an event theme or design, find a venue, arrange entertainment, book vendors, send RSVPs and marketing information to attendees, and balance the budget. The list goes on. 

If you're unsure whether you possess all the necessary event planning skills , consider gaining some hands-on experience. Perhaps shadow an experienced planner, assist with events at a local organization, or even volunteer for a nonprofit event. 

Create your event planning business plan.

A well-structured business plan is the foundation of any successful venture, and event planning is no different. Consider it your roadmap to success. Here are the key sections to include: 

• Executive Summary:  Summarize your business concept, goals, and what sets you apart.
• Overview : Outline your company background, structure (e.g., sole proprietorship), and essential details.
• Industry Analysis : Demonstrate your understanding of the local event planning market, including potential clients and event trends .
• Competitive Analysis: Examine your competition, identifying their areas of strength and areas you can exploit.
• Marketing : Craft a strategy for attracting clients—how will you make them aware of your exceptional services?
• Management: Detail your unique experience and skills.
• Operations Plan : Describe your day-to-day process for planning and executing events.
• Financials : Project your income, expenses, and profit expectations over your initial years of operation. 

Find your event planning niche.

Finding your niche is how you stand out from the rest—it helps you specialize in a specific subset of the broader event planning industry. Also, it becomes easier for your target market to find you. Common niches and event types include: 

• Business event planning:  Award ceremonies, charity and nonprofit events, corporate bonding retreats, meetings and seminars, conferences, grand openings, fashion shows, experiential events, holiday parties, networking events , trade shows, and VIP events. 
• Private/social event planning:  Weddings,   anniversaries, holiday parties, baby showers, theme parties, wedding/bridal showers, bachelor/bachelorette parties, milestone birthday parties, and murder-mystery parties. 

Identify your unique selling proposition.

Identify your event planning business’ unique selling proposition (USP) to set yourself apart from your competitors. It is the reason why clients should choose your company over others. 

Here’s how you can define your USP: 

• Identify your target market:  The first step in uncovering your event planning USP is to identify your target market. Who are your ideal clients? What type of events do they typically host? What are their pain points and needs? Understanding your target market lets you tailor your services to your client's needs and preferences. 
• Analyze your competition:  The next step is to analyze your competition. Who are your competitors? What services do they offer? What is their pricing strategy? What are their strengths and weaknesses? Understand your competition to identify gaps in the market and ways to differentiate your business. 
• Determine your unique strengths:  What sets your business apart from your competitors? What unique strengths do you bring to the table? It could be your expertise in a particular type of event, your creative approach to event design, your extensive network of vendors, or your exceptional customer service. Identify your unique strengths and use them to craft a compelling USP.

Consider funding and costs.

The events business can be lucrative, but getting started requires smart financial planning. Calculate your initial startup costs carefully. Price your services strategically so you cover expenses while remaining competitive. If number crunching isn't your strong suit, invest in a bookkeeper or accountant early on.

While exact costs vary by location and services offered, here's a ballpark range to get you thinking:

• Rent: $0 to $2,300
• Equipment: $5,000 to $17,000
• Inventory: $0 to $500
• Licenses and Taxes: $250 to $350
• Communications: $100 to $250
• Payroll: $0 to $4,000
• Advertising/Promotion: $500 to $2,000
• Legal Fees & Accounting: $650 to $1,500
• Insurance (1st Quarter): $800 to $1,700
• Miscellaneous: $750 to $1,500
• Total: $8,050 to $31,100 

Remember, startup expenses don't have to be astronomical. Begin with the essentials, and scale up as your business grows.

Structure your pricing strategy.

Pricing your services is an art and a science. Factor in your location (cost of living varies), your experience level, and what your competitors charge. Most importantly, ensure your pricing allows you to cover costs and earn a worthwhile profit while remaining attractive to clients. 

Remember, transparency is key—explain your fee structure clearly so there are no surprises later on.

Here are some common pricing models for your consideration: 

• Hourly rate: Ideal for projects where the scope is difficult to predict upfront. Rates typically range from $25 - $100+ per hour, depending on your skills and the complexity of the event. 
• Flat fee:  A single charge covers your planning services. This works well for events with well-defined parameters. Sometimes, planners add a percentage of vendor fees to ensure sufficient compensation. 
• Percentage of the event:  Typically, this will be 15-20% of the total event cost. Such pricing structure is common for complex events, as your fee scales alongside the project.  
• Day-of coordination:  A specialized service, handling the on-site logistics on the day of the event itself. 
• Vendor commission:  In this model, your income comes from commissions from selected vendors, rather than directly from the client. This requires careful negotiation and transparency with all parties involved. 

Obtain necessary legal documents and permits.

Don't neglect the legal side of your business. Taking these steps protects both you and your clients from potential issues:

Register Your Business :   Choose a legal structure (LLC, Sole Proprietorship, etc.) that's right for you, and register officially with your state. Obtain a tax ID—essential for everything from opening a bank account to filing taxes. 

Obtain Necessary Permits : The red tape of event planning might not be glamorous, but it's crucial. Permits vary by location, so contact local authorities to learn exactly what you need. Common examples include: 

• Building permits (tents) for outdoor events that require tents.
• Business license to operate legally.
• Event permits vary by city, so contact the local government for relevant ordinances.
• Noise permit if your event is outside.
• Fire/fireworks permit, which you must check with your county.
• You can get a health permit from your county’s health department.
• You need a liquor license if you plan to serve alcoholic beverages. 
• Seller’s permit, which you may need as an event planner.
• Temporary use/structure permit for vacant land or temporary space for loading areas, vendors, and parking. 

Get your event planning business insured.

Obtain insurance coverage for your event planning business to protect yourself and your clients from unexpected incidents. Here are some important coverages to consider:

• Workers' compensation:  This is mandatory in all states. It protects your employees (and yourself, if you count as an employee) in case of work-related illness or injury.
• General liability insurance:  A must-have for any event planning business. This protects you from claims of property damage or bodily injury at an event you organized. 
• Property insurance:  Safeguard your equipment (tables, chairs, laptops, etc.) from theft, fire, and other unexpected events.
• Business interruption:  If unforeseen circumstances force you to temporarily shut down, this can provide financial support. Think of it as backup income if things go awry.
• Business Owner's Policy:  This bundles several important coverages into one convenient package, often at a good value. 

Market your event planning business.

Once your business is set up, it's time to attract those exciting new clients. Here are some strategies to get you started:

• Build a Website: Your website is your online storefront. Services like Weebly and Squarespace make it easy, even if you're not tech-savvy. Invest time in making it visually appealing and easy to navigate.
• Boost Your Online Presence: List your business on directories like Yelp, Eventective, and Google My Business. This helps potential clients discover you when they're searching for event planners in your area.
• Get Social: Create engaging profiles on relevant platforms (Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, etc.). Share social media-worthy photos, behind-the-scenes glimpses, and client testimonials.
• Traditional Marketing Still Works: Don't underestimate the power of beautifully designed brochures, flyers, and business cards. Distribute them strategically at local businesses or events.
• Get Referrals: Happy clients are your best advertisement. Encourage them to leave glowing reviews, and feature video testimonials on your website and social media.
• Strategic Partnerships: Caterers, photographers, venue owners—these businesses have the same clientele as you. Build relationships and create a referral network to mutually benefit. 

Related: Read some practical  event planning tips  for before, during, and after the event. 

What skills do you need to run an event planning business?

The basic skills needed to run an event planning business effectively are primarily soft skills, such as organizational skills, business management skills, and presentation skills. Here are some necessary skills to run an event planning business successfully: 

• Attention to detail
• Customer service
• Education (staying updated on event trends) or experience
• Interpersonal relationship skills
• Negotiation
• Organization
• Under-pressure performance 

Is an event planning business profitable?

Event planning has the potential to be a very profitable business venture. The fact that  89% of event and meeting leaders  consider in-person events crucial for revenue growth demonstrates the ongoing demand for well-planned events. 

However, the profitability of your event planning business will depend on several factors. The key to success lies in your ability to command premium rates for your services while keeping your expenses in check.            

What does an event planning business do?

An event planning business organizes and coordinates various aspects of events for individuals or organizations. This includes selecting venues, arranging catering and other vendors, creating event schedules and itineraries , managing budgets, and ensuring all necessary equipment and supplies are available. 

Do event planners travel a lot?

Event planners may travel depending on the nature of the events they plan. Some events may occur locally, while others may require travel to different cities or countries. Ultimately, the amount of travel required will depend on each event's specific needs and requirements. 

The Future of Event Planning is Yours to Create

The event planning industry offers vast opportunities for those with an eye for detail, a flair for organization, and a knack for staying on budget. Whether your heart lies in orchestrating sleek corporate events or bringing dream weddings to life, the skills you hone as an event planner are valuable in countless contexts. 

A carefully crafted business plan, paired with smart marketing and a dedication to providing exceptional experiences, can turn your passion into a truly successful venture. Find your niche, or cast a wide net—the choice is yours.

If you're ready to take the leap into the world of event planning, don't hesitate. Use this guide as your springboard. With hard work, a little business savvy, and a genuine love for creating memorable moments, there's no limit to what you can achieve.  

Up next, learn some  best practices in event management to create scalable and successful event strategies for your business.

John Hunter

John is the Senior Manager of Event Cloud Content Marketing at Cvent. He has 11 years of experience writing about the meetings and events industry. John also has extensive copywriting experience across diverse industries, including broadcast television, retail advertising, associations, higher education, and corporate PR.

More Reading

How to create a post-event report that proves roi, teambuilding through culinary experiences in seattle southside, how to measure and calculate trade show roi.

Subscribe to our newsletter

How do I start my own event planning business?

Like any small business, you have to start out by doing a lot of research and creating a plan for what services you’ll offer and how you’ll market them .

You’ll also have to figure out things like budgeting, whether or not you’ll want to expand your team with event staff or other specialists, and administrative tasks like quoting, billing, etc.

As you can already tell, most of the work is done up front. But you only have to do it once! And even though you’ll most likely tweak your plan as your business continues to grow, the work you put in now will largely serve as a foundation of the company for years to come.

How to start an event planning business

If you’re looking to snag one of the 116,700+ (on average) jobs available to meeting, convention, and event managers out there, here’s what you’ll need to get started.

Step 1: Determine if it’s a good fit.

Like most jobs, your skill set and personality will largely determine your success in this field. And while you don’t need to check off all the qualities on this list, here are some things to consider before you start an event management business :

• You can keep the big picture in mind while still taking care of all the little details.
• Whether it’s Sunday brunch or the company holiday party, you’re everyone’s go-to person for all group events.
• Working within a budget and strict timeline makes you feel creatively stimulated, not stunted.

Try the most popular event management business software

Get Started Free

Step 2: Research certifications.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics notes that demand for event managers will grow an additional 11% by the time we reach 2026. With such a positive industry outlook, it’s good to find new ways to stand out amongst the competition as new event planners enter the market in coming years.

Certifications are fantastic ways to add credibility to your business , regardless of your experience level. Besides proving you’re dedicated to further your education in the field, these credentials show that respected institutions can vouch for your abilities (and your business).

Some of the top certifications event managers pursue include:

• Certified Special Events Professional
• Certified Event Planning Specialist
• Certified Quality Event Planner

There are lots more options to choose from, but these serve as a great jumping off point. However, if you aren’t able to acquire one right now, you can still get your business off the ground without it.

It’s worth noting that beyond certifications, there are no strict college degree requirements (although it seems most event planners do have some sort of bachelor’s education under their belts when starting out).  

Step 3: Fill out an event management business plan.

Any cursory Google search for the phrase event management business plan will inevitably lead you to some free wedding and event planning business plan templates .

However, you’ll find that the one we’ve created (below) provides a not too much, not too little approach you won’t find in any other guides.

Each point has been carefully selected so that you can create the event management business plan of your dreams without getting overwhelmed or missing out on details you definitely need to include. As long as you check off the items we listed, you’ll have a solid business plan ready to go in no time.

Step 4: Handle all the necessary paperwork.

To start an event management business, you’ll need each of the following:

• An event management business plan (use the free template we made below)
• Approval for a tax business structure that suits your financial needs
• General business liability insurance

These documents cover all the basics. But as you gain more experience, you might want to add on things like home-based insurance or upgrade to a new tax entity once you enter into the appropriate bracket.

We won’t get into these more advanced concepts for this beginner guide, but make sure to revisit these categories before you’re officially open for business.

Step 5: Figure out finances.

To be clear, you definitely can start an event management business with no money ! However, whether your funding is from your own bank account or someone else’s, small businesses in the events industry should consider starting out with these budget line items:

• Office space and essentials. You can use the computer, printer, and supplies you already have, assuming you do have (or can at least borrow) those things now. But keep in mind: if you’d like to write off your in-home office space on your federal taxes, your room must be secluded and have its own door.
• Advertising. At the very least make sure you have a small batch of business cards and a portfolio website ready to go. If you have some cash to spare, consider getting into paid social media ads or printed marketing materials like mailers.
• Software. The good news is there are plenty of great free event management software programs available these days, so you might not even have to budget for this one!

And that’s basically it! Depending on your niche or preferences, it would be good to also use this startup costs guide created by the Small Business Association to see if there’s anything else specific to you that might be missing.

Step 6: Choose a team.

Vendors, chefs, marketing agencies, software providers, event staff, and personal or office assistants all make wonderful additions to your event management business.

You can start out on your own (which, according to small business statistics , most people do) or you can go through the process of finding, interviewing, and hiring employees.

Depending on the amount of new business you plan to take on, you may or may not need to ever hire someone to help you part-time. At the very least though, you should start compiling a list of people who fit into this network so you can collaborate, get referrals, and perhaps even sub-contract them in the future.

Grow your event management business with the best tools

Get Started Now

What is your vision for an event planning business?

Once you’ve completed all of these steps, it’s time to review the big picture. As you figure out your plan, budget, and staffing options, your idea of what you want for your business might change. And that’s totally okay!

Learning how to be flexible is a skill all small business owners must learn. Just make sure you adjust now so you can carry your vision with you for future decision making.

How to write a personal event planning business plan

1. create an executive summary.

• Objectives. Write down your realistic and measurable business goals .
• Mission. Check out these inspiring company mission statements for ideas.
• Keys to Success. Also known as why you think your business will succeed and how you will make sure it does.

2. Make a company summary

• Company Ownership. If it’s just you, consider doing a sole proprietorship .
• Start-up Summary . Think of it like a company overview . Include your business’s back story, location, and anything else you’d basically put on your website’s About section.
• Company Locations and Facilities. Include the address you’ll put on your taxes and any long term rentals like kitchen prep spaces or coworking offices.

3. Identify your products and services

• Services. Event management services can really vary so use this section to outline what you do and what you don’t do.
• Prices. The average yearly event planner’s salary comes out to about $50,000 so plan accordingly.
• Competitive Comparison. Who are your immediate competitors? What do they have that you don’t? Record this research and look for imaginative ways to stand out. Be very honest with your assessment of how your business stacks up against them and what you should do to improve your chances of success.

Try the most popular event management software in the world

4. create a marketing analysis summary.

• Marketing Segmentation. Targeting means finding what area, demographic, or behavioral patterns your high ROI prospects all have in common, just like you’d do for any customer-focused corporate event.
• Target Market Segmentation Strategy. Now that you know who you audience it is, it’s time to research and define all the ways you plan to gain their business.

5. Do a strategy and implementation summary

• Sales Strategy. Here are the two best advanced event business pricing strategies to choose from.
• Sales Forecast. It’s a bit complicated, but figuring out how much money you think your business will make over the next six months to a year (or more) makes studying a sales forecasting guide well worth the effort.
• Milestones . Whether your goal is the total number of sales or income from sales (or something else entirely), you’ll want to formally establish what milestones you’d like to hit by when. Just leave wiggle room for the unexpected and adjust expectations as you go.

6. Write a management summary

• Organizational Structure. For event management teams, clearly defined roles are more important for teamwork than pretty much anything else.
• Personnel Plan. Here are some things to know about hiring staff for an event specifically that will also apply to your company as a whole.

7. Create your financial plan

• Important Assumptions. Business plan assumptions can be fairly complex. For now, just focus on listing your anticipated fixed and variable event planning expenses , marketing costs, and what taxes you’ll have to pay on your earned income.
• Break-Even Analysis . How much did you invest? And how much will you need to earn (after taxes, equipment costs, etc. are subtracted) in order to equal your initial investment? Keep this number handy – it’ll help you decide whether or not to take on more projects, motivate you to upsell whenever possible, and give you a realistic for success.
• Projected Profit and Loss. The IRS might want to see your profit and loss statements at some point, so make a point to regularly record your expenses and sales in one organized document.
• Projected Cash Flow. This free (and very helpful) small business book says to calculate it one month at a time for more accurate figures.
• Projected Balance Sheet. If you’ll be acting as your own bookkeeper, check out this balance sheet template to speed up the process.
• Business Ratios. Even if you’re not a math person, you can definitely handle this last (but very important) event management business plan step. There are lots of business ratios to choose from, but if you want the quickstart version go with these 3 most important balance sheet ratios for professional services firms .

Now you know how to start an event management business!

How do you become an event planner? You plan. Plan your business, plan your client’s events, and plan for a successful future.

There are lots of details involved but if you follow the ideas laid out in this guide, you’ll have yourself a healthy event management business plan along with some great strategies for reaching your goals!

For more on starting your own company , check out these tips for financing your event business , current event statistics worth considering, and event trends you should know for 2019.

• Free Planner Tools
• Event Seating Software
• Event Check-In Software

Venue Tools

• Event Diagramming Software
• Interactive Floor Plans
• Photo-Realistic 3D
• Lead Capture Tools
• Event Planning
• Guides & Webinars
• Customer Stories
• Contact Sales: +1 (877) 973-2863
• About Cvent
• Cvent Community
• Help & Support
• Training & Certification
• Status & Uptime
• Terms of Service
• Privacy Policy
• Your Privacy Choices
• +1 (877) 973-2863 - Option 1
• [email protected]

Copyright 2024 Cvent Inc. All rights reserved.

Don't bother with copy and paste.

Get this complete sample business plan as a free text document.

Event Planning Business Plan

Start your own event planning business plan

Corporate Retreat Professionals

Executive summary executive summary is a brief introduction to your business plan. it describes your business, the problem that it solves, your target market, and financial highlights.">, opportunity.

Companies need to make sure their employees have the best training and tools available.  They use the retreats to help colleagues get together and work well together which helps avoid turnover. Happy coworkers mean happy customers

The Corporate Retreat Professionals (CRP) is an event planning company specializing in corporate customers.  CRP will offer two types of services, retreat training services as well as product launch event planning.  The retreat training services will be either leadership development training or teaming skills training.  For both types of retreats, CRP can take care of the planning of the event, as well as actually hosting the training through the use of one of CRP’s strategic business partners.

The corporate market for event planning is steady and profitable.  For some large companies, economic downturns mean cuts in training. This is, however, only the case for short sighted companies.  The benchmark companies may trim down the workforce during a downturn, but they do not cut funds for training.  They recognize that investing in human resources is always a good investment.  CRP intends to profit nicely from this.  Additionally, even in economic downturns, companies still have product launches and will still need someone to organize these events.  In short, the need for corporate event planning/hosting services rarely diminishes, it is a steadily increasing demand that CRP will capitalize on.

Competition

In the past, the buying patterns for the larger corporations was in the past to have an in-house solution. This pattern is is disappearing in favor of outsourcing as there is the constant drive for gains in efficiency, something outsourcing can offer.

Corporate Retreat Professionals will provide companies with the highest level of event planning.  We exist to attract and maintain customers.  When we adhere to this maxim, everything else will fall into place.  Our services will exceed the expectations of our customers.

Expectations

Financial highlights by year, financing needed.

We will be getting $50,000 from the owner and founder of the company. 

Problem & Solution

Problem worth solving, our solution.

Corporate Retreat Professionals will provide companies with the highest level of event planning.  We exist to attract and maintain customers.  When we adhere to this maxim, everything else will fall into place.  Our services will exceed the expectations of our customers.

Target Market

Market size & segments.

CRP will serve the corporate customer in the event planning market.  CRP will be specializing in two important niches.  The first is leadership development and teaming skills development.  With the recent trend in corporate downsizing, corporations are ditching their in-house solutions in favor of outsourcing.  Even though we are in the midst of an economic downturn, investments in human capital are generally not reduced.  Corporations still have the need for leadership development and teaming skills development.  These are investments that cost a bit up front but pay nice returns in the long run.  These are the services that CRP will specialize in.

Additionally, CRP will offer event planning for product launches.  Product launches are an integral stage in the release of a new product, communicating to the public about the new "thing" the company has just released.  Our customers will be companies seeking to raise awareness about their new product release.  CRP will provide a complete service of planning and hosting these product release events.

4.1 Market Segmentation

CRP is providing services to corporate customers only.  We will not be going after the "social market" which is an alternative market within the event planning niche. 

The corporate customer is a company that contracts with CRP to plan and typically host an event for the company.  Corporations will be turning to CRP to plan the events because:

• It is cost effective for a third party to plan the event.  This is the case because the third party only does event planning so they can plan and host the event more efficiently.
• The company does not have additional people that can be taken away from their daily tasks to invest time in this infrequent event.

Our event planning services for corporate retreats will typically be utilized by larger corporations.  A larger company can be generally defined as one with more than 40 employees.  Smaller companies sometimes will utilize this service of ours, however, it is the larger corporations that typically have the budget for this activity.

For our product launch event planning, we will be servicing companies of all different sizes.  Typically the companies that use this service will be product based companies, but we will also offer this service to service-based companies who desire to announce a new service that they are offering.

CRP is targeting large companies for our corporate retreat event planning.  The large corporations typically have the budget and the foresight to recognize the value in corporate retreats.  In addition, it is the larger corporations that typically use the corporate retreat as a training session for their employees.  The training is typically in leadership development or teaming skills.  While they do have these retreats at different intervals through the year,  it is more cost effective for them to hire a service such as CRP to plan the events when needed instead of paying the carrying costs of having a full-time, trained employee ready to do the planning when it is needed.

CRP’s product release planning services will be targeted at all different size companies.  Companies of all sizes have product release and it is unusual for them to have product release many times a year requiring someone to be a full-time planner on staff.  Therefore, it makes sense for them to hire an outside service to plan the event using their expertise in event planning to drive down the costs of production and hosting.

Current Alternatives

Currently there are three other companies that offer event planning specifically to corporations. They however, tend to do events that are more general in scope such as parties to reward customers or employees, or events to change the company image. There is no company that specializes in event planning of corporate training and product release events. There are companies that offer corporate training, but these companies provide the actual training and do not do any of the actual event planning/ logistics of the entire event.

There are companies that provide product-release services, but they do not specialize in it. Because event planning is a tight market, CRP will benefit from their specialization in this area.

Our Advantages

CRP’s second competitive edge is based on the use of strategic relationships. CRP clearly realizes that they cannot be good at everything. CRP believes it is better to concentrate on a few things, excel in those areas, and form strategic partnerships with companies that excel in the service areas that CRP doesn’t. Applying this philosophy, CRP has decided in addition to planning corporate retreat training sessions, they want to offer the service of hosting/leading these events as well. The service of hosting/leading however, is quite different than planning and CRP believes that it would be more cost effective to form a strategic relationship with an expert in this field instead of trying to become proficient themselves. CRP then is able to offer a top-notch service offering of hosting/leading the training seminars but does not have to invest heavily in developing the program.

The use of strategic relationships is unusual in the event planning space. Most event planners are generalists and try to do a little of everything. CRP is following the model of benchmark companies in other industries that have recognized the value of specialization and the use of strategic relationships.

Keys to Success

Our keys to Success are: 

• Create a service-based company whose #1 value is exceeding customer’s expectations.
• Utilize of CRP’s services in 10 of the 100 top performing companies as listed by the Seattle Business Journal.
• Increase our number of served clients by 20% per year through superior service.
• Develop a sustainable, profitable start-up business.

Marketing & Sales

Marketing plan.

CRP will, for the most part, be using the sale strategy of personal selling. With his five years of consulting for larger corporations, Jeff has formed relationships throughout the business community. Jeff will initially leverage these relationships to form some initial clients. Once things get rolling and CRP has developed some satisfied clients, Jeff will be developing relationships with his network of friends developed through the Chambers of Commerce and trade shows.

Jeff’s spiel to prospective customers will be based on the high level of service offered and cost advantages by going with CRP. The cost savings can be quantified and shown to the customer while the higher level of service can be guaranteed as well as communicated through testimonials from satisfied clients.

Additionally, the website will be used not only to communicate information to prospective customers but also a method of communication where CRP can provide more specialized information such as cost estimates as well as answering questions through the site.

CRP will offer event planning for the corporate market.  CRP will concentrate on two types of event planning:

• Corporate retreats – These events are typically used for two different reasons.  They are either a leadership training or teaming skills training where employees of the corporations are sent away to develop these skills.  In addition to the planning of the events, CRP will be able to host the event as well.  While CRP’s core competencies are not in hosting, CRP will align itself with a well-respected host of leadership development/teaming skills programs and have them assist CRP in the hosting aspect.  Using a strategic partner, in this case, allows CRP to stick with a narrow focus but still offer the service to our customers.
• Product launches – These are events where the corporation is releasing a product and they have an event that is open to people outside of the corporation.  The purpose of the product launch event is to create visibility for the new release. 

Milestones & Metrics

Milestones table.

Key Metrics

Our Key Metrics are: 

• # of monthly customers, we would like to slowly increase our monthly customers 
• #of return customers 
• # of reviews and recommendations 
• food and drink inventory turnover
• each even cost of goods 
• cost of training our staff 
• # of events and of rooms occupied to break even 

Ownership & Structure

CRP is a Washington corporation whose sole stock holder is Jeff Organizer. Jeff will be incorporating to protect himself from personal liability.

Management Team

Jeff Organizer, Founder and President, has a degree in Business from the University of Washington. After college, Jeff spent five years working for Andersen Consulting. During these years, Jeff became familiar with a large number of companies and the important players in the Seattle business community. While working for Andersen, Jeff attended an MBA night program and received his MBA in 1996.

After completing his degree, Jeff decided to join Boeing in their PR department. It was at Boeing where Jeff learned the bulk of his organizing and event planning skills. These skills, in conjunction with his MBA education, gave Jeff the confidence to handle a wide range of business propositions. After three years at Boeing, Jeff decided to start his own business. Corporate Retreat Professionals was finally born

Personnel Table

Financial Plan investor-ready personnel plan .">

Key assumptions.

Our key assumptions are: 

• Personnel are the difference between customers choosing one company over the other, training is key 
• happy bonded coworkers mean longer hours and better products 
• there are a set number of events we need to breakeven. more will make us a profit. 

Revenue by Month

Expenses by month, net profit (or loss) by year, use of funds.

Start-up Expenses

Legal 1,000

Stationery etc. $300

Brochures $300

Consultants $300

Insurance $200

Rent $1,000

Office equipment $300

TOTAL START-UP EXPENSES$3,400

In addition we will be having $5,000 of long term assets.  The remainder of the $50,000 will be used as cash to help fund the operations. 

Sources of Funds

We will be getting $50,000 from the owner. 

Projected Profit & Loss

Projected Balance Sheet

Projected Cash Flow Statement

The quickest way to turn a business idea into a business plan

Fill-in-the-blanks and automatic financials make it easy.

No thanks, I prefer writing 40-page documents.

Discover the world’s #1 plan building software

Event Planning Business Plan Template [Updated 2024]

Event Planning Business Plan Template

If you want to start an Event Planning business or expand your current Event Planning or Event Management business, you need a business plan.

The following Event Planning business plan template gives you the key elements to include in a winning event planner business plan or event management business plan.

You can download our Business Plan Template (including a full, customizable financial model) to your computer here.

Below are links to each of the key sections of a free Event Planning business plan template:

Event Business Plan Template I. Executive Summary II. Company Overview III. Industry Analysis IV. Customer Analysis V. Competitive Analysis VI. Marketing Plan VII. Operations Plan VIII. Management Team IX. Financial Plan

Comments are closed.

Event Planning Business Plan Home I. Executive Summary II. Company Overview III. Industry Analysis IV. Customer Analysis V. Competitive Analysis VI. Marketing Plan VII. Operations Plan VIII. Management Team IX. Financial Plan

How to Write an Event Organiser Business Plan (With Examples)

If you’re looking to turn your event into a viable and profitable enterprise, you’ll need to devise a solid business plan. Whether your aim is making more money, securing investment and partners, or simply keeping up with your commercial goals, an event business plan is the launchpad of a successful business.

A well-written plan can be an invaluable resource for you, your team , and your event – and writing one need not be difficult. Our systematic and straightforward event business plan step-by-step guide will show you how to create one while providing you with useful examples for budgeting and promotion that you can adapt for your particular market.

How do you write a business plan as an event planner?

From coming up with your blue-sky mission statement to the nitty-gritty details of hosting your event, there are several steps to creating a great event business plan. Read on to get our in-depth tips, see examples and find out exactly what should go into your plan.

In this article, our tips for writing an event business plan are broken down into eight sections. We’ll show you how to:

• Begin your event business plan with a mission statement
• Describe your greater vision with a vision statement
• List the key objectives you want to track
• Enhance your event business plan with storytelling
• Detail an event marketing strategy
• Outline your event’s operational requirements
• Crunch the numbers for your event budget
• Conduct a SWOT analysis for your event

1. Begin your event business plan with a mission statement

Your mission statement describes your event in a short sentence or two. It helps to sell your event to important stakeholders and forms the foundation of your marketing. In fact, it’ll also help to keep you focused since every decision you make will ultimately trace back to your mission.

The Macarthur Centre for Sustainable Living (MCSL), a community-focused, not-for-profit organisation with sustainability at its core, is just one example of how a simple mission statement turned into a successful real-life venture.

MCSL has a simple philosophy based on its objective to make a positive difference in environmental sustainability by encouraging the community to adopt sustainable lifestyle choices. Its mission statement sums up how MCSL operates as well as what it stands for:

“To develop MCSL into a regional place of excellence that inspires the community to embrace an environmental conscience.”

This high-level mission statement sells the spirit of MCSL succinctly. Make yours equally inspiring, and keep it as short as possible to make it easy to keep your mission in mind.

2. Describe your greater vision with a vision statement

While a mission statement says what your event is about, a vision statement describes what you hope your event brand will become . It could also be known as your Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal (your BHAG ).

The Cancer Council Victoria uses the mission statement “Prevent cancer. Empower people. Save lives.”

But the foundation’s vision is even more aspirational:

A cancer free future.

What’s your blue-sky vision? You might not cure cancer, but perhaps you want to eventually turn your foodie pop-up into a nationwide series of “locavore” festivals. Perhaps you want to introduce attendees to a new style of dance? Or bring art into the homes of the nation?

Brevity and clarity are also key in this section of your business plan, so you should be able to sum up your vision statement in one short sentence. For example, a lot of businesses these days want their activities to produce no carbon emissions whatsoever, so they might use a vision statement like “net-zero by 2050”.

A good way to come up with your vision statement is to ask yourself what effect you eventually want your event to have more widely. Be as imaginative as you can and also think about why you created your event in the first place. This will help you to produce evocative language, which will have a greater impact on your audience.

3. List the key objectives you want to track

Your key objectives convert your mission statement into on-the-ground action. They are realistic goals that you can achieve in the short term and in the future. Examples might include:

• Gaining a set number of followers on social media
• Expanding your event into a different area
• Pinning down a special guest to make an appearance
• Selling a certain number of tickets for each event

Make a list of the key tasks and deliverables integral to your event. In the foodie pop-up example above, a few key objectives might be to:

• Host three foodie pop-ups in your local area this year
• Find at least ten sponsors – local food purveyors or restaurants
• Acquire 10,000 followers on Instagram

Make your objectives aspirational but achievable – and definitely measurable . Make records of where you currently are in regard to achieving these goals and attach metrics to each one. Eventbrite offers useful analytic data, which can be used to help you track your return on investment (ROI) and more.

4. Enhance your event business plan with storytelling

Here’s the heart of your business plan: a tangible description of your event. This is important because not only does it tell potential investors what they’re being asked to buy into but it’s also often the first (and only) chance you’ll get to grab a potential attendee’s attention online.

The key here is to provide a text that’s as informative as it is readable. Strike a balance between providing the reader with all the essential details they need, without overwhelming them with information.

Define what makes your event unique and sell your audience on your vision with data that grounds it in reality. For example, if you’ve had a high demand for tickets in the past, let the reader know how many tickets you’ve sold for your events to date.

Craft a succinct event story with our event business plan checklist:

• Describe your target audience, with research into the market
• List potential or actual sponsors, investors, and partners who will support and influence your event
• Lay out the team structure you intend to build – who will get what done?

Your job here is to convince the reader that your event will be successful. Give proof that you can back up your ideas with business acumen.

5. Detail an event marketing strategy

Word of mouth is a timeless marketing channel, but most events don’t sell themselves right away. You’ve already described your mission, your vision, and the event itself, so now you can use this content in your marketing strategy and include additional information:

How will you price your event?

Will you use a flat rate or provide an early bird option at a discount? While the latter might prove a great idea for festivals and conferences, recurring events like workshops would benefit from a different marketing approach. For example, consider providing tiered ticketing options for regular events, giving guests a choice of a standard or VIP ticket with added extras. This can create a buzz of prestige around your event.

What’s your promotion budget?

Knowing what resources you have is integral to marketing your event effectively and securing a good ROI.

Which marketing channels will you use?

Your target audience will determine the direction of your marketing channels. This includes which social media platform you choose to market your event on. For example, if your arts event caters to twenty-somethings, the highly visual environment that Instagram provides will often be a better marketing match than LinkedIn , which is more suited for specialist industry lectures and business networking events.

Making the right choice of channel means that half your work is done because your event will get more exposure with people who are already interested in your sector, generating a higher lead-to-conversion rate.

6. Outline your event’s operational requirements

There are countless logistics that go into even the smallest event. Break your needs into categories: facilities, services, staffing , production, technology, legal, and insurance – just as a starting point!

Then start to anticipate what the real implications are for your event with reference to each of these categories. Depending on your specific event, facilities might include setting up a cloakroom or the hire of portaloos, shower cubicles, or charging points. Services might include anything from catering, rubbish disposal or cleaning, to the cost of basic utilities if they aren’t included in the venue hire. Production might cover contracting performers, printing tickets or wristbands, and transport of sound equipment.

Don’t leave anything out. This exercise will help you with the next step – assigning a cost to each aspect of your event.

7. Crunch the numbers for your event budget

Financial forecasts are essential to showing whether your event will be profitable – and to making your plan a business plan. It’s common to include both an overview of your numbers as well as a full budget spreadsheet, usually as part of an appendix.

Identify all potential income streams, like ticket sales , exhibition space sales, food, or merchandise. If you have funding secured or capital saved, include this as well.

You’ll also need to tally all expenditures , including your operational and promotional costs. These might include venue and equipment hire, paying staff working at the event, and the cost of targeted ads.

Your business plan might serve as a way to win over potential investors. For instance, if your idea for a national yoga teachers’ conference will require an initial cash injection to get it off the ground, show how it will pay for itself in a matter of years in your budget. You should go into detail about cover prices, including any deals you’ve been able to get with suppliers or the venue.

Make sure to illustrate your event’s projected earnings in a simple graph, such as a bar or pie chart. This is an effective and simple of way communicating how you’re making your budget work for you.

8. Conduct a SWOT analysis for your event

SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. This assessment is important because every event carries inherent risks, and it’s a liability to ignore them. You’ll want to identify and acknowledge any risks, and then provide solutions. Let’s take a look at this concept using the example of a fundraising triathlon.

You’ve sold many tickets so far.

You’ve planned the event for the mildest time of year.

You’ve got catastrophe insurance.

There’s high competition from other similar events.

Opportunities

Extra funds can be raised with a cold drinks stall.

The triathlon may need to be called off in the event of bad weather, eg a thunderstorm.

Event business plan FAQs

How do i start an event organising business.

You could start by writing an event management business plan. See the above section, “Outline your event’s operational requirements,” to get an idea of what managing an event involves.

What is a business plan in event management?

A business plan is where you convince investors that your idea for turning your event into a business is not only viable, but also profitable. This will include presenting the necessary figures detailing why your business will offer a good ROI. Check out the sections “Enhance your event business plan with storytelling” and “Crunch the numbers for your event budget” for more tips on how to write an event planning business plan.

How do you write a business plan for an event?

The above steps in this article explain how, but try looking for an event business plan example online if you’d like to see how it’s done.

What is an event planning proposal?

A proposal is a resumé of how you plan to execute your event, written with key stakeholders as the audience.

Set your event business plan in motion

To dive deep into the details of creating an event business plan, and to learn how to compile these sections into an effective document, download our free templates for planning, organising, and hosting your event.

Create your free event listing today

• WAS THIS ARTICLE HELPFUL?

SPREAD THE WORD

about the author

Hannah Phelvin-Hartley

Hannah Phelvin-Hartley specialises in producing content for the lifestyle, education, engineering and automotive, politics, human rights and legal sectors. She can translate from Italian, Spanish and French into English. In her free time, Hannah can usually be found cooking, reading, practising Yoga and dancing.

You might also like these

How to Write an Event Planning Business Plan

• Event Planning
• Retail Small Business
• Restauranting
• Real Estate
• Nonprofit Organizations
• Import/Export Business
• Freelancing & Consulting
• Food & Beverage
• Construction
• Operations & Success
• Becoming an Owner

Event planners know how important organizational skills are in planning and executing a successful event. But as an event planning business , you may be overlooking the importance of having a business plan that keeps you organized and on track in the big picture operation of your business.

What an Event Planning Business Plan Is

An event planning business plan is a document that outlines the major aspects of your business. It articulates what the business is, its objective, how it operates, the structure and other important elements.

The Need for a Business Plan

Perhaps you are just starting your event planning business and because it is so new, you then wonder if you should devote time to developing a plan. Or, you may have been operating your solo operation from your dining room table for the past several months, and everything seems to be running along just fine.

Either way, a business plan is an important component of your business. Just as you have an event planning checklist to spell out the goal of an event, the budget, the target audience and other such factors.

What to Include in Your Event Planning Business Plan

A business plan will put your objectives in writing and keep you focused on the long-term goals of your event planning business, so note the plan in as much detail as possible to ensure that when you go to actually start your business, you have already ironed out potential setbacks in the planning stage. Use your event planning business plan to keep you on track. Reevaluate your business plan every three months and determine if you need to modify anything to reflect changes in your event planning business.

• Description: The first aspect of your business plan is a description of who you are or what you want your business to be. This can be as simple as just a few sentences. For example, “ABC Event Planning is a full-service event planning business…” or “ABC Event Planning specializes in planning weddings…”.
• Objective: What is your business objective? What are the goals of your business? Are you aiming to be the top event planner in your town or do you have your sights on a loftier goal?
• Structure: How is your business structured? Are you the sole operator or do you have partners or support staff? If you have employees, outline their job responsibilities.
• Products and Services: What product or service does your business offer? Include everything from negotiating hotel contracts to hiring vendors and providing on-site staffing. 
• Target Market: Who are your potential clients?  What segment does your event planning business want to attract? Identify the people who would be interested in your services.
• Marketing: How will you market your business to attract customers? Do you have plans for a website? Will you utilize social media? Attend local business events? 
• Finances: How will you handle any upfront costs of conducting your business? How will billing and payment be processed?

What to Do Once the Plan Is Written 

Do not write out a business plan, check it off your to-do list and tuck it into a drawer. This business plan is the roadmap for your event planning business. Keep it front and center so that you never lose sight of why you started this business, what it is about, where you want to go and how you plan to get there.

• Help Your Customers See the Value of Event Planning
• How to Write an Event Planning Service Proposal
• 7 Things to Include in an Event Planning Business Proposal
• Why You Need an Event Planning Checklist
• Tips to Increase Attendance at Business Events
• How to Grow an Event Planning Business
• Common Event Planning Mistakes to Avoid
• Event Management vs. Planning
• An Introduction to Corporate Incentive Travel and Events
• What Is a Seminar?
• What Is Event Management?
• What Are the Guidelines for Planning a Public or Community Event?
• How to Find and Hire the Best Event Planner
• 10 Tips for Planning an Amazing Company Holiday Party
• How to Start a Career in Event Planning
• How to Word Invitations For Special Events

Event Planning Business Plan [Sample Template]

By: Author Tony Martins Ajaero

Home » Business ideas » Entertainment Industry » Event Planning

Are you about starting an event management business ? If YES, here is a complete sample event planning business plan template & feasibility report you can use for FREE .

One good thing about event planning is that most often than not, events are done during weekends and if you are lucky not to be working during weekends, you can successfully test run an event planning business. The truth is that, most of the basic skills needed to effectively run an event planning business are some of the soft skills you are likely going to acquire in your workplace.

On the average, it is the practice for most standard event planning companies to handle all aspect of event planning that ranges from wedding planning, to annual general meetings (AGM), to corporate events, to end of year parties et al. This is so because there are little or no difference with the planning and execution of events. However, you can decide to build your event planning company around an area of specialization in the industry.

Suggested for You

• Wedding Planning Business Plan [Sample Template]
• Wedding Consulting Business Plan [Sample Template]
• Plumbing Business Plan [Sample Template]
• Tent Rental Business Plan [Sample Template]
• 19 Event Planning Questions to Ask Before Giving Clients a Quote

What It Takes to Start an Event Management Business?

As a professional event planner, you would have been trained on how to engage your clients in such a way that they should be able to answer any question you may ask them regarding the event or any related topic that will help you deliver a fantastic event.

Over and above, the service delivery for an event planner covers budgeting, scheduling, venue selection, acquiring necessary permits, coordinating transportation and parking, arranging for keynote speakers, motivational speakers, master of ceremony (MC) or entertainers, arranging decor, event security, catering and emergency plans .

The hallmark of an event is when the success benchmarks are meet or even surpassed. So part of what you need to ask your client as a professional event planner is to know key measurable areas where they would want the event to be assessed.

It could be the numbers of participants that attended the event, the feedbacks they got from the event and it could be any success indicator as agreed by the organizers of the event.

A Sample Event Planning Business Plan Template

1. industry overview.

Event planning is all about helping corporate organizations, government, groups and individual plan and execute their events from start to finish. An event planner ensures that they work with the stipulated budget of the organization or individual and ensure that they deliver a successful event as agreed.

In some cases, it is the responsibility of the event planner to draw – up a budget for the organizer of the event once they get a brief of the nature of the event. Events planning require that you take off the burden of planning an event from the shoulders of your clients. This is whether it is a corporate or informal event.

Therefore, you would need an eye for details in addition to the eye you have got. Confused? Do not be, that was on a lighter note. Now, the truth is that you would need to be extremely detailed. You do not want to come across your clients as one who leaves some kills important details out. If you do not possess this skill now, you may consider building it up.

The key to a successful event is to ensure that all that is listed in your event planning checklists is ticked. As a matter of fact, if you undergo event planning training, you are going to be taught how to draft event planning checklists for various events and key components that must be listed in your checklists.

The event planning is such an industry that needs you to be vast and well informed about news about the industry. What does this mean?

This means that you have got to be alert about everything as it concerns events planning all around the globe. You may consider reading up a whole lot- do not be far away from information. You can successfully pull off being a researcher off by reading books on this business, as using the internet.

According to Inside Business, the event planning industry is expected to grow to 20% with the median income of an event planning being $42,180 a year.

This industry is expected to grow to over 60,000 jobs. Statistics has it that the top 5 highest paying location in the united states for event planners and their average annual earnings are; Virginia – $54,770, New York – $57,300, New Jersey – $57,730, Massachusetts – $58,860, Washington DC – $67,120.

So also the top 5 states in the United States with the highest numbers of employment for event planners are; California with 7,730 event planners are employed, New York – 7, 250, event planners are employed, Texas – 6,320,event planners are employed, Florida – 3,560, event planners are employed, Virginia – 3,500 event planners are employed.

No doubt the event planning / management industry cannot be said to be over saturated despite the fact that the entry bar for starting an event planning business is pretty low. As an event planner, if you are creative and hardworking, you can successfully create your own steady market. It is safe to say the industry is still growing especially with the advent of new social media platforms.

For example in recent times, a world class event planning / management company in city in the United States of America can successfully organize an event with active participants from all over the globe participating in the event without living their country. This is possible with the aid of teleconference, and Skype et al.

Some of the factors that encourages entrepreneurs to start their own event planning business could be that the business is easy to set up, the start – capital is indeed affordable and the running cost can be put at the minimum level; you can actually start your own event planning business from the comfort of your home. All you need to do is to create an office somewhere in your house.

Lastly, event planning / management business is not restricted to just organizing conferences, corporate events or parties, but also organizing big international events such as Olympic and United Nations Events.

2. Executive Summary

Tony & Tammy House of Events LLC is an all – round event planning company that will be based in Las Vegas – Nevada.

The company will handle all aspect of event planning such as wedding planning, children’s party, sports tournaments / competitions, annual general meetings (AGM), to corporate events, trade fairs and exhibitions, end of year party, party rental services, event planning trainings and event planning consulting and advisory services et al.

We are aware that to run an all – round event planning outfit can be demanding which is why we are well trained and equipped to perform excellently well. Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC is a client-focused and result driven event planning outfit that provides broad-based experience at an affordable fee that won’t in any way put a hole in the pocket of our clients.

We will offer a standard and professional event planning services to all to our individual clients, and corporate clients at local, state, national, and international level. We will ensure that we work hard to meet and surpass our clients’ expectations whenever they contract their events to our organization.

At Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC, our client’s best interest would always come first, and everything we do is guided by our values and professional ethics. We will ensure that we hire professionals who are well experienced in a wide variety of event planning et al.

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC will at all times demonstrate her commitment to sustainability, both individually and as a firm, by actively participating in our communities and integrating sustainable business practices wherever possible.

We will ensure that we hold ourselves accountable to the highest standards by meeting our client’s needs precisely and completely. We will cultivate a working environment that provides a human, sustainable approach to earning a living, and living in our world, for our partners, employees and for our clients.

Our plan is to position the business to become the leading brand in the event planning line of business in the whole of Nevada, and also to be amongst the top 20 event planning outfits in the United States of America within the first 10 years of operations.

This might look too tall a dream but we are optimistic that this will surely come to pass because we have done our research and feasibility studies and we are enthusiastic and confident that Las Vegas is the right place to launch our event planning business before spreading to other parts of The United States.

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC is founded by Mr. Tony Angelo and his wife Tammy Angelo. The organization will be managed by both of them since they both have tangible experience working at various capacities within the entertainment and event planning industry in the United States.

As a matter of fact, Mr. Tony Angelo who is the Chief Executive Officer of the organization was part of the team that organized Atlanta 96® Olympics and the wife in time past has worked with the team responsible for organizing Grammy Awards.

Mr. Tony Angelo graduated from both University of California – Berkley (First Degree), and University of Harvard (MSc.).

3. Our Products and Services

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC is going to offer varieties of services within the scope of the event planning and entertainment industry in the United States of America. Our intention of starting our event planning outfit is to make profits from the industry and we will do all that is permitted by the law in the US to achieve our aim and ambition.

Our business offering is listed below;

• Wedding Planning
• Corporate Event Planning
• Outdoor Party Planning
• Annual General Meetings
• Sports Tournaments / Competitions Planning
• Children’s Party and Birthdays Party Planning
• Party Rental Services
• Event Planning Trainings (Training School)
• Event Planning Consulting and Advisory Services

4. Our Mission and Vision Statement

• Our vision is to build an event planning brand that will become the number one choice for both individual clients and corporate clients in the whole of Las Vegas – Nevada.
• Our vision reflects our values: integrity, service, excellence and teamwork.
• Our mission is to provide professional and trusted event planning services that assist individuals, businesses and non-profit organizations in organizing all of their events.
• We are to position the business to become the leading brand in the event planning line of business in the whole of Nevada, and also to be amongst the top 20 event planning outfits in the United States of America within the first 10 years of operations.

Our Business Structure

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC will build a solid business structure that can support the growth of our business. We will ensure that we hire competent hands to help us build the business of our dream. The fact that we want to become one of the leading event planning outfits in the United States makes it highly necessary to deliberately build a well – structured business from the onset.

Below is the business structure that we will build Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC on;

• Chief Executive Officer

Event Planning Consultant

Event Planning Training and Development Consultant

• Wedding Planning Consultant

Admin and HR Manager

• Business Developer

Front Desk Officer

5. Job Roles and Responsibilities

Chief Executive Office:

• Responsible for providing direction for the firm
• Creating, communicating, and implementing the organization’s vision, mission, and overall direction – i.e. leading the development and implementation of the overall organization’s strategy.
• Responsible for handling high profile clients and deals
• Responsible for fixing prices and signing business deals
• Responsible for signing checks and documents on behalf of the company
• Evaluates the success of the organization
• Reports to the board
• Responsible for interviewing and hiring vendors, selecting and ordering materials, negotiating rates, coordinating the sequence of events, following up with guests and vendors and producing full-scale events.
• Plans, designs and produces events while managing all project delivery elements within time limits
• Liaises with clients to identify their needs and to ensure customer satisfaction
• Conducts market research, gather information and negotiate contracts prior to closing any deals
• Provides feedback and periodic reports to stakeholders
• Proposes ideas to improve provided services and event quality
• Organizes facilities and manage all event’s details such as decor, catering, entertainment, transportation, location, invitee list, special guests, equipment, promotional material etc
• Ensures compliance with insurance, legal, health and safety obligations
• Specifies staff requirements and coordinate their activities
• Cooperates with marketing and PR to promote and publicize event
• Proactively handle any arising issues and troubleshoot any emerging problems on the event day
• Conducts pre- and post – event evaluations and report on outcomes
• Researches market, identify event opportunities and generate interest
• Manages the organization’s event planning training school
• Coordinates training programs facilitated by Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC
• Writs winning proposal documents, negotiate fees and rates in line with company policy
• Identifies training and development needs for staff through job analysis, appraisals and consultation
• Facilitates and coordinate strategic sessions.
• Works directly with clients in a non-advising capacity, such as answering questions, scheduling appointments and making sure all training concerns are properly taken care off
• Responsible for handling all trainings both internal and external trainings

Wedding Planner / Consultant

• Assists the bride and groom with everything from a timeline and budget to the choice of flowers, wedding location, musicians, caterers, and the choice of the groom’s tuxedo.
• Responsible for making sure that all the details of the big day play out smoothly as planned
• Responsible for overseeing the smooth running of HR and administrative tasks for the organization
• Design job descriptions with KPI to drive performance management for clients
• Regularly hold meetings with key stakeholders to review the effectiveness of HR Policies, Procedures and Processes
• Maintains office supplies by checking stocks; placing and expediting orders; evaluating new products.
• Ensures operation of equipment by completing preventive maintenance requirements; calling for repairs.
• Defines job positions for recruitment and managing interviewing process
• Carries out staff induction for new team members
• Responsible for training, evaluation and assessment of employees
• Responsible for arranging travel, meetings and appointments
• Updates job knowledge by participating in educational opportunities; reading professional publications; maintaining personal networks; participating in professional organizations.
• Oversees the smooth running of the daily office activities.

Marketing Executive

• Identifies, prioritizes, and reaches out to new partners, and business opportunities et al
• Identifies development opportunities; follows up on development leads and contacts; participates in the structuring and financing of projects; assures the completion of development projects.
• Writes winning proposal documents, negotiate fees and rates in line with company policy
• Responsible for handling business research, marker surveys and feasibility studies for clients
• Responsible for supervising implementation, advocate for the customer’s needs, and communicate with clients
• Develops, executes and evaluates new plans for expanding increase sales
• Documents all customer contact and information
• Represents the company in strategic meetings
• Helps increase sales and growth for the company
• Responsible for preparing financial reports, budgets, and financial statements for the organization
• Provides managements with financial analyses, development budgets, and accounting reports; analyzes financial feasibility for the most complex proposed projects; conducts market research to forecast trends and business conditions.
• Responsible for financial forecasting and risks analysis.
• Performs cash management, general ledger accounting, and financial reporting for one or more properties.
• Responsible for developing and managing financial systems and policies
• Responsible for administering payrolls
• Ensures compliance with taxation legislation
• Handles all financial transactions for the company
• Serves as internal auditor for the company

Client Service Executive

• Welcomes guests and clients by greeting them in person or on the telephone; answering or directing inquiries.
• Ensures that all contacts with clients (e-mail, walk-In center, SMS or phone) provides the client with a personalized customer service experience of the highest level
• Through interaction with clients on the phone, uses every opportunity to build client’s interest in the company’s products and services
• Manages administrative duties assigned by the manager in an effective and timely manner
• Consistently stays abreast of any new information on the company’s products, promotional campaigns etc. to ensure accurate and helpful information is supplied to clients when they make enquiries
• Receives Visitors / clients on behalf of the organization
• Receives parcels / documents for the company
• Handles enquiries via e-mail and phone calls for the organization
• Distributes mails in the organization
• Handles any other duties as assigned my the line manager

6. SWOT Analysis

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC engaged the services of a core professional in the area of business consulting and structuring to assist the firm in building a well – structured event planning outfit that can favorably compete in the highly competitive event planning and entertainment industry.

Part of what the team of business consultant did was to work with the management of our organization in conducting a SWOT analysis for Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC. Here is a summary from the result of the SWOT analysis that was conducted on behalf of Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC;

Our core strength lies in the power of our team; our workforce. We have a team that can go all the way to give our clients value for their money; a team that are trained and equipped to pay attention to details. We are well positioned and we know we will attract loads of clients from the first day we open our doors for business.

As a new event planning outfit, it might take some time for our organization to break into the market and gain acceptance in the already saturated event planning and entertainment industry; that is perhaps our major weakness.

• Opportunities:

The opportunities in the event planning and entertainment industry is massive considering the number of weddings, parties and other events that takes places on a daily basis in the United States. As an all – round event planning outfit, we are ready to take advantage of any opportunity that comes our way.

Some of the threats that we are likely going to face as an event planning outfit operating in the United States are unfavorable government policies, the arrival of a competitor within our location of operations and global economic downturn which usually affects purchasing power. There is hardly anything we can do as regards this threat other than to be optimistic that things will continue to work for our good.

7. MARKET ANALYSIS

• Market Trends

The event planning and entertainment industry is in a continuous state of evolution and as such, ground breaking strategies and ideas that are once highly successful are no longer as productive as they were in time past. Close observation of the trend in the industry reveals that the past few years have seen the rise and proliferation of social media and new tech tools.

The trend also extends to increased attention, paid to engagement and new market segments, adopting eco-friendly measures and sustainability when planning events, and of course increase in demands from event sponsors.

As a matter of fact, social media has now become one of the most important tools event planners leverage on to disseminate information about their events, interact with attendees, solicit feedback, and create year-round engagement with their target audience.

Furthermore, new software apps and emerging technology have made it easier for event and wedding planners to gather all the needed data and information that will help them plan and project for the future.

In recent time, mobile event apps are becoming more popular; event planner can now successfully host events via social media platforms / online platforms. In the United States for example, there several vendors providing mobile apps with more event planners patronizing the apps.

Over and above, with the invention of event apps, it is now compulsory for event planners and venue owners to offer Wi-Fi throughout the event, in all meeting rooms. The truth is that it will no longer be acceptable to not have Wi-Fi accessible at events; people will hardly rent halls without Wi-Fi facility.

8. Our Target Market

Although Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC will initially serve small to medium sized business, from new ventures to well established businesses and individual clients, but that does not in any way stop us from growing to be able to compete with the leading event planning and management companies in the United States.

As an all – round event planning / management outfits, Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC offers a wide range of services hence we are well trained and equipped to services a wide range of clientele base. Our target market cuts across people of different class and people from all walks of life, local and international organizations as well.

We are coming into the industry with a business concept that will enable us work with the highly placed people and companies in the country and at the same with the lowly placed people and smaller businesses. Below is a list of the people and organizations that we have specifically design our products and services for;

• Potential Couples / Young Adults
• Blue Chips Companies
• Corporate Organizations
• Religious Organizations
• Political Parties / Politicians
• Households / Families
• The Government (Public Sector)
• Schools (High Schools, Colleges and Universities)
• Sport Organizations
• Entrepreneurs and Start – Ups

Our competitive advantage

We are quite aware that to be highly competitive in the event planning and entertainment industry means that you should be able to deliver consistent quality service, your clients should be able to experience remarkable difference cum improvement and you should be able to meet the expectations of both participants and organizers of events.

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC might be a new entrant into the event planning and entertainment industry in the United States of America, but the management staffs and owners of the business are considered gurus. They are people who are core professionals and licensed and highly qualified event planners / managers and wedding planners in the United States. These are part of what will count as a competitive advantage for us.

Lastly, our employees will be well taken care of, and their welfare package will be among the best within our category (startups event planning and event management companies) in the industry meaning that they will be more than willing to build the business with us and help deliver our set goals and achieve all our aims and objectives.

9. SALES AND MARKETING STRATEGY

• Sources of Income

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC is established with the aim of maximizing profits in the event planning and entertainment industry and we are going to go all the way to ensure that we do all it takes to attract clients on a regular basis and sign retainer – ship with most of our clients.

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC will generate income by offering the following event planning / management services for individuals and for corporate organizations;

10. Sales Forecast

One thing is certain, there would always be parties and events in the United States of America and as such the services of event planning / event management companies will always be needed.

We are well positioned to take on the available market in the U.S. and we are quite optimistic that we will meet our set target of generating enough income / profits from the first six month of operations and grow the business and our clientele base beyond Las Vegas to other cities in Nevada and other states in the U.S.

We have been able to critically examine the event planning and entertainment market and we have analyzed our chances in the industry and we have been able to come up with the following sales forecast. The sales projection is based on information gathered on the field and some assumptions that are peculiar to startups in Las Vegas – Nevada.

Below is the sales projection for Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC, it is based on the location of our business consulting firm and the wide range of consulting services that we will be offering;

• First Year-: $150,000
• Second Year-: $650,000
• Third Year-: $1,000,000

N.B: This projection is done based on what is obtainable in the industry and with the assumption that there won’t be any major economic meltdown and natural disasters within the period stated above. There won’t be any major competitor offering same additional services as we do within same location. Please note that the above projection might be lower and at the same time it might be higher.

• Marketing Strategy and Sales Strategy

We are mindful of the fact that there is stiffer competition amongst event planning companies in the United States of America; hence we have been able to hire some of the best business developer to handle our sales and marketing. Our sales and marketing team will be recruited base on their vast experience in the industry and they will be trained on a regular basis so as to be well equipped to meet their targets and the overall goal of the organization.

We will also ensure that our excellent job deliveries speak for us in the market place; we want to build a standard event planning business that will leverage on word of mouth advertisement from satisfied clients (both individuals and corporate organizations).

Our goal is to grow our event planning company to become one of the top 20 event planning companies in the United States of America which is why we have mapped out strategy that will help us take advantage of the available market and grow to become a major force to reckon with not only in the Las Vegas but also in other cities in the United States of America.

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC is set to make use of the following marketing and sales strategies to attract clients;

• Introduce our business by sending introductory letters alongside our brochure to corporate organizations, schools, households and key stake holders in Las Vegas and other cities in Nevada.
• Promptness in bidding for event planning / event management contracts from the government and other cooperate organizations
• Advertise our business in relevant business magazines, newspapers, TV stations, and radio station.
• List our business on yellow pages ads (local directories)
• Attend relevant international and local expos, seminars, and business fairs et al
• Create different packages for different category of clients in order to work with their budgets and still deliver quality event planning services to them
• Leverage on the internet to promote our business
• Engage direct marketing approach
• Encourage word of mouth marketing from loyal and satisfied clients

11. Publicity and Advertising Strategy

We have been able to work with our brand and publicity consultants to help us map out publicity and advertising strategies that will help us walk our way into the heart of our target market. We are set to take the event planning and entertainment industry by storm which is why we have made provisions for effective publicity and advertisement of our event planning outfit.

Below are the platforms we intend to leverage on to promote and advertise Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC;

• Place adverts on both print (community based newspapers and magazines) and electronic media platforms
• Sponsor relevant community based events / programs
• Leverage on the internet and social media platforms like; Instagram, Facebook , twitter, YouTube, Google + et al to promote our brand
• Install our Bill Boards on strategic locations all around Las Vegas – Nevada.
• Engage in road show from time to time
• Distribute our fliers and handbills in target areas
• Ensure that all our workers wear our branded shirts and all our vehicles are well branded with our company’s logo et al.

12. Our Pricing Strategy

Just like in consulting business, hourly billing for event planning / event management services is also a long – time tradition in the industry. However, for some types of event planning / management services, flat fees make more sense because they allow clients to better predict the overall service charges. As a result of this, Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC will charge our clients both flat fee and hourly billing as long as it favors both parties.

At Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC we will keep our fees below the average market rate for all of our clients by keeping our overhead low and by collecting payment in advance. In addition, we will also offer special discounted rates to start – ups, nonprofits, cooperatives, and small social enterprises.

We are aware that there are some clients that would need regular access to event planning consultancy and advisory services and assistance, we will offer flat rate for such services that will be tailored to take care of such clients’ needs.

• Payment Options

At Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC, our payment policy will be all inclusive because we are quite aware that different people prefer different payment options as it suits them. Here are the payment options that we will make available to our clients;

• Payment by via bank transfer
• Payment via online bank transfer
• Payment via check
• Payment via bank draft
• Payment with cash

In view of the above, we have chosen banking platforms that will help us achieve our plans with little or no itches.

13. Startup Expenditure (Budget)

Starting an event planning business can be cost effective; this is so because on the average, you are not expected to acquire expensive machines and equipment.

Basically what you should be concerned about is the amount needed to secure a standard office facility in a good and busy business district, the amount needed to furniture and equip the office, the amount to purchase the required software applications, the amount needed to pay bills, promote the business and obtain the appropriate business license and certifications.

When it comes to starting a small scale event planning / event management company, the following expenditure should guide you;

• The Total Fee for incorporating the Business – $750.
• The budget for basic insurance policy covers, permits and business license – $2,500
• The Amount needed to acquire a suitable Office facility in a business district 6 months (Re – Construction of the facility inclusive) – $40,000.
• The Cost for equipping the office (computers, software applications, printers, fax machines, furniture, telephones, filing cabins, safety gadgets and electronics et al) – $ 5,000
• The Cost of Launching your official Website – $600
• Budget for paying at least one employees for 3 months plus utility bills – $10,000
• Additional Expenditure (Business cards, Signage, Adverts and Promotions et al) – $2,500
• Miscellaneous: $1,000

Going by the report from the market research and feasibility studies conducted, we will need over two hundred and fifty thousand (250,000) U.S. dollars to successfully set – up a medium scale but standard event planning business firm in the United States of America.

Generating Funding / Startup Capital for Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC

Tony & Tammy House of Events, LLC is a family business that will be owned by Mr. Tony Angelo and his wife Tammy Angelo. They are the sole financial of the firm, but may likely welcome partners later which is why they decided to restrict the sourcing of the start – up capital for the business to just three major sources.

These are the areas we intend generating our start – up capital;

• Generate part of the start – up capital from personal savings
• Source for soft loans from family members and friends
• Apply for loan from my Bank

N.B: We have been able to generate about $50,000 (Personal savings $40,000 and soft loan from family members $10,000) and we are at the final stages of obtaining a loan facility of $200,000 from our bank. All the papers and document has been duly signed and submitted, the loan has been approved and any moment from now our account will be credited.

14. Sustainability and Expansion Strategy

It is easier for businesses to survive when they have steady flow of business deals / customers patronizing their products and services. We are aware of this which is why we have decided to offer a wide range of event planning and other related services to both individual and corporate clients.

We know that if we continue to deliver excellent event planning services, there will be steady flow of income for the organization. Our key sustainability and expansion strategy is to ensure that we only hire competent employees, create a conducive working environment and employee benefits for our staff members.

In the nearest future, we will explore the options of either selling out franchise or expanding our scope beyond Las Vegas – Nevada to other major cities in the United States of America. We know that if we implement our business strategies, we will achieve our business goals and objectives in record time, as well as become a household name .

Check List / Milestone

• Business Name Availability Check:>Completed
• Business Incorporation: Completed
• Opening of Corporate Bank Accounts various banks in the United States: Completed
• Opening Online Payment Platforms: Completed
• Application and Obtaining Tax Payer’s ID: In Progress
• Application for business license and permit: Completed
• Purchase of All form of Insurance for the Business: Completed
• Conducting Feasibility Studies: Completed
• Generating part of the start – up capital from the founder: Completed
• Applications for Loan from our Bankers: In Progress
• Writing of Business Plan: Completed
• Drafting of Employee’s Handbook: Completed
• Drafting of Contract Documents: In Progress
• Design of The Company’s Logo: Completed
• Graphic Designs and Printing of Packaging Marketing / Promotional Materials: Completed
• Recruitment of employees: In Progress
• Purchase of the Needed furniture, office equipment, electronic appliances and facility facelift: In progress
• Creating Official Website for the Company: In Progress
• Creating Awareness for the business (Business PR): In Progress
• Health and Safety and Fire Safety Arrangement: In Progress
• Establishing business relationship with vendors and key players in the industry: In Progress

• Venue Management Software
• Event Management Software
• Event Floorplan Software
• GET STARTED
• Sales - 877-266-3885
• Email Sales Rep
• Testimonials

Planning Pod Blog

Fresh insights and best practices for event professionals.

• Starting an event planning business: Your guide to turning a passion for planning into profit

by Hannah Barnes | Aug 20, 2024 | Business , Business Management , Event Planning , Event Planning for Wedding Planners

Are you a born organizer with an eye for detail? Do you find yourself dreaming up the intricacies of perfectly executed events? If so, starting an event planning business might be the career for you.

Let’s be honest…the event industry is a passionate but sometimes anxiety-filled one. Crafting once-in-a-lifetime experiences while dealing with unpredictable challenges (weather disruptions, equipment malfunctions, and unreliable vendors) often equals intense pressure for event coordinators and wedding planners.

But never fear! This comprehensive guide on how to start an event planning business is built to help you think ahead and stay prepared so you can become profitable without panic.

Planning Pod is your ultimate event management toolkit. Designed with wedding and event planners in mind, it offers a comprehensive suite of features to streamline your operations. And it helps you create and define the processes for your new business! Join the countless professionals who trust Planning Pod to make their events unforgettable. Get started today!

Business fundamentals

Before diving into the world of event planning face-first, it’s crucial to establish a solid foundation for your business. Here’s an insider hint: before you learn how to become an event planner, it’s critical that you know how to run a business in order to be successful.

Your niche in the event industry 

Understanding your market is key to success, so take the time to identify the types of events most in demand in your area. Are you in a city bustling with extravagant weddings? Or a charming town with intimate ceremonies? Pinpoint your target clientele to take it a step further – are you catering to luxury weddings and receptions, or budget-conscious banquets? 

You can also consider specializing in a niche, such as elopements, cultural weddings, or eco-friendly events. Though it might be tempting to provide services for a wider variety of clientele, niching down can really help you stand out in a competitive market.

Choosing the right business structure

Selecting the appropriate business structure for your business is a critical decision. It significantly impacts your personal liability, tax obligations, and the overall management of the business. The structure you choose will determine the legal separation between you and the business itself, which has far-reaching consequences. Factors such as the size of your business, whether or not you are the sole owner, and the level of risk tolerance need to be carefully considered when weighing your options. Ultimately, the right structure can provide essential protection for your personal assets, optimize tax benefits, and facilitate growth for your event business.

A sole proprietorship is the simplest business structure to establish. It requires minimal paperwork and gives you, the owner, complete control over the business. However, this simplicity comes with a significant drawback: unlimited personal liability. This means that your  personal assets (house, car, bank accounts, etc.) are at risk if the business incurs debts or faces legal issues.

An LLC, or Limited Liability Company, offers a middle ground between sole proprietorships and corporations. Like a corporation, an LLC provides limited liability protection, shielding your personal assets from business debts and liabilities. It is generally easier and less costly to form and manage than a corporation. And LLCs offer flexibility in terms of taxation, allowing you some choice in how the business is taxed.

A corporation provides the strongest level of liability protection for business owners. As a separate legal entity, a corporation is responsible for its own debts and obligations, shielding you and any other shareholders from personal liability. While this level of protection is advantageous, corporations are more complex and expensive to set up and maintain. They also come with additional regulatory requirements and tax obligations compared to sole proprietorships and LLCs.

It’s important to research the legal requirements and tax implications of each structure to make an informed choice for your event business. And don’t forget to obtain necessary licenses and permits to operate your business and events legally.

Budgeting for success 

It goes without saying that starting an event or wedding planning business requires careful financial planning. You will need to determine the initial capital needed to cover startup costs, including office or event space, equipment, marketing, and insurance. 

Budgeting is crucial for financial success in the event industry. A detailed budget outlines all anticipated expenses, from space rental and utilities to marketing costs and employee salaries. It also includes projected income from various event services. By carefully tracking both income and expenses, you can gain a clear picture of your financial standing, setting up your future self for success and the ability to make informed decisions.

Competitive pricing is also essential for attracting clients and generating revenue. Researching event industry standards will help you understand the market value of your services and adjust your pricing accordingly. It’s important to consider factors such as your experience, location, and the level of service you provide when determining your rates. Remember, striking the right balance between affordability and profitability is key to long-term event business success.

Finally, financial projections provide a roadmap for your event planning business. By creating comprehensive forecasts, you can anticipate future income, expenses, and cash flow. These projections help you identify potential financial challenges, set realistic goals, and make strategic decisions. Regularly reviewing and updating your financial projections ensures that your business stays on track and adapts to changing market conditions.

NOTE: Tools like QuickBooks, Xero, and FreshBooks are designed to manage financial records. While primarily intended for day-to-day bookkeeping, many also offer forecasting and budgeting features.

The heart of your business: Event planning and management

Once your business foundation is in place, it’s time to focus on the real reason you started it up in the first place: your passion for event planning and management.

Defining your expertise

It’s time to determine the specific services you will offer in your event business. Will you handle full-service planning, including vendor selection and coordination, or focus on day-of coordination? 

To stand out in a competitive market, consider specializing in specific areas of event planning. Focusing on particular aspects, such as event design, floral arrangements, or wedding invitations, allows you to develop in-depth expertise and cater to clients with specific needs. This specialization can help you position yourself as a go-to expert in your chosen area and attract clients seeking those specific services.

Clearly defining your service packages is also crucial for attracting the right clients. It’s important to outline the specific services included in each package, such as event planning, coordination, design, production and vendor management. Clearly communicate the scope of your services, pricing, and any additional fees or options.

By providing transparent and detailed information, you can help clients understand the value you offer and make informed decisions about choosing your services.

Building a strong network 

Cultivating strong relationships with reliable vendors is essential for delivering exceptional events. Take the time to build a network of reliable caterers, venues, florists, photographers, and other wedding professionals with whom you can collaborate. You can attend industry events, join professional organizations, and leverage online platforms to connect with these potential partners. In your approach, be sure to prioritize building trust and open communication with your vendors to ensure smooth collaboration.

When it comes to working with vendors, protecting your business and clients requires clear and comprehensive contracts. With the help of a legal professional, you will need to outline the terms, conditions, and responsibilities of both parties in written agreements. Be sure to specify services provided, payment terms, cancellation policies, and any liabilities. And always review and update contracts regularly to reflect current industry standards and legal requirements.

By having well-defined contracts in place, you can mitigate risks, protect your interests, and build trust with clients.

Mastering the details 

Efficiently managing event timelines and schedules is crucial for a successful event planner. And thankfully, in this day and age there is a multitude of digital options for this very purpose.

Utilizing digital project management tools and software is essential for maintaining organization and ensuring seamless event execution. These digital platforms offer a range of features, from task management and scheduling to resource allocation and communication. By leveraging technology, you can streamline your business workflows, improve efficiency, and minimize the risk of errors.

And it goes without saying that creating detailed checklists and timelines is fundamental to successful event planning. These documents outline every aspect of the event, from initial consultations to the final cleanup. Checklists help ensure that no detail is overlooked, while timelines provide a clear roadmap for both the planner and the client. By clearly defining tasks and deadlines, event planners can effectively manage expectations and reduce stress.

NOTE: Planning Pod’s end-to-end digital event management solutions include a full suite of event planning tools and pre-built templates for checklists, itineraries, task management, and CRM (Customer Relationship Management) activities.

Protecting your business 

Unforeseen circumstances often arise during events of any kind. From getting rained out to a catering van breaking down on the highway, unexpected challenges can pop up seemingly out of nowhere. 

Protecting your event planning business with adequate insurance coverage is essential for mitigating financial risk. General liability insurance safeguards your business against claims of bodily injury or property damage, while professional liability insurance (also known as errors and omissions or E&O insurance) protects against claims of negligence or mistakes in your professional services.  

Click here to read more about different types of event insurance for your business.

Developing a comprehensive crisis management plan is also crucial for handling unexpected challenges with composure and efficiency. This plan should outline potential emergencies, such as venue issues, vendor cancellations, or severe weather, and establish clear procedures for responding to each scenario. By having a well-defined crisis management plan in place, you can minimize disruptions and maintain client satisfaction.

Personal development and growth: Nurturing your business

Balancing work and life .

Event planning is a notoriously time-consuming role, not to mention running an entire business centered around it. With countless details to manage, deadlines to meet, and client expectations to exceed, it’s easy to find yourself overwhelmed. Balancing the demands of the job with personal life can be a constant challenge, especially when you are first starting a wedding planning business or event planning firm.

Effective time management is crucial for maintaining a healthy work-life balance in the event planning industry. By implementing time management tools and strategies, event planners and business owners can reduce stress, increase productivity, and prevent burnout. Prioritizing tasks, delegating responsibilities when possible, and setting clear boundaries between work and personal life are truly essential for long-term success and job satisfaction.

Building a strong team

As your event planning business grows, you may find the need to expand your team to handle increased workload and client demands. This decision involves careful consideration of your business goals, financial resources, and the specific skills required.

Deciding whether to hire employees or contractors depends on several factors, including the nature of the work, budget constraints, and desired level of control. Employees offer stability and consistency, while contractors provide flexibility and specialized expertise. Carefully evaluate the pros and cons of each option to determine the best approach for your business.

Fostering a positive and collaborative work environment is essential for building a strong and successful team. Create a culture of open communication, mutual respect, and shared goals. Empower your team members, provide opportunities for professional growth, and recognize their contributions. By investing in your team, you can create a strong foundation for your event planning business.

Staying ahead of the curve 

The event planning industry is constantly evolving, with new trends and best practices emerging regularly. To stay ahead of the curve and maintain a competitive edge, it’s essential to attend industry conferences, workshops, and webinars. These events provide valuable opportunities to learn from experienced professionals, network with peers, and discover innovative ideas.

Obtaining relevant certifications can also significantly enhance your credibility and expertise as an event planner and business owner. These credentials demonstrate your commitment to professional development and your knowledge of industry standards. By showcasing your certifications, you can differentiate yourself from competitors and build trust with potential clients.

And it goes without saying that such workshops, certifications and training will prove invaluable prior to opening your event or wedding planning business.

Remember that continuous learning and skill development are essential for elevating your event planning business. Seek out opportunities to expand your knowledge in areas such as design, technology, and marketing. By staying curious and open to new ideas, you can enhance your ability to create exceptional events and exceed client expectations.

Simplify your event planning with Planning Pod. Our all-in-one platform is designed to handle every aspect of your events, from conception to completion. Join the growing community of professionals who rely on Planning Pod to deliver exceptional experiences. Get started today!

Most Recent Posts

• Onboarding event customers for success: Building trust in the event industry
• Cultivating raving fans through a seamless customer experience for events
• Event insurance made easy: A comprehensive guide to different types of coverage
• Event insurance: An event business’s secret to standing out in today’s crowded market

Submit a Comment Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Submit Comment

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter for industry-relevant news and insights.

You won't regret it ;)

How to Write an Event Business Plan: A Complete Guide

Events need to prove their worth to get funding. Without an event business plan, your idea may not find support. An event business plan helps you focus on the purpose and goals of the event. In your plan, illustrate your event’s financial potential and plan the resources and operating structure you’ll need to deliver. Whether you’re brand new or an established event planner, think of your business plan as the strategic vision for where your event can be three to five years from now.

Table of contents

Why do i need an event business plan, executive summary, section 1: background and history.

Section 3: Development plan

Section 4: Event requirements

Section 5: Marketing and communications plan

Section 6: Financial plan and considerations

Section 7: Appendices

If you’re hoping for long-term financial returns on your event planning, you’ll need a reliable event business plan. Even if you’re used to winging most of your event planning, having your strategic vision down on paper will save you time and resources, and minimise stress in the long run. Here’s how:

• It’ll help you keep track of your budget, so you don’t have to worry about overspending.
• It doubles as a calendar for key dates and deadlines, such as venue selection, invitation mailing windows, etc.
• The plan is a handy checklist – it’s easy to track what’s already been taken care of and what still belongs on your to-do list.
• You’ll have a reliable way to track metrics for what actions are being taken to meet your event goals.
• It’s a one-stop shop for all your logistical needs.

Read on to discover what to include in your event business plan and how to structure it.

Your front cover should detail your event name, the document’s title (for example, [Event Name] Business Plan 2022-2024), the date created, and your contact details. If you already have a logo, include that as well.

Your table of contents should be a way for someone to understand your business plan quickly. Use numbers and titles to clarify the main sections and include subheads within those sections.

The executive summary should contain a comprehensive overview of the event. It’s essentially an elevator pitch you’ve had time to edit to perfection. It introduces you and your event and lets your reader know why they should care enough about your event to read the rest of the document.

Your summary should be at least one page long but no longer than 10% of the total length of the plan. Although it’s at the beginning of the plan, edit it after writing the rest of your content to ensure it accurately summarises your whole strategy.

Your executive summary should contain the following:

• Basic information: What the event is; when and where it will take place
• Your mission: The event’s purpose; how will it benefit the stakeholders
• Your background: Information about you (the event creator) and anyone else involved
• Budget: An estimated event income and expenditure
• Business plan reviews: Time set aside to monitor progress

This section allows you to showcase who you are and how you’re different. Share your background, history, and past success.

• Who you are: Provide background information about you and the tea m behind the event. Add details about relevant experience. What events have you worked on in the past? What’s your track record?
• Event history: If it’s the first year of your event, detail where the idea for the event came from and any historic information about the event category and audience. For existing events, detail when your event was launched, why it was founded, where it’s been held, who it attracts, and how it has developed.

Remember to include any milestones that would impress readers.

Section 2: Development plan

Your development plan is the place for you to think big. Identify your long-term vision. Then, showcase your strengths and clarify how you’ll overcome your weaknesses.

• Vision: Describe the long-term vision for the event and any specific goals – for example, to launch internationally or franchise your event series.
• Strategic development:  Outline your plan for the event three to five years from now. How will you achieve key objectives? What’s the timeline, and who’s responsible for driving strategy and implementation?
• SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis: Identify strengths and weaknesses of your event, as well as opportunities and threats it faces.
• Risk factors: Provide an initial risk assessment covering key areas such as programme s , finances, operations, reputation, legal, audience, and health and safety. Show how you’ll manage and mitigate these risks.

Section 3: Event requirements

Once you know your vision, lay out the details. Determine what’s needed for putting on this type of event in terms of venue, services, and permits.

• Facilities: List the facilities required for the event –  venue , accommodation, catering, and technical support.
• Services: List the services required – staffing, traffic management, health and safety, security, and medical support.
• Production: Detail the production equipment required – power, fencing, staging, sound, and lighting.
• Legal and insurance: Detail the necessary insurance and licenses required to cover all aspects of the event.
• Technology: List the technology you’ll need to make your event successful – think audio/visual needs and ticket scanners.

Section 4: Marketing and communications plan

Your marketing and communications plan will be your roadmap for getting the word out about your event. At this point, your business plan is getting long – but don’t quit now. It doesn’t matter how compelling the rest of your plan is if this portion of your event business plan isn’t built out. No one will attend an incredible event if they don’t know it’s happening!

• Positioning : What’s the message you want to relay to your audience? This is what makes your brand different. What do you want future attendees to think of when they hear about your event?
• Product : Detail what the event offers attendees.
• Price : Explain your   pricing strategy and different ticket options.
• Convenience: Explain how you use technology to drive attendance.
• Promotion : Detail the  promotional t a ctics you’ll use to reach your audience – social media, paid advertising, direct mail, print media, or influencers.
• Budget plan : Provide a breakdown of your event marketing budget. Not sure where to start? Check out this   event budget guide

Section 5: Financial plan and considerations

No event business plan is complete without an analysis of financials. Explain the expected value of your event – your revenue streams and losses.

• Income and expenditure projections : Demonstrate that your event is financially viable and achievable. How will the event be paid for? Identify income streams such as ticket and exhibition space sales, funding, grants, and sponsorship. Present detailed event budgets and cash flow projections for the period of the plan. Use this  event budget template to help with calculations.
• Economic impact estimation: If your event is large, what benefit will it have for the local area? For example, you might attract out-of-town attendees that benefit hotels, restaurants, and other businesses. If it’s a smaller pop-up, how will you partner with other local businesses? Show that your pop-up is an economic investment in the community.

Section 6: Appendices

Include any additional materials such as third-party reports, research documents, codes of practise/policies, and site/venue maps. Not sure if you should include something in the appendix? Include the material if you think it would help answer a reader’s question.

Turn your plan into reality

Writing a comprehensive event business plan is the best way to validate your event and focus your team and other stakeholders on your goals. Once everyone has signed off on your event business plan, stay on track to make your goals a reality with this event planning Gantt chart .

Take your event to the next level with Eventbrite

• WAS THIS ARTICLE HELPFUL?

SPREAD THE WORD

about the author

Andrea Tang

Andrea Tang has built a diverse portfolio of content, covering a range of topics that include international affairs, business, and sports. She loves storytelling in all forms, and regularly collects new hobbies - such as martial arts, aerial circus, and theater, to name just a few - in the guise of “research”.

You might also like these

The Ultimate Event Strategy Guide for Conference Planners

An event strategy plan is the crucial first step in organizing an event. It is an all-encompassing process that enables event planners to manifest their written plans into an actual event. The global event industry was worth $890 billion as of 2020 , highlighting the crucial role of effective event planning. From creating event goals to measuring its success, your event strategy is the trusted mentor guiding that journey. 

However, event strategy planning is a complex endeavor with multiple interconnected steps. That is why getting it right is imperative for a successful outcome. We hope this comprehensive guide provides you with the tools and knowledge to create a compelling event strategy plan for your event. So, let’s dive into this blog and discuss every aspect of an event strategy plan in detail.

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• What Is An Event Strategy?

Why Does Event Strategy Matter?

• How To Plan An Event 4.1 Develop an Event Purpose Statement 4.2 Create Event Goals 4.3 Align with the Company’s Goals 4.4 Adhere to CLEAR and SMART Framework 4.5 Define your target audience 4.6 Plan your event budget
• Strategies For Event Budget Planning 5.1 Set your Financial Budget 5.2 Be Resource Mindful 5.3 Create an Event Ticket Price
• How Do You Market An Event? 6.1 Engage in Pre-Event Activities 6.2 Build a Robust Event Website 6.3 Undertake Social Media Marketing Endeavours 6.4 Craft an Effective Event Reminder Email 6.5 Leverage Press Releases for Targeted Event Promotion 6.6 Maximize Event Impact with Relevant Sponsorships 6.7 Streamline Efforts with Event Marketing Tools
• Steps On Managing An Event 7.1 Step 1: Utilize Event Management Tools 7.2 Step 2: Select the Venue and Plan Logistics 7.3 Step 3: Look into Risk Management and Contingency Plans 7.4 Step 4: Send a Welcome Mail 7.5 Step 5: Do Event App Adoption 7.6 Step 6: Craft Attendee Experience
• How To Measure Event Performance 8.1 Send Thank You Mails 8.2 Optimize Event Success with App Analytics 8.3 Send Out Event Surveys

Key Takeaway

What is an event strategy .

An event strategy is more than just a plan. It’s a data-driven, goal-oriented, measurable roadmap for in-person, virtual, or hybrid events. The key to its effectiveness lies in setting a clear and achievable goal and using data to guide your efforts.

An effective event strategy plan takes cognizance of your organizational ability to convert the abstract plan you imagine into a real event strategy. Carefully analyzing the event’s purpose, business goals, and inherent capacities is the cornerstone of a successful event, giving you the confidence to execute your plan precisely.

A recent Forrester report showcased how B2B businesses spend over $250,000 of their budgets on events , emphasizing the importance of having a concrete and detailed event strategy. This strategy should not exist in isolation but should be aligned with the organization’s goals. This alignment ensures that the event contributes to the overall business objectives, guides resource allocation, and facilitates outcomes measurement. 

The event strategy framework provides a clear path to see the big picture. It asks and answers the big questions of why, What, When, and how it relates to your event. It is a guiding constitution that gives everyone purpose and direction in performing their tasks, keeping them focused and clear-minded. 

A typical B2B event is a complex entity with numerous variables, stages, and moving parts. An event strategy is crucial because it can structure, manage, and prioritize these elements, ensuring they act harmoniously. The significant tasks of planning, launching, marketing, managing, and budgeting an event demand a stable structure, making event strategy a crucial component. 

Let’s start by understanding the first step of event organizing, which is the planning stage. Event organizing is a comprehensive process that involves a series of steps from conceptualization to execution. The planning stage, which we will delve into, is where the event strategy plays a crucial role. 

How To Plan An Event?

The planning stage of the event is the head of the event strategy. Quite literally, because you create an idea of your event with your head and refine that idea into a concrete, achievable, and measurable event goal. By doing so, you can direct all your event organizing efforts to attaining that objective. Now, let’s look at the event planning process in detail. 

Develop an Event Purpose Statement

The significance of an event’s purpose cannot be overstated. The conscious understanding of the question, “Why are you holding this event?” The answer to this question is the motive that you strive to achieve. An event without a clear objective and purpose will drain money, resources, and time. As the event planner, it’s your responsibility to develop a clear purpose and goal for your event, preventing the wastage of resources and ensuring a focused approach. 

When formulating your event’s purpose, creating a goal that resonates with attendees and reflects the company’s objectives is crucial. This alignment ensures that everyone involved is working towards a common goal, fostering engagement and commitment. Moreover, the purpose should be clear and attainable, providing a roadmap for the event’s success. 

Next, you need to convert what you imagined into concrete forms of communication for your stakeholders by creating an event purpose statement. Since your event’s purpose is visible to your audience, highlight the event’s intention, reasoning, target audience, and importance. Your event marketing and promotion will revolve around your purpose, so make it clear and reasonable. 

Strategize accordingly to define a purpose statement for each sub-event, individual meeting, or conference that identifies with a specific group of people. For instance, if there’s a product launch event to introduce a new product, you must state your purpose for every room or auditorium your attendees will enter to inform them of the intention of that room and the value they will get out of it. It will help boost brand equity for the event while providing a better attendee experience. 

Create Event Goals

An event goal provides a definitive and measurable point that directs your resources to achieve that goal. It must answer the following questions: “What is the objective of this event?”, “What do you want to achieve with this event?”, and “What type of event is needed?”. It must also address what this event has in store for your attendees. Having a clear event goal will make your planning process much more manageable.

If the event aims to exhibit your products or services to stakeholders and expand your market reach, then that goal will inform you to plan a trade show. Your goal of attracting potential buyers and investment will guide you in designing your trade event.

After creating your event goal, you need to make it achievable by anchoring your goals to a concrete base and building a solid goal with the following strategies.

Align with the Company’s Goals 

One way to make your event objective achievable is to make it commensurate with the company’s objectives. This is an effective way to solidify your event objectives and make them attainable. For example, if the company’s goal is to generate revenue, then do a trade show, or if the goal is to educate clients, organize a live training session.

Adhere to CLEAR and SMART Framework

The final stage of the refinement process is adhering to your event’s goals according to SMART(Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound) and CLEAR (Collaborative, Limited, Emotional, Appreciable, Refinable) standards. These standards are frameworks that make your goals achievable. 

The SMART framework helps create clear and measurable goals, ensuring every aspect is well-defined, relevant, and achievable within a scheduled time frame. Similarly, the CLEAR framework enables your goals to be flexible, adaptive, and communicative. It makes your goals resonate with the people by developing an emotional connection, which fosters collaboration among multiple teams. 

This means that your event goals must have the necessary mechanics to measure whether you have achieved your goal. By making your goal clear and achievable, you can decide on the type of event to organize. Jump into this blog on ‘15 Types of B2B Events that Every Event Planner Must Know About’ to know more. In this blog, you’ll learn the different types of events planned per the requirements/objectives behind them.

Define Your Target Audience 

Now that you’ve asked the ‘Why’ and ‘What,’ it’s time to ask ‘For whom’ are you organizing this event? This means you must understand what type of attendees will find your event relevant and their specific needs and expectations. This understanding will guide the changes you need to make based on your selected audience type, making them feel valued and considered. 

If you want to generate revenue, organize a sales event for salespersons. To select a receptive audience for your event, you need to understand your event goal and the type of event—these two will help you define your target audience. Remember, your audience is not just a group but an integral part of achieving your event’s goal. 

Plan Your Event Budgets

The next most impactful stage in the planning process is budgeting. Limited budgets can eliminate some good ideas. However, strategic budget planning can help navigate those challenges and make the budget work for you rather than the other way around. In the next section, we will deal with the intricacies of event budget planning. 

Strategies For Event Budget Planning

An event budget outlines events’ financial and non-financial components by listing them and analyzing each component for its necessity and relevant impact on the event. A budget understands the value of each aspect and strives for an optimum allocation of resources without any unnecessary wastage. 

Let’s explore some practical ways to plan your event budget. 

Set Your Financial Budget

To create a reasonable budget for your event, consider its purpose and goal since they have the most impact. Moreover, the nature or type of event is crucial in determining the required budget. 

Set your budget by collaborating with your leadership to understand your organization’s ability to finance your choice of event. Outline every aspect of your event by categorizing each element, anticipating the need, providing a description, estimating the cost, and finalizing the actual price. Use collaborative sessions among all the stakeholders to achieve the best of both worlds. The key is to ‘compromise’ and be ‘open-minded’ to new or alternate suggestions, which helps you reduce unnecessary costs. 

A few elements need to be considered for a cautious budget. 

• Costs related to food and beverage
• Venue rental
• Travel expenses
• Decor costs
• Marketing expenses
• Staff salaries
• Utility costs
• Office supplies expenses
• Opportunity costs of choosing one strategy over another
• Direct and indirect revenue from ticket sales, hotel commissions, sponsorships, etc. 
• Brand equity generated from the goodwill of your attendees 

Be Resource Mindful

Other than the financial aspects, you must consider your available resources. These include skilled workers, technology, time, connections with external agencies, company support, etc. Planning an event by considering these resources will prove effective.

Create an Event Ticket Price

Take account of your expenses incurred for the event and your revenue goal. Both will inform you of your decision to set fixed or multiple-priced ticket prices. Unless it’s a free event like fundraising, explore options of having a subsidized ticket or VIP tickets for specific people. 

With this, we have wrapped the planning stage of the event strategy. Now, it’s time to move on to executing your planning into reality, beginning with marketing your event.

How Do You Market An Event?

You have a great event purpose, a solid goal, and a concrete budget to execute the planning. Still, you must communicate that purpose and objective to attract attendees and panelists. A successful event marketing strategy can help you achieve your event’s goals.

An event marketing strategy involves everything related to marketing your event, including defining your target audience, deciding suitable marketing strategies, maintaining relevancy with your audience and event’s goals, enhancing brand equity, promoting your event’s objectives, and measuring success. 

Similarly, setting up your marketing goal is equally important. This depends on the goal and nature of the event. It can be event promotion to drive attendance, retweets, shares, likes, click-through rates (CTR), and other forms of content creation. Organizing your event marketing strategy around a determined goal will help balance marketing costs. 

The following are some essential strategies to guide your event management efforts. However, for a detailed understanding, check out our blog for more  event marketing strategies .

1. Engage in Pre-Event Activities

The first step is pre-event engagement to create a buzz around your event to make it attractive. Use hoardings, banners, social media posts, and announcements to let people know something special will happen. Do teaser campaigns to create hype around the event, as we see for a movie release. Similarly, pre-event surveys help you ground your marketing strategies with customer expectations and ensure your efforts resonate with consumer wants. 

Visit our blog on pre-event activities to gain more insightful ideas. 

2. Build a Robust Event Website

Develop an intuitive, informative, and visually appealing website for your event. Make sure to highlight your event purpose and goal. Include the relevant details highlighting what prospective customers might expect, like date, time, location, speaker’s list, reason to attend, etc. Your website should have a bold call to action (CTA) to captivate and register new attendees and a save-the-date section reminding attendees to participate. 

To learn more about conference websites and how they must look, check out our article, 20 Important Conference Websites To Watch Out For in 2024

3. Undertake Social Media Marketing Endeavors

Leverage social media channels to spearhead your event marketing campaign. Proliferating your event purpose and objective via social media posts, reels, tweets, and influencer marketing will impact your event. 

Do paid campaigns and sponsorships further to expand your reach and visibility to your target audience. Create an event hashtag for a focused keyword of your event to track your audience’s activities and control the social media content. 

Get more social media content ideas for your B2B events by reading our article, “ 27 B2B Social Media Content Ideas To Drive Success All Year Long ”.

4. Craft an Effective Event Reminder Email

You should have a prospective attendee list from the email signups on the event website. Use tools like Mailchimp, Sender, SendinBlue, etc., to set up systematic event reminder emails for prospective attendees at strategic intervals. Design the email to be informative and attractive and include a hook to captivate your audience. Finally, avoid spamming and providing unnecessary sponsorship-related ads. 

5. Leverage Press Releases for Targeted Event Promotion

Anchor your marketing campaign around a relevant keyword for conference attendees. Doing press releases and news announcements is a professional way to spread your event message since you’re targeting B2B professionals. Most business people will tend to get Google News alerts around your chosen keyword and see the news article for your event, so make sure to include all the necessary information. 

6. Maximize Event Impact with Relevant Sponsorships

Getting relevant sponsorships is an integral part of event marketing strategy. For instance, you can organize a health-related event for business professionals and ensure that the company you’re organizing the event for sponsors a smartwatch for attendees. Ensure that the smartwatch features multiple health trackers and can send alerts related to your event. By doing so, you can guarantee a satisfying attendee experience that will have a lasting impact on your event. 

Ensure that your sponsorships are relevant to your event and that attendees can benefit from such products. To learn more about event sponsorships, read our article “ Everything You Need to Know About How to Get Event Sponsorship.”

7. Streamline Efforts with Event Marketing Tools

Use an event marketing tool to organize all your event marketing efforts. This is important to streamline your different marketing strategies and help in effortless planning and execution. You can choose to use all-in-one event marketing software or multiple software, but your choice must take into account the following: 

• Event registration system
• Marketing-related analytics
• Video production
• Mobile event management

Now that the planning and marketing stages have been covered in great detail, let’s move on to the final step: managing your event in real-time and understanding the event management process. 

Steps On Managing An Event 

Your planning, marketing, and budgeting efforts have all been dedicated to the event you must manage. All you have to do is create an event checklist and ensure that every aspect of your event adheres to those requirements. In this stage, you must focus on delivering what you promised in your event goal and marketing campaigns. Managing the event is an all-encompassing effort to provide attendees with the ultimate event experience and value. 

Here are a few event management steps that you can follow to ensure that your attendees have the ultimate event experience. 

Step 1: Utilize Event Management Tools

Use effective event management software to organize your event. Your tool must have a real-time tracking system that allows you to check every sub-event and conference and ensure smooth functioning. It must facilitate communication and interaction among attendees and panelists, networking opportunities based on shared interests, and room for resolving issues and grievances. For instance, adopt the best event networking apps that enable maximum attendee interaction. 

Ensure a dedicated space for a smooth registration process to minimize hassles. Set up an on-site registration booth for newcomers’ convenience. Issue badges to attendees for clear identification and documentation. Make the process of getting into your event as convenient as possible.

Overall, an event management tool should assist you in organizing different aspects of your event for smooth functioning. 

Step 2: Select the Venue and Plan Logistics

You have to choose the venue based on your event objective and the type of event. It can be a virtual event, on-site event, or hybrid event. However, venue and logistics are most important for in-person and hybrid events. Consider the following while selecting a venue:

• Your event objective
• Nature of your event
• The location of your target audience 
• Venue pricing
• Climate patterns 
• Relevancy to your attendees
• Opportunity to customize your event venue 

Moreover, logistical considerations regarding food, supplies, stays, machinery, and equipment must also be considered. Deciding what event is most suitable for you is paramount. Follow this article to learn more: ‘Virtual vs. Physical Meeting: Which One’s Better & Why?’ 

Step 3: Look into Risk Management and Contingency Plans

‘Prevention is better than cure’ has never been more true. Having a contingency plan and strategies for managing potential risks at your event would be best. List the worst possible scenarios that might arise during your event and find ways to mitigate them. Make your event management plan resilient and fail-proof. Of course, there will always be unseen problems you might not solve; nevertheless, ensure an alternate course of action to minimize potential risks.

Step 4: Send a Welcome Mail

For a memorable attendee experience, provide a welcome kit. It can be online or physical, but ensure you include a greeting mail, access to your event app, a WiFi password, a reference, and a menu of different events. Include sponsored goodies in this kit to help attendees navigate through your event. 

Step 5: Do Event App Adoption

Encourage attendees to download event conference apps in your email reminders and welcome kit. Emphasize the app’s importance by highlighting its features related to the event, like attendee interactions, live-tracking of ongoing events, an AI chatbot, updates from your networks, and previewing the event’s purpose and goals.

The front-end part of your event management efforts must be in the app because this will be your attendees’ constant companion in the event. It should guide your attendees and help them navigate through the event. 

Step 6: Craft Attendee Experience

Your event management process should focus on optimizing the attendee experience. To enhance your agency’s brand, ensure that your event organizing is almost flawless and caters to every reasonable requirement of your attendees. Exclusive promo codes and goodies provide additional benefits that supplement this. 

An interactive event focusing on live Q&A sessions , brainstorming sessions, engagement activities, gamification, and video sessions will also enhance the attendees’ experience by making them active event participants. 

Also, please read our article on attendee engagement strategies to learn more. 

In the next section, we will discuss how to measure the effectiveness of your event planning and execution. 

How To Measure Event Performance

Your event is over, and now it’s time to measure its success. This evaluation process is not just about assessing past performance but also about learning and improving for future events. All your planning, budgeting, marketing, and management efforts will be evaluated against your choice of measuring criteria. 

Firstly, you need to know how to measure your event; this is possible with Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), which you’ll develop based on your event goals. For example, if your event goal is to increase sales, you can track the number of sales pledged by your attendees and define your event’s success. 

Simply put, KPIs are anything that points to the core performing aspects of your event, the fulfillment of which will determine its success or failure. 

Similarly, your return on investment (ROI) indicates your event’s success, hinting at any positive value you received after your event. Whether monetary or non-monetary, this value will be measured against your KPIs, underscoring the importance of your efforts in achieving a positive outcome. 

There are a few activities that can help you measure your non-monetary event ROIs, and they go as follows:

1. Send Thank You Mails

You can earn goodwill by sending a gratitude email for your attendee’s participation in your event. Since it is true, let your attendees know they’re essential and instrumental in your event. Try customizing an email with your marketing software to be more appealing. This will leave a good impression on your attendees and boost your brand value.  

2. Optimize Event Success with App Analytics

Using your stated KPIs, gauge your event metric through your event app analytics. This will save you time and provide better insights into critical metric areas you previously ignored, including attendee behavior and activity. Proper analysis and storage of these metrics will help you organize your future events. 

3. Send Out Event Surveys

Send out event surveys for perfect and honest insights into attendees’ experiences. Ensure the reliability of the feedback and provide questions that you want answered. Leave a space asking for the merits and demerits of the event. This will help you gain valuable feedback for your future event planning strategy. Please read our article, 27 Event Survey Questions For Maximum Responses , to learn more about post-event survey questionnaires. 

Now you know the different stages of event planning. Note that every stage has an equal bearing on your event, and giving equal attention to each step will ensure its success. From rigid structures to unforeseen changes, event planning strategies must balance data-driven decisions and room for flexibility. 

That is why it is important to have adequate information on how different events work and what attendees think of them. For all event-related information, visit Eventible .

It is a platform where professionals can find, review, and evaluate business events. It has over 10,000 event reviews offering insights on event quality, networking opportunities, and overall event experience. Eventible can enhance your event strategy by gaining honest feedback, detailed ratings, and testimonials from attendees. 

Top 5 Marketing Events for Q2 (April-Jun) 2024

Related posts, top 5 finance events for q2 (april to june) 2024, in conversation with hugh forrest, co-president & chief programming officer at sxsw, top 5 it events for q2 (april to june) 2024.

Comments are closed.

Alison Bensch

Senior director of global events, cloudinary, proudest of.

In both cases, we had to figure out how to take what are historically in-person events and translate them into engaging virtual experiences with a team of just two in-house event marketers, counting myself.

ImageCon is our flagship customer summit. In 2021, more than 1,700 people across 107 countries registered for the two-day event, which included 20 virtual sessions designed to help retailers unleash the full potential of their visual media.

Our hosted event series included about 8 virtual events across North America and EMEA markets. To drive up attendance and engagement, we hosted unique virtual cooking and mixology classes, wine tastings, tequila pairings, and more, with celebrity chefs and bartenders such as Marcus Samuelsson, Julio Cabrero, and Amanda Freitag.

Rockstar Mode

ImageCon was a success, in part, because we secured high-quality speakers and focused on providing true value to attendees by creating sessions to optimize their usage of the Cloudinary platform to improve their business. We featured customers in the content by doing customer spotlights. We also improved the production level of the summit by partnering with an agency.

I am proud we were able to pull off a high-quality event of this scale while managing 30 other events for the year.

Prior to the pandemic, our hosted event series consisted of in-person dinners and intimate happy hours. We wanted to recreate these virtually, without making them feel like webinars. We succeeded, in part, because we invested in high-quality talent to attract participants and create fun, memorable moments we probably could not have pulled off in-person.

We also took pains to make the events as easy as possible to attend, for example, by mailing guests meal kits or drink kits with everything they needed to participate. Of course, everything was branded, right down to the salt and pepper. We know our attendees’ time is precious, so we encouraged them to involve their family and were sure to include enough food and/or drink to share.

After the experience, we broke out into small groups, allowing people to network with peers and Cloudinary team members, who led discussions on relevant industry topics. Thus, attendees topped off a great culinary or cocktail experience with valuable learnings that could help their business. In fact, I see us continuing with some of these virtual events even after we have resumed in-person ones.

Our on-demand event content is now a powerful sales enablement tool for our sales team, who share session recordings with prospective customers, as well as existing ones who are considering adding on a new capability. We will continue to measure the performance of this content.

For the hosted events, we evaluate success by measuring pipeline acceleration. So, we consider where event guests are in their consideration process before attending the event. We use the event, and event follow-up, to help move the prospect or customer to the finish line. We usually see prospects who engaged in marketing campaigns were more likely to close, and close faster, than those who did not attend an event.

While this is harder to measure, we know our event series keeps the Cloudinary brand top of mind and deepens our relationship with customers. We document the positive feedback we receive from attendees and sales reps for internal use and marketing purposes.

Survivor Mode

Another challenge was creating an event strategy against a backdrop of so much uncertainty. I have seen industry colleagues invest resources in planning in-person events, only to have to rejigger in the final hour. I made the decision from the onset of the year to plan for virtual events, given our small team and resources. This allowed us to create more effective and engaging virtual events from the start and maximize our budget.

Nothing beats in-person events, and I am excited to be moving forward with these in 2022. But I plan to continue with digital and hybrid events, as well, for a number of reasons. When done right, they can be more memorable than in-person ones, and certainly more convenient. They also allow me to engage people across a wider geographic region (all of Europe for example or across the US), which leads to cost-savings and unique and widened interactions for our attendees.

Annie Yuzzi VP

Global corporate events and experiences, sumo logic, bethany roskin murphy, director of global events, drift, charlene kate ditch, founder, charlene kate events, gabrielle d., global events director, automation anywhere, gerilynn marburger, director, global events, hewlett packard enterprise, hollie ashby, senior manager, cxo and third party events, palo alto networks, lindsey cohen, director- event marketing, snyk, ceo & chief event strategist, liz king events, nicola kastner, vice president, global head of event strategy, sap, rachel russell, field marketing manager, even, samantha calle, associate director, xandr, margaret shaeffer, head of field marketing & events, linearb, traci depuy, head of global events, salesforce, dale rickert, global conference head of greentech festival, matthew lin, head of marketing, beetc, emilie watrob, head of event marketing, zs, katherine leong, director, corporate events, gainsight, sr. director, marketing technology (brand and events), salesforce, karim youssef, creative director, dpw, elizabeth thomas, head of global events, elastic, gerry schneider, vp events at wearedevelopers, director, global events at hewlett packard enterprise, mike kalyan, event and seminar marketing manager, shrm.

LOVE EVENTIBLE?

Disclaimer: If you choose to provide us with your email address or any other personally identifiable information, we will use it only to send you our newsletter or respond to your query.