Pick the perfect conference venue

When it comes to organising a conference, picking the right venue is of the utmost importance. You can be as organised as you like, and secure some great speakers, but if the setting is off people will not go home feeling like they got the best conference experience. Whether you’re creating a series of conferences, or just introducing a one-off, you’ll want it to be a roaring success – the type that people talk and Tweet about.

Here are some things you should consider when putting together the perfect conference.

Venue location

According to the Sundial Group, the location is one of the most important things when it comes to deciding upon meeting venues – after all, this is likely to be the deciding factor as to how many people decide to attend.

When deciding on which venue to use for your conference, it’s important to think about what your specific business needs are before making any decisions.  How many people do you anticipate attending? Are you in a modern, innovative industry or one that values formality? What do you want the atmosphere of your conference to be like? These are all questions to pose to yourself when deciding on conference facilities.

It is also important to think about where people will be coming from, and make it as easy to get to as possible. If attendees will be coming from all over the country, then try find somewhere fairly central. Most important of all, it should be near convenient transport links – a conference that’s going to cost you a couple of hundred in a taxi is not going to be that attractive.

Price

The Cardinal rule of venue hunting is to stick to your budget. By all means do a bit of market research to determine the type of price you’re looking at. At the same time, don’t wait until you’ve found a venue and fallen in love with it to create a budget – the likelihood is you’ll end up paying way more than you would have otherwise.

Sit down and really think about your budget before going on a venue hunt. This will ensure that after paying for the location you still have enough to pay for other considerations, and you don’t have to scrimp. In addition, if you have a firm budget, and let the venues know this, you may be able to haggle and get a better deal than just shelling out the money for the first figure they give you.

Find your venue early on

It is a good idea to start looking for your conference venue early on in the planning process. This means that you can secure a room on a solid date, and work from there when it comes to publicising the event, and reaching out to speakers.

If you start to plan a conference without having secured a location, this also means the date is subject to change. Venues are also often rather booked up, meaning that getting in there early will help you get your preferred date.

In addition, you also don’t want to start telling people about the conference on a certain date, only to have to get back in touch with a new one. This could make you look disorganised and potentially put people off coming altogether.