If you’re like every other event planner on the planet, you’ve had to cancel or postpone an event because of the coronavirus. After saying your share of WTFs and considering all the other things to worry about, you might wonder if the time and effort you put into planning your event will go to waste.
It doesn’t have to.
If that describes your day, we’re sorry, you deserve better. On the plus side, there’s a day in your honor: December 15, National Cat Herders Day.
This special date made us think of the challenges of event planning – more specifically, event registration. Slippery and unpredictable? Yes, but it doesn’t have to be.
We tracked down Bryan Meyer, Lightspeed’s head of event operations and registration management, fresh off his most recent red-eye flight from a customer event. What better time for an interview, we thought, as we asked for his cat-herding-whisperer insights into making event registration simply the cat’s meow.
You want to make your event a “Wow!” for your audience, right? Engaging. Memorable. Above all, an event experience.
Let’s set the backstory with an opening crawl (we’re Lightspeed, we’re allowed):
A long time ago, in a conference center far, far away.
It is a dark time for event attendees. Keynote speakers, entrenched behind their podiums, hit every bullet on their PowerPoint slides with relentless force.
In the darkness, audience members shift in their seats and cough in sequence. Dreaming of the scheduled agenda break.
The besieged event planner huddles backstage. A daring new hope glimmers for a brighter, engaging future…”
Unless it was past your bedtime, you watched one of the most amazingly bizarre endings to an awards show in recent memory. If you turned in early, there’s no doubt you have read about Warren Beatty channeling Steve Harvey and erroneously giving La La Land the Oscar for best picture.
The matter was cleared up but, wow. That’s a pretty big stage on which to shit the bed.
So where did it all go wrong?
Some will call this a mid-life crisis. Others will say “finally, he’s growing up.” Haters will say “he couldn’t hack it on his own”. Champions will say “it’s about damn time.”
It’s about the people, both cohorts and customers, whom I’ve had a pleasure of working with for the past 15+ years. You see, I had a revelation a couple of years ago… technically two revelations; one as it related to the people I work with, and one about the people I work for.
