7 Tips for Planning a Successful Real Estate Event
How can you increase your chances of having a successful real estate event? Whether it is a real estate education seminar, first time homebuyer class, expo for distressed homeowners, tour of foreclosure properties, fundraising event, or simply getting together, a real estate investment club or group of strategic partners, there is a lot that can be done to ensure attendance is maximized and results are optimized. So what are some of the ways that real estate professionals and companies can really take control of the outcome and ensure success? The following list highlights 7 tips to help you run the most successful real estate event you can imagine: Arrange Accommodations The immediate and long term success of an event relies on the entire experience, not just a few minutes of pitch. Assisting with accommodations can be a great way to increase attendance and have better control over the whole event experience. Perhaps you have local rental properties to house attendees in? Maybe this is an opportunity to spark a powerful new alliance with a local hotel? Or perhaps you can negotiate better bulk and group rates with a provider to make it easier to attend, and ensure your guests have left over cash for your product or service. Travel Arrangements Assisting with travel arrangements checks many of the same boxes as accommodations. You don’t want your attendees to be late, stressed, or burned out when they arrive. Helping organizing travel can help overcome this. Consider the same strategies as above, and consider whether this might be an opportunity to develop addition sponsors, cash in air miles you aren’t using, or even gain quite a few for your extended end of year vacation. This is also an opportunity to get everyone connecting prior to the event and gain a warmer start. Their experience getting in will also set up their perception of the entire real estate event before they arrive. Don’t you want to be the one who choices what this will be? Friendly Staff Whether it is the tour bus driver, hotel staff, concierge, caterer or your team, friendly staff can make all the difference. Great customer service can seem rare, and even nonexistent in today’s society. If you’ve ever visited the Parc Soleil Hilton in Orlando, FL you’ll find all of the staff not only pleasant, but going out of their way to proactively be friendly to guests. The difference in the experience is amazing. This level of service can be hard to fake, and maybe this Hilton resort has found a way to clone the most awesome people oriented team members, but it is possible. Instead of attendees feeling irked, mistreated, and bitter, great service can make them really love the entire experience. Whether they buy or not, this will create raving fans for your next real estate event. The Finer Details While many real estate entrepreneurs and executives are the type that tend to rush into action, it is often an attention to details that distinguishes the truly elite from the rest. Paying attention to the details says volumes about you, your real estate business, and how attendees can expect you to perform. At function dinners; who will ensure the minutest details are incorporated and organized when it comes to place settings and service? Will you stock accommodations with necessities? How about providing car services? What about refreshments during the event to keep attendees focused and feeling their best? Gift Bags There are many ways to skimp and cut corners on organizing real estate events. Finding ways to maximize ROI is great, but it shouldn’t come at the expense of appearing cheap, or failing to impress. Gift bags are great inclusions that can make a big, immediate impact, and go on creating results over the longer term. Gift bags can include promotional items, which will remain as constant calls to action and referral sources in the future, but are also a fantastic way to improve positioning for real estate event organizers. Eco-conscious and ethically sourced gifts will speak greatly to your values, while wowing with luxury items and new tech gadgets can dramatically enhance perceived value. Scheduling Packing in value with dense information delivery and great speaker lineups can be good. However, it can be equally important to schedule specific and generous time for mingling and connecting. One of the biggest benefits of attending real estate events, and one of the biggest motivators to invest in attending won’t be to hear you, but to network with others. So provide it. The better connected your group is, the longer they’ll stick with you. #Hashtags Your audience and reach certainly should not be limited to the attendees of your real estate event, or even those that were invited. Much can be done to raise awareness, spread the word and even re-purpose content afterwards. However, it shouldn’t all be on the organizers and promoters to invest time and money in this. Those that want maximum reach, value, and results ought to enroll attendees and their firms in going viral. If you’ve followed the above advice, their affiliation with your event will do wonders for their reputation. So urge them to hit their social networks and build the buzz. Create unique hash-tags for the event and measure your impressions. Consider incentives for driving more activity with rewards for those that create the biggest impact or specific results.