Venues

Location, Location, Location
(or Believe It When You See It)

Each type of site has its advantages and disadvantages. Generally, but not always, you get better service and quality at the more expensive locations. I have produced some of my most successful events in low cost (or no cost) meeting rooms that few people recognize as possible sites. For example, many office buildings have conference rooms available at no cost to their tenants. Also, I have found groups of professionals such as therapists or doctors who have a meeting room as part of their individual practice offices. If you know someone associated with either of these types of situations, you might get them to book the room for you. Thus, a free or low cost room.

More likely, however, you are going to have to pay for your facility. You can have it in someone’s home, but I do not recommend this for several reasons. First, it tends to limit the size of your event. You usually don’t have adequate space for registration tables, sales tables, ample seating, projection equipment, etc. in someone’s home. Second, many people are reluctant to attend an event in a private home (unless its something like a Tupperware party). Third, parking can become an issue. And last on my short list (which is short because I am only covering the main reasons), is the issue of the family itself. Pets, children, phone calls, limited and / or uncomfortable seating (folding chairs) are huge distractions. And distractions diminish your success.

So, what types of venues work? Almost anything is possible if the space is large enough. Typical sites are hotels, conference centers, retreat centers, theaters, meeting rooms in all types of businesses, schools, churches, community centers and just plain outside (with a tent covering in case of rain or too much sun). If you do plan portions of your event outside without covering, make sure that you have a plan B. Some of my most successful events have been outdoors in a grove of trees at a fairly secluded retreat center on a somewhat remote island. We did, however, also have access to the large meeting hall if the weather turned inclement.

Regardless of the venue, make sure that your seating arrangement is perfect. In some instances a circle of chairs works well. However, the majority of the time, you want your participants' attention and energy focused on your presenter. Accordingly, you need to seriously consider seating. The context that it creates can make or break an event in the least expensive or highest-end venue.

Sure, you can check them out on the web, through brochures, by talking to sales & marketing staff, but until you have a direct experience of a site, you can’t be sure what challenges it will provide. Perhaps there is not enough room in the hallway for your registration table, so you have to sacrifice some of your valuable meeting space for that. Or perhaps the room partitions are less than soundproof (as promised in all the marketing material – and soundproof means nothing if you have a rock band in the room next to your guided visualization session). Anything can and probably will happen, so you need to be as cautious as possible.

If the site is in a distant city and you can’t reasonably check it out yourself, perhaps you can send a relative or friend who lives in that city. If nothing else, after you recruit a local event support team (be it volunteer or paid) in that city, you can have one of them do a site inspection. Weather the inspection is done by you or someone else, I strongly suggest that you don’t just make an appointment with a sales and catering representative. Drop by unexpectedly when something is taking place in the room you plan to use or a similar room.

It’s best if the event you see is public, but you can always sneak a peek at any sort of meeting, training or seminar. I have never had a problem looking in a room if I am unaccompanied. If, however, a hotel representative is showing you around, they will be less likely to allow you such leeway. Also, if you’re alone, you can often strike up a friendly conversation with participants, presenters or producers to get the “real lowdown” on the room as well as the service.

Doing this may feel like spying (because it essentially is spying), but it can be very helpful in avoiding the pitfalls that others have had to experience at that site. In my experience, even the most expensive hotels are notorious for having what they tell you are unavoidable distractions, and it’s best to know about the problems you could face well in advance. This type of pre-event inspection is good to do with any venue, but it’s particularly important at sites that make the majority of their profits from filling rooms and selling food and beverages because they tend to do whatever they can to fill their rooms. Hotels and conference centers generally provide the most impressive façade. People feel more comfortable going into these public places, and if they are high-end venues, by subconscious association your participants will believe that your event is also high class. That does not, however, mean that high-end venues will provide high-end service. Their staff can be as slow to get you what you need as the staff of much less expensive venues. And, high-end venues usually charge you more and tend to charge you for everything. Moderate to lower end venues are often willing to negotiate as well as just get things done for you in order to keep you coming back.

On the less expensive side are places like community centers, churches and office building meeting rooms. All these can be made to work really well if you take the time to create the perfect context (environment) for your participants. Perhaps you want a more casual feel to your event (which does not necessarily mean that the tuition / fee is less), so a community center or church works better than a hotel for you. Generally, however, such sites do not provide the service or equipment that is available at hotels and conference centers (at a price, of course).

That does not have to be an issue, as I always suggest bringing as much, if not all, of the “stuff” that you need for your event. You can rent a projector, flip chart, sound system, etc. or you can bring your own. This is particularly easy today since technology has brought the size of most things down to where they can be easily packed.

You also need your own logistics supplies box. This should include everything from office supplies to duct tape (an essential tool for any event) to sarongs (for covering tables and making your room more colorful). Don’t count of the venue to supply anything, especially not the signage. A hotel will probably have some type of paper or electronic announcement of your event, but their announcement may be wrong and probably will not direct people to your room.

You want to make your participants as comfortable as possible and good signage (as far out as possible from the actual site) does just that. Create a set of reusable laminated signs with arrows so you can tape them up quickly in the lobby and all the way to the door of your room. You can also remove them quickly, and if the hotel staff pulls them down (hotel policy, etc.), they are unlikely to throw them away. These signs will come in particularly handy when you are producing your event at a less commercial site like a church or community center. Such places do not usually have any type of announcement signage, so bringing your own signs is essential.

The most important thing that you need to realize about venues is to select ones that fit your audience. Again, you need to have all venues contexts (environment) fully support your message as well as the next steps you want your participants to take. If you are producing an event for high-end business leaders, a church meeting room will not work. Those folks probably won’t even show up, and if they do, they’ll feel like the event is not up to their standards – even before your presenter says the first word. Folks like that expect four or five star service and venues. They expect to be treated well. Some are so caught up with themselves that they expected to be treated like royalty. However, if that is your chosen audience, you need to provide them with that context / environment. The event needs to happen at The Four Seasons Hotel or a similar “special” site.

If, however, you are planning a meditation retreat, the primary quality of the site should probably be that it’s simple and quiet. A more natural setting would provide an even better environment, but it could easily be held in a city church basement if it was quiet and clean. In that instance, I would spend some time “decorating” the room. Perhaps some simple sarongs adding a bit of color to tables and walls or maybe some “spiritual” art posters. Most certainly, some fresh flowers and / or plants. All this could be done in less than an hour. The key is to tailor your venue to your target audience.

When you follow that one simple guideline, you can’t help but succeed. You will have created an extremely valuable first impression as well as an ongoing context that supports your presenter(s) in accomplishing their mission. So, rather than having to push uphill against an audience that does not feel comfortable, your presenter(s) will have the audience on their side, cheering for the event’s success.