Planning a successful event takes a lot of forethought. It all starts with nailing down your goals for hosting the event, whether it be to drive a specific number of registrations, fundraise a certain amount, or simply provide an experience for your audience.
You want to kick off any event planning process by thinking about your event from the top down — starting with that goal and then everything you’ll do to accomplish it — so that you can set up your online event registration form and reporting to help you in the long run.
How?
Think about what you’ll want to know about your attendees before you build your event registration form.
Gathering information from them early on, literally as they are registering, will help you understand who your attendees are and what they want to see at your event. (You can even plan future events armed with this info!)
This information could be as straightforward as needing to know their t-shirt size and any dietary restrictions — or, get specific and ask for more information like their role, career level, areas of interest, etc. so you can group attendees for meaningful activities based on their similarities, or plan experiences that’ll really resonate with everyone if you pick up on a common theme.
Another idea is leaning into a user-generated content strategy and collecting their thoughts or ideas on a certain topic to share during the event. This is particularly impactful for a virtual event where your attendees can’t necessarily be together, but you still want to provide a space for attendees to hear from each other.
Whatever it may be for, don’t be afraid to take advantage of using your event registration form to learn more about the audience you’re serving and create opportunities to engage them.
The way your registration form is set up can also make or break the quality of your event reporting.
As you go through the event planning process, you’ll find yourself constantly referring back to your attendee registration data to make informed decisions — but your ability to do that greatly depends on not only what you’re asking, but also how you’re asking it.
Get the most accurate reporting by limiting available answers whenever possible: for example, asking registrants to choose from a list of options (multiple choice) will keep your data for that question in those specific categories (rather than leaving it open ended and having to try to categorize the answers yourself) so you can easily see trends among attendees.
Using an event management platform that includes a powerful event registration form and reporting capabilities can be a real game changer. Be sure that the one you’re using will allow you to not only get quick stats on any field at a glance, but also provides more robust, customized reports that dig into specific needs.
Now, if you’re reading this blog post and realized you never thought about how important event registration form and reporting setup truly is, you’re not alone! Many event planners don’t pick up on the importance until after they’ve executed an event or two — on top of many other event planning tips and tricks.
For more tips from the pros that you may not have thought about before, download our guide Event Planning for Non-Event Professionals below.
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