Which corporate event is most suited to your business?
Corporate events come in all shapes and sizes and can vary widely depending on the purpose, audience and business objectives. At one end of the spectrum you have large, often international, conferences and conventions focused on industry-specific topics and attracting thousands of attendees. Tradeshows and expos also fall into this large-scale category of corporate events, where companies come to showcase their products and services to potential customers, partners and industry professionals.
Your stereotypical corporate events, including corporate conferences, award ceremonies and gala dinners are often mid-size, hosted local to company headquarters and are designed to recognise and celebrate achievements and success or communicate key business messages.
Finally, at the smaller end of the spectrum are the more intimate corporate events, including networking events, meetings and team building events. Whilst not a finite list, this gives you some indication of the scale and variety available. So how do you decide which corporate event is right for your business?
Begin by looking at the company objectives for running a corporate event in the first instance. Through understanding your company goals, and what the outcome of the event is intended to be can help to define your approach. Are you bringing employees together or is this event for business partners? Are you seeking to build new business relationships or recognise and reward existing? Perhaps you’re giving back to the community through a charitable event. Aligning on the purpose and objective of the event will help start your journey to shaping your corporate event ideas.
The benefits of running a corporate event are clear, enhancing business relationships, fostering professional development and driving business success. But get the format wrong and it could become an event to remember for years to come for all the wrong reasons.
Once you have your event objectives and initial corporate event ideas consider how you are going to deliver the event. Knowing how to effectively plan a corporate event is important, this is when utlising an experienced event agency can be invaluable. At FMI Agency we provide light-touch support through to end-to-end event management, so whatever level of help you require there are plenty of options for scalable resource.
The varieties of corporate event
Corporate Conference
A corporate conference is a large-scale event typically organised by a company with the aim of bringing together employees, senior leaders, and stakeholders to discuss, learn about, and collaborate on topics relevant to the organisation. Often themed, a strong creative identity can generate excitement amongst attendees whilst aligning with the goals and objectives of the event. For example, if the event is for sales professionals a theme may be based on achieving success. If the event is for operational staff, it may be around productivity or efficiencies.
A corporate conference will have a strong agenda, with structured plenary presentations, breakout sessions, workshops and networking opportunities structured around the conference theme and objectives. Frequently kicking-off with an opening presentation welcoming attendees, these large format presentations can be highly engaging with creative video and speaker content to set the tone for the event. Breakout sessions can be interactive, encouraging delegate participation, contributions and hands-on. Afterall, no-one wants death by PowerPoint!
Awards Dinner
Awards dinners epitomize the pinnacle of recognition within industries and organisations, gathering achievers under one roof to celebrate excellence and strong performance. These events are meticulously planned, from the choice of venue to the dinner service, all designed to provide a fitting backdrop for honouring outstanding individuals or teams.
Attendees may be greeted on arrival with a cocktail or champagne reception before entering a grand ballroom where the stage is set. Typically, a formal event, a creative theme can bring together the achievements and values of a business. For example, recognising performance may be hung around star performers, supported with themed entertainment such as acrobatics.
As the dinner progresses, the spotlight shines on deserving recipients as they ascend the stage to accept their accolades. These awards dinners are not only a testament to the dedication and talent of the awardees but also serve as a source of inspiration and aspiration for the entire workforce.
Incentive Travel Programme
Incentive travel programmes are like the ultimate corporate event for rewarding hard work and dedication. These events replace a traditional bonus with something much more exciting and aspirational. From sandy beaches and water sports to abseiling and adrenaline sports, incentive travel programmes can leave a lasting impression on attendees for years to come.
Varying in groups size from ten to fifty plus people, incentive travel programmes can include individuals or partners as well. Annual travel programmes can really ramp up excitement with bigger and better destinations and activities being proposed year on year to motivate employees or business partners.
These corporate events are all about saying ‘thank you’ to employees, partners or teams with a well-deserved break from the norm while showing them just how much their efforts and contributions are valued by the business.
Choosing your corporate event may not be straightforward but it can be streamlined by considering your business objectives and target audience. Keep your end goal in mind, along with your budget parameters, to help structure and plan your corporate event.
How can you come up with corporate event ideas?
Coming up with corporate event ideas can be a fun and creative process but it’s important to tie your event back to you company objectives and your business specifically. Every business is different, from industry, workforce size, markets, values and goals so it’s important your ideas fit with your business.
At the start of any event planning process we ask the questions; who, what, why, when and where. The answers to these can be provided through meetings with your stakeholders, brainstorm sessions with colleagues or team members, and internal meetings to gather views and event ideas freely. These opinions should all be fed back into the process of planning your corporate event.
At FMI we also focus heavily on brand engagement, ensuring that your event, whatever its size, will positively impact the audience and be remembered for months, if not years to come. Utilising a strong event theme in your communications both pre and post event can be very powerful at embedding key messaging. This can then translate through to your venue, staging, set design and so on and so forth, creating a strong and immediately recognised identity.
A corporate event intended to communicate diversity and inclusion initiates, for example, may benefit from a carefully selected guest speaker who can tell a great story to your audience based on their life experience. Perhaps they have overcome barriers, succeeded against all the odds – whatever their tale, it can provide valuable insight for your audience and make the event memorable.
A corporate event proposed to bring a disparate workforce together, such as a field team or sales team may find stronger engagement and audience interest if they built a demonstration area. An interactive, purpose-built area where they can display their products or better communicate their services through real life examples. Video content can be extremely powerful, consider technology, film and audio to help communicate the features and benefits of your products or services.
Corporate event planning with FMI
FMI are a trusted corporate events agency to many large companies and global brands. We put brand engagement at the heart of all of our event ideas, from initial concept and theme through to execution and delegate experience.
We offer corporate event planning in both the UK, EMEA and Worldwide. Our expertise lies in getting under the skin of your event objectives and delivering a solution that exceeds these. We have an experienced corporate event management team who have years of experience, and who have travelled all over the world planning, setting-up and delivering world class events.
We have worked closely with the likes of Targus, LV=, Inchcape and more… elevating their businesses with highly engaging corporate events. If you’re looking for an expert to ask the right questions, provide impartial event advice then get in touch. Tell us about your project and we can explore how our event experts can help.
