How to Plan a Successful Affiliate Conference or Event

Here are some tips I found very helpful. To get started on hosting an affiliate marketing event you first need to think about what kind of event you want to host. Are you going to do a meetup that’s a relaxed atmosphere or are you trying to do more of a learning event where you have speakers and try to teach those who are attending?

Once this is figured out you can get started on planning your event. Any event takes planning, but with the help of a few friends, and a little hard work, you can create a very successful event.

First off, a number of questions must be answered.

• What is the vision and purpose behind the event? (ours was to get closer with our affiliates and make new contacts)
• What are some ways you can accomplish your goal?
• When is the best time to hold this event? (with the planning of our meetup we had to watch out for other shows and holidays)
• How many people do you want to have attend? (will have a big effect on cost)
• Where can you accommodate the number of people at the time you want to hold the event?
• How much money will the event cost?
• How much money is available, and from where will it come?

These are all questions which must be answered, but by taking them one step at a time, an effective successful event can be planned. Consider these steps to give you a framework to help plan your event:

1. Come up with an idea, vision, or set of goals for the event. (we wanted our event to be very care free and fun for those attending that’s how we came up with a “at sea” type of agenda)

2. Determine what is necessary to implement the vision and create a budget. (things can add up fast)

3. Contact places to hold the event and inquire available dates for the event. Make the reservations for the proper facilities to put on the event.

4. Identify possible sources of funding and begin to request money for the event. (unless you are funding this yourself also you can ask for or sell sponsorships to the event)

5. Reserve the proper resources, equipment, and personnel necessary for the event.

(steps 3, 4, and 5 should happen at about the same time)

6. Publicize the event.(I feel like this is very important get the word out as much and however you can)

7. Host the event.

8. Follow-up from the event.

Picking an event location and date.

Auditoriums are a great place to bring a speaker, or host workshops. Depending on the nature of your event, you might want to even look into using outdoor facilities. (which is what we did we wanted a unique location) For dates take into consideration there are a lot of shows in our industry and almost everyone tries to attend these. For instance are meetup is the same month as adtech and thanksgiving so we tried to come in somewhere in between (November 19^th).

Publicizing an event:

The key to hosting a successful event is to publicize it well. You can put in all the time and have all the money in the world, but if no one knows about the event, attendance will be low. What we have found to be a great source is the blogs such as Zac Johnson and other well known affiliate bloggers. Also facebook and other social media sites work well for this. Don’t forget the shows like affiliate summit.

Plan, Plan, Plan! Prepare,Prepare,Prepare!

Depending on what you are trying to do look at it from all angles make sure all your bases are covered when planning an event. Hopefully your event when it is over will have accomplished what you wanted.

This guest post was written by Mike Pacheco of CashedOutMedia.com Affiliates.