Meeting Planner Careers

Everyone has their own private pet peeves, including your clients. Have you ever stopped to think about how or if you are driving them ‘round the bend? Learning a lesson from a client’s frustration with other meeting planners can save you a great deal of headache and earn your company new loyalty points.

Communication is a key factor. Almost every conflict between a meeting planner and his client can be traced back to a failure to communicate. Imagine you are booking a keynote speaker and have asked her to hold a date open. She is excited at the prospect of working with you and complies. Your workload piles up and you forget to tell her your client decided to go with a different speaker. When you don’t send that email releasing the date, resentment and frustration are the natural consequences.

Do you tailor your email mailing list to include only those people who need to know? Sending reminders to people who have complied with all your requests can ruffle a few feathers. It makes them feel that you just aren’t paying attention when, in fact, you’ve just taken the easy way out. Keeping track of the small stuff may be tedious; however, success is often in the small details.

You just got your first meeting client, and you’re worried because she doesn’t have enough money to make it look good. She wants high tech gadgets, a nice reception, and a keynote speaker. She has the funds for a coffee bar, hand printed event schedules, and a motivational tape from the library. How in the world are you going to deal with that?

First of all, know that you can. While most event centers offer high tech gadgetry, very few clients really need to make use of everything a center offers. Often wifi, a laptop, and a projection screen will do for rooms; and although your client may think four rooms are required, you can show how three rooms can work better.

Instead of dinners and receptions, why not try a cuisine sampler and open socials? You can get some wonderful food samples from caterers that fit themes like international cuisine, festival foods, seafood, wild game, vegetarian dishes, desserts, etc.–all for much less than a full service evening dinner with a speaker.

And about the speaker–why not look to a local non-profit for an inexpensive speaker? Some speakers are free. They are happy to come and speak about their missions, which range from human service to animal causes, just for the opportunity to get their causes more press. In the meantime they motivate your audiences with their selfless efforts and the hardships they have over come.

No doubt you will be facing other corners you need to cut when your clients don’t have a lot of money, but your job is to be creative. Be creative with costs as well and your client will not only call you back, but hand out your business card to her friends. If you don’t, your meeting will look like a kindergarten class with no toys or graham crackers.