Events are critical in providing outreach and exposure for an organization, and some can often be an excellent fund- and friend-raising tool. However, it’s easy to make a mistake when there are so many details. And those mistakes could cost you your reputation and customers if you’re not on top of every detail.

Here are most common mistakes made – and solutions – to help avoid such problems:

Mistake #1: Failing to identify meeting objectives. Be sure to know one hundred percent what your management expects from this event. Examples: education, recruiting, awards presentations, new product roll-out, executive installation, etc.

Mistake #2: Failing to budget properly. Many planners make this mistake by overlooking some very costly items. Specifically speaker travel, audio/visual, program handouts, shipping charges, decorations, security, and afternoon breaks. Don’t overlook these costs!

by Kevin Warrene VP, Sales and Marketing BMRW & Associates, Inc. February 3, 2003

Promoting your own web site should be at top of your marketing strategies. There are many ways to get traffic to your site. You could spend thousands of dollars to search engines, search engine optimization companies or keyword positioning companies or you could follow these simple tips to help you market your web site on a very small budget. These are in no particular order as I feel they are all integral parts in web site promotion.

Tell Everyone - Word of mouth is sometimes very best advertising. Always direct people to your site for more information. This is by far easiest to do as most business people interact with customers, industry specific contacts, vendors and prospects on a daily basis. Tell world... I have a web site!!!

Business Cards - This is a must. Your business cards should have your web site address on it as well as your email address.

Email Signatures - Always put your web site address in your email signature at end of your communication. You can get very creative with signatures for different features you want to talk about. I probably have at least a dozen different email signatures that I use.

Stationery - Make it a point to put your web site address on your letterhead, notepads, post-it notes....for that matter anything printed should have your web site on it.

Advertising - If you are spending money advertising on TV, radio, print or online you need to make sure that your web site address is listed. You should want to drive this targeted traffic to your site.

Linking - Several search engines are starting to use link popularity to begin to rank your web site in search results. If would be in your best interests to find sites that are industry related to yours and work on reciprocal links. Ask your vendors about a link to your site. Work on getting linked to any possible site that would have relevant content to your site.

Customers - I feel very strongly that you need to notify all of your customers that you can about your web site. This can be with a direct mail piece, a flyer at your checkout, a flyer in their statement or an email. Your customer can continue to come back to web site 24/7 to find out what is going on at your company.