Hi everyone and welcome to my second blog post!
Today I’m going to be discussing the importance of preparation and documentation for successful event execution, and also the importance of review and reflection. As we have previously learnt in PR Techniques, events take time, energy and exceptional organisational skills to ensure they run smoothly and those who attend are satisfied.
The Stirling Lions Soccer Club recently hosted The Comedy Lounge (see more here: https://www.comedylounge.com.au) for a night full of eating, drinking and laughing with a mix of the funniest stand-ups from Australia and around the world!
On the day of the event, I was required to come to the club a bit earlier to help set up tables, the stage and a ticket station area where door sales would be occurring, so that it was all ready to go for the evening.
Tables all set up
I returned to the club at about 6pm to help with last minute preparation before guests started arriving at 6:30pm. As the club is local and primarily a volunteer-run organisation, it can understandably be a bit difficult to cover ALL bases of event preparation if there aren’t a lot of helping hands! As a result, I did notice some gaps and areas to be addressed and improved upon. I was responsible for being at the door handling the cash box and ticket sales with another volunteer, and as guests were coming in, we realised that it was hard to determine which guests already had a ticket and what table number they were on. Some people would walk in saying, “Oh, we are on _______’s table, they’ve already paid for a table of 10” or “_______ has our tickets”. There was no specific list of table numbers and guest names that we could follow, so we had to allocate tables on the spot – it was just a bit unorganised! Despite this little hiccup, the night was such a great success. My stomach was hurting from laughing so much! I went around and took photos of the comedians and the guests which were uploaded to the club’s Facebook page. This small amount of media coverage was important for the club as it showcased the type of community events they hold, the family-friendly culture they have and also raised awareness about the club for people who may want to become members for next year’s season. Although I was a bit hesitant, I did raise my suggestions on how to better prepare for club events in the future with the vice president and president of the club and they took my advice on board which was a relief! Hopefully we can implement this for the trophy presentation night event coming up.
Among other recent tasks over the weekend, I was required to again, write a speech to announce over the loud speaker from the media room before the 21st round of the NPL WA which was Stirling Lions vs Floreat Athena. In this speech, there was actually a lot more to say compared to the first one I touched on about in my first blog post. I additionally had to thank some special guests for attending the game including a local minister and ward members, go into a lot more depth about a sponsorship offer and raise awareness about a raffle and the upcoming trophy presentation night – not to forget announcing the player numbers and names again – I thought I was going to run out of breath!
Stirling Lions vs Floreat Athena
Pre-game announcing from the media room
Keep your eyes peeled for more of my blog posts!
Breanna