How To Find A Venue For Your Event

28 days left until the 5th Annual World Hypnotism Day.
(Sunday January 4, 2009)

In order to find a good venue for your event, you need to think about the purpose of your World Hypnotism Day event. What do you want to accomplish?

If your focus is to do a stage hypnosis event… you need a stage.

If your focus is to give a lecture or seminar, you need a room with chairs pointed to the front of the room.

If your focus is to do group hypnosis to stop smoking, you need a quiet comfortable space.

You get the idea.

How To Find A Venue

This will depend on where you live. I’m going to list some ideas and resources that have worked for me. Your mileage may vary.

My goal is to jump-start your brain so it will help you find resources in your area.

One of my favorite resources is craigslist.org. To be clear… it’s NOT my list. But, their office is just around the corner from me here in San Francisco and I have met Craig Newmark (founder) at parties and social events around town.

Craigslist is essentially an online classified ad system, but it does much more. You can place full page ads done in html with photos etc. and it’s classified by categories and searchable. (you might even test ads for your business there)

In the beginning they served only San Francisco, but now they are worldwide. Chances are if you live in a city of any size, there is a craigslist for your area.

Example for Atlanta http://atlanta.craigslist.org

You’ll need to be a little creative as to where to search and by what keywords, but I have had good success in finding venues for events on there.

Places where you can look for rooms also include the following:

• Libraries
• Schools
• Use Google and search for “meeting rooms (your city)”
• Ask people in your community
• Ask your local Chamber of commerce
• Hotels (last resort as this will be most expensive, BUT hotels are hurting right now so you might be able to deal)

Booking A Room For Your Event

This might seem like obvious stuff, but if you have never rented a venue before this list will help you out.

• Go look at the venue. (Or at least photos online). Think about how easy it is to find, is there enough parking, it is quiet or noisy, is it big enough or too big. These factors will be important to your event.

  
  

• Ask about their terms. Some small venues do business on a handshake. Large venues will have scary corporate legal contracts. READ THESE CLOSELY! Know what you are getting yourself on the hook for before you sign.
• Ask them to pencil you in while you think about it. You don’t want to lose the venue while you are making the final decision. Respect their time by making your choice within a few days.
• Send a deposit to hold the room. Even if they don’t ask for it… do it. This will save you any arguments about if your reservation gets misplaced, and will let the venue know you are serious.
• Get written confirmation they have your deposit and you are on the calendar. Seems obvious, but you would be amazed at how many people don’t do it.
• Be clear on who is responsible for cleaning, locking & unlocking the room, if they provide chairs, who will do the set up of chairs & tables, if they have screens, projectors etc. and if you can use them. In other words, pay attention to all details.
• Get there early to set up. Something is sure to be wrong or missing, allow yourself time to deal with it so you aren’t stressed out when the event begins.

Remember to signup for access to the members area on the World Hypnotism Day website. You’ll get access to free resources to help your WHD event be a success.

http://worldhypnotismday.com/participant-signup-form.shtml