Imagine booking an event date with your client and they don't want to start preparations until 2 weeks prior to the event! 

In Latin America, it's customary practice to plan an event in 2 weeks, maybe because it is cultural, or because attendees don't even RSVP until then, or most of the time they never do. When we hosted The Disney Institute in Colombia, it is common American practice to plan in advance. So 6 months prior to the scheduled event, we had 2 RSVP's. Every week, we held a conference call and every week the numbers never changed. Naturally, our client was a nervous wreck if this was going to happen or not. I kept reassuring them about our culture and sure enough, ten days prior to the event, The Disney Institute's event was sold out. 

As a tip...when clients wait until the last minute...start doing everything that is on your side. Work on what you can do without their input, so when they finally realize we are running out of time, the essentials are in. This is why it is very important to get the brief as accurate as possible, which are: Who, Why, When and Where.

So what is the WOW! Moment?

How do you pull an event in 14 days?

Wow Moment:   

• Creating the Event's Agenda

• Speaker confirmations

• Audience attendance

• Staff confirmations

The majority of the audience engaged in conversation with the speakers and took notes meticulously.  To put together an educational seminar where everyone walked away pleased with learning an abundant amount of information was the final WOW moment. 

If you are curious to track the interesting face off between legacy media and digital challengers regarding how big data is used in the Latin America, please follow hashtag #emonetization on: https://twitter.com/EventsByIndigo

Oops! Moment

The BIG Ooops came was when the videos could not be uploaded or had a glitch.Our tech guys since brought 3 computers to troubleshoot the problem. In working with speakers, there 3 back up plans I have when presentations won't load. 

• When there are highly technological and extremely designed videos, it is very rare that other computers have the capability or the program to run them. Thus, I always advise speakers to always bring their computers and USB.

• As an event planner, TRY to get the presentations before the event so that the A/V tech can work calmly and download the correct program. I use dropbox.com for speakers to send me their large files, but in my 25 years, I have received 2 presentations in advance! I have my assistants explain unforeseen events that can possibly happen on stage to get them to send it.

• Never assume it will work out. Here a few examples, the Wifi location of the event blocks YouTube videos, the presentation's software expires the day of the event, or the pictures on their presentation are connected to the cache of their website and not hard saved in their laptop's drive...thus videos or pictures won't appear during a transfer.