Regardless of your industry, planning an event takes up time, money and resources – but when an event is over, it can be difficult to maintain the same levels of motivation you had during peak times.

From highlighting your availability to effectively managing your social media accounts, a proactive approach is key to ensuring your next event is a success.

There’s no better time to start planning your next event than now – and today, we’re taking a look at how event organisers can manage their time between events to guarantee that they’re being as productive as possible.

1. Manage your marketing

Social media offers up some exciting communication channels when it comes to retaining contact with current clients, as well as providing a platform you can use to drum up new business.

From Facebook to LinkedIn, ensuring you’re active on social media will not only be useful between events, but can also help to establish and maintain relationships before, during and afterwards. Better yet, you can even schedule posts to go live during your busiest periods. Here are some social media platforms you should be using as an event organiser:

• Facebook – from posting event details to uploading images after the fact, Facebook can be a great platform to spread the word – but it’s also a great way to ensure you’re active in between events. In order to stay on your audience’s radar between events, maintaining an online presence is key
• LinkedIn – in terms of networking, LinkedIn is the most valuable tool in your marketing arsenal. Whether it’s maintaining contact with current clients or discovering new contacts, you can operate the app remotely – meaning you’re never too far away from uncovering your next event opportunity
• Twitter – a professional Twitter account is a must – and whether you promote your events from your business account or have a Twitter page dedicated solely to events, regular posts should be a part of your day-to-day activity. Event organisers often work outside of standard 9-5 office hours, but you can manage your social media accounts at all times – using platforms like Hootsuite and Sprout Social to schedule your social media posts ahead of time

Creating and maintaining relationships online is crucial when it comes to event planning – developing familiarity with your business and encouraging your ‘followers’ to attend your next event.

2. Get your finances in order

When it comes to the planning stages, finding the funding for your event can be a challenge.

Drumming up funds is not without its obstacles, and you can’t expect it to be readily available when an event rolls around. Financial planning is crucial to an event’s success – helping you to ensure you don’t overspend or end up allocating funds in the wrong areas.

Keeping a close eye on your spending will only have a positive effect on the success of an event, allowing you to be realistic and alter your event if you find that you’ve overspent at any point.

See: How To Get Your Event Budget Planning Right

Creating and nurturing relationships with banks, sponsors and other businesses will help you secure finance for future events and it’s important these relationships are maintained – not simply relied upon when you need them.

It’s always advisable to underestimate rather than overestimate the amount of budget you’ll be able to secure from funding. As the event nears, it’s better to have more resources than necessary, than it is to find yourself over budget or underfunded before the big day.

3. Fill up your diary

As an event organiser, you’re granted a certain amount of flexibility – and understanding how to effectively use your time between events is crucial.

It can be tempting to wait for an event date to creep closer before you start considering key factors, but this is often how necessities are missed and problems arise. A busy diary is the best way to stay organised and ensure none of your important tasks slip through the net – and the planning process should begin at the earliest opportunity.

While you might have months before your next event, the days will soon fly off the calendar. Fill your diary with essential deadlines – this way, you can make sure you won’t miss any meetings or things that need to be actioned.

From pinning down the perfect venue to hiring staff, there are a number of jobs that contribute to the success of an event – and starting the planning process as early as possible will ensure minimal stress as your event draws closer.

4. Keep an eye on the trends

In the world of marketing, there’s no room for complacency – and if you want to stay one step ahead of your competitors and organise a lucrative event, keeping a finger on the industry pulse is key.

This might be new ticketing and survey software, for example, or jumping on relevant hashtags on Twitter. Whatever the latest trend happens to be, make sure you’re in on it – because you can guarantee that your competitors will be.

(Hint: Sign up for the Eventbrite Blog newsletter for all their updates on event planning innovation, tools and best practices!)

Along with changing trends, don’t overlook the importance of feedback. As an event organiser, this can be invaluable in helping you to plan and perfect future events.

If you truly want to learn from each event you organise, gather feedback from presenters, speakers and staff – and then use their comments and queries to inform your next event.

5. Shake up your approach

Just because you’ve always planned and managed an event in a certain way doesn’t mean it’s the best approach.

The start of a new year often encourages change, but when it comes to event planning, mixing up your marketing should always be high on your agenda event as we move into Q2 and beyond.

If you find yourself with some spare time between events, think about past successes and failures and identify what influenced them. This will help you to target individual audiences and inform the success of future events.

While following industry trends is a great way to stay ahead of the curve, shaking up your approach will ensure your events remain fresh and exciting, encouraging the return of existing audiences while targeting a new market.

By taking a proactive approach to managing your time and money between events, you can ensure you’re as busy as possible and your diary remains full.

Bio: Jamie Turner is the co-founder of Actual Music – specialising in coordinating corporate event entertainment. With a team of experienced and passionate entertainers at its helm, Actual Music exists to deliver first-class entertainment to its customers – whatever the occasion.