How can you involve the community in planning events?

Remember that community driven events are less about "content" and more about the experience. There are many events to choose from. What will make yours stand out and be remembered? Reverse engineer the feelings and experience your community is needing, craving, and asking for. Every community wants to feel like they belong- to a mission, a cause, and knowing what they need to feel that should be reflected in programming and messaging, and CTAs.

In my experience as a Community Development Officer, a big part of what we do is building relationships, awareness and understanding of community at the micro level. From here we are learning about communities concerns or ideas to help or simply do something fun for their neighbours. Our role is to bring those together with similar concerns/passions and I support their conversations on the purpose, target audience and the beneficial outcomes. We may have strategic actions that align with a specific concern or target group, which I try to encourage the community action group to consider. With these things considered, you can decide on an activity/initiative that aligns with the community and the intended outcomes!

In my experience, what has worked well most often is establishing early connections with the stakeholders, community leaders or persons of influence from inception to staging of the actual event. It means engaging your partners including NGOs in working toward achieving the program outcomes, and taking in early feedback and input on various elements of the activity. That way you get direct buy-in from the beneficiaries themselves, who are your most important stakeholders.

Consulting and inviting the community to be a part of your event is the best way to get their involvement while making it an event many community members will attend. Allowing the community to tell you their ideas ensures their commitment to the event as they feel they have been heard and are a part of the experience.

Your Brand Community- there are many collaborators in event planning- and they are a part of your community. Speakers, sponsors, customers, prospects all make up an ecosystem that provides very valuable reasons to collaborate on event planning - in fact they are the value. They should be center stage for crafting the variety of conversations, learning, and networking. What initiatives are important in their business and to their brand? It's likely important to your attendees. Answer that when planning your event- and bring them into the conversations. They can set the tone for the "theme" of an event.

Source your materials, food, beverages, swag, printing, etc. from local businesses. This way you are helping the community twice: putting money directly into your community and getting people engaged in the community. HOWEVER: be prepared to pay them full price! Too many small business owners struggle to survive and feel overwhelmed with requests for donations and sponsorships. They also feel guilty and left out if they have to say “no”.

As a community leader that spends most days in our brand community channels, I can tell you that it is a platform rich in feedback, honesty, and brand advocates with brilliant voices who we can empower to be part of our event. They volunteer, they speak, we offer an Ambassador program and more. Event planners can create advisory teams, experience crews, first timers networking- and bake in expertise, knowledge, and shared experiences that keep each event sustainable, but facilitates a wonderful place for relationships to grow deeper and progress and for attendees to come back and be with their community over and over again.