If You Are The Ringmaster Of An Event, Build A Safety Net!

Many years ago when I was working for the Woolworths organisation as Marketing Manager, the company put me through a 6 week Management Course which included training in an area they called “potential problem analysis”.

Woolworths were of the opinion that if their senior managers were to be true experts in their chosen fields, they needed to be on their toes at all times with regard to potential problems that might arise.

Whilst I found the course to be rather straining at the time because of its depth of detail, I must say that the lessons I learnt relating to being prepared for any problems whatsoever, have proven to be a wonderful asset in subsequent years.

So no matter how organised you think your marketing plan is, make sure you always institute a potential problem analysis mindset.

Back in my Woolworths days, I can recall the boss who implemented this program asking me about the marketing of the opening of a Dubbo Woolworths shopping centre.

He asked if everything was organised and if I had ticked all the boxes?

I replied, “Yes, absolutely” – to which he then embarrassed me by asking a number of questions. 

I had organised a major TV star at the time, Tony Barber (TV’s Sale Of The Century host), to arrive by helicopter to open the mall.

There were major parades of Disney characters arriving at the front of the mall, the Mayor was cutting the ribbon, media had been invited to a special pre-opening function the night before in the mall and so forth.

This senior manager posed the following types of questions to me, to which I didn’t have the appropriate responses: 

• What if it rains and all of your parades get washed out? What are the contingencies?
• What if there’s high winds and Tony Barber’s helicopter cannot land in the planned space? Where would it land?
• Do you have appropriate ambulance and first-aid care ready to react to any incident in the expected large crowd, from heat exhaustion through to heart attacks?
• Do we have the appropriate insurance for all of the street performers, given the parades will start outside our premises and might not be covered by public liability?
• Given that the celebrities and the Disney troupe are likely to attract a large crowd (particularly given this had been heavily marketed on all Dubbo media), do you have the absolute necessary security and crowd control arrangements in place?

I won’t go any further, but he had about 100 other questions that he posed to me under the guise of “potential problem analysis”.

Of course, I was grossly embarrassed and went back to the drawing board to ensure that I had answers for all of these “anal questions”.

I think he even went as far as to ask me what plans we had if earth tremors were felt that day!!

And whilst he may have been slightly exaggerating in his questioning in order to make a point to a younger John Dwyer, the lesson has remained with me ever since.

He told me that if I was supposedly the main man, the expert, the ringmaster – then I was responsible for considering every aspect of the event.

Whatever promotion or marketing program you are running, make sure you sit down and go through your potential problem analysis, as you can never be too anal in preparing for any circumstances.

It’s a very valuable safety net procedure which you should go through each and every time you put together a marketing plan. 

We all know what the terrific results will be if everything works – but it’s just as important to have contingency plans in place if the unexpected should happen.

Remember, “experts” consider everything, including “potential problems.

If you’d like to see how I managed to score Jerry Seinfeld for the Great Building Society (a small bank in Newcastle, Australia) you might like to watch this video.

I certainly put my “potential problem analysis to the test here  - https://vimeo.com/317927013

To find out how to build a safety net procedure, visit www.wowmysales.com

Or contact us at [email protected] if you’d like to add some WOW to your business!