Let’s just get this out there: event planning is hard. It takes a special type of person (and when we say “special,” we mean extremely organized, strategic, and detail-oriented) to plan and execute events for a living – not to mention do it well.
Tiffany Ashitey and Tasha Morris of creative agency, Benchmark Creative Group, run SHEBOSS – an event series that helps women navigate the unspoken rules of business and explore universal issues that aren't always spoken about (think: money management, being your own advocate, and the reality of being the only female in the room).
After a SHEBOSS event hosted at Splash HQ, we sat down with Tiffany and Tasha to pick their brains: about the company they’ve built, their go-to event strategy, and career advice for first-time event planners. Check out what they had to say:
Tiffany: We are a Brooklyn-based, female-led creative agency, and we work with brands to bridge the gap between their offline community and their online community.
A lot of times brands will have a lot of social followers, but they’ll fail to engage with them in person – or vice versa. Since we have so much experience with events and they’re at the heart of what we love, we focus a lot of our work on social and event activations to connect the online with the offline.
Tasha: Our most recent and biggest client is Black Tech Week, which is historically a weeklong conference in Miami that focuses on building a minority-focused ecosystem in the tech world.
They’ve now turned that single conference into a city tour across the U.S. – most recently in NYC last month. We’ve been working with them on their expansion into a roadshow, and developing strategies for getting the word out to each city.
Tiffany: SHEBOSS literally started as an everyday conversation. Tasha, my friend, and I were talking about a rough work day and two questions arose. One: How come men don't seem to go through these things? And two: Are other women going through this and just not talking about it?
From that, SHEBOSS was born. Our first event was in March 2017, very appropriately a part of Women's History Month.
Tiffany: Whether you’re an entrepreneur, still climbing the ladder, or already in the C-suite – these are things that you have, will, or someone around you has experienced.
We knew we needed to find and unite other women who were experiencing the same professional issues. By creating this dialogue, and bringing in dynamic speakers with amazing stories, our hope is to give women the tools to help them navigate their professional lives.
Tiffany: Before we decide on speakers, we look at the topic we’re tackling and build a formula. We think thoughtfully about what would make a panel conversation more dynamic and more engaging – we target speakers from different sectors who can all speak on the same subject, but have unique perspectives.
Tasha: Once we have a good idea of what we’re looking for, we’ll reach out to our network of old colleagues and college friends. We also go to a lot of heavy networking events to meet people.
And sometimes... we do cold outreach. We’ll go through LinkedIn and target specific people who we think would be great. And we always do research on if they’ve done other speaking engagements in the past – just because someone is knowledgeable, doesn’t necessarily mean they’re great at public speaking.
Tasha: After an event, we’ll send a recap email. We’ll follow up with photos for people to check out, or a follow-up from the actual panelists. It can be anywhere from two to three newsletters just to keep the community talking about the event and engaged.
Do you find that the people who go to your events are much more engaged in your marketing strategy than the people who haven’t?
Tiffany: Absolutely. When people attend one of our events and then they get our newsletter, they feel more connected. We’ve seen a lot of replies off of our newsletter, like, "Thanks for sending this! This is awesome!" And I don't think that would happen unless we had connected with them in-person at one of our events.
Tiffany: A lot of times event planners assume in advance that the room is just going to get full. But it doesn't happen unless you put in the work behind it.
It’s important in your pre-event communications to make sure people understand what they’re going to get out of the event. Value is crucial, which is why we’re so thoughtful about the topic and the speakers we’re featuring at our events.
Tasha: We also rely on our partners. We make sure they have all the tools they need to spread the word – whether it’s a flier, specific messaging, or hashtags and social media handles to include. And then we’ll also do a flash sale or a promo to incentivize people to buy tickets.
Tiffany: It’s getting people to believe in our mission. It’s not easy to find speakers, partners, or venues – trying to convince these people that our event is worth their time, whatever they’d be contributing – that’s an uphill climb.
Tiffany: My biggest piece of advice is do your homework.
Don't just assume that because you have a great idea, or you have a lot of followers on social, that nothing is going to go wrong. There is no such thing. Something always goes wrong, so be prepared – but don't let that stop you from doing it.
Tasha: It’s also really important to make sure that your message goes beyond your current reach. So if there’s anything you could do today, it’s to find partners and create allies that believe in what you do. That way, when you’re ready to launch, they’re there to help you along the way.
Tiffany: Our company’s future is multifold. The future of our company is to create a large, seven-figure agency. We want 25 people that are passionate and have that hustle about events, marketing, and branding.
For SHEBOSS, we want to build it into a national conference, and either take it on tour or find a hub city.
Tasha: After last year, we asked ourselves, “where do we want this to go?” Because there’s no point in doing anything if there’s no goal. We knew we needed to grow this into a national conference. Because if people are having this conversation in New York, who’s to say they’re not having it in LA, Houston, or Charlotte?
Want to up your event game? Watch our Run of Show videos for expert tips on securing guest speakers, maximizing event engagement, and finding partners and sponsors (downloadables included!).
