How to start an events company in South Africa

How to start an events company in South Africa

This is a guide on how to start an events company in South Africa.

Starting an events company can be an overwhelming experience, a lot of people need event planners for different events, from corporate events to social events.

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Picking a niche

Event planning is very broad, it’s often best to focus on a particular niche, especially when starting out. Events are mainly done for:

  • Celebrations (weddings, reunions, parade, birthdays, anniversaries)
  • Promotions (product launches, fashion shows, political rallies)
  • Education (conferences, graduations, meetings)
  • Commemorations.

It’s best to pick your niche, you may be tempted to do all events, but resist the temptation and choose a niche then later you can scale up.

Requirements

There are not many requirements for this business, your taste and expertise are more important than anything.

1. Operating premises

You don’t have to have an office or rent out any operating premises, this is a business that you can start directly from your home.

2. Website

One of our interviewees said that over 95% of her clients come from her website. She says most of her website visitors come from Google, from searches like “Kids party services”. A website is not only a nice to have but a necessity for this kind of business.

Do not only create a website but optimize it for SEO. The average lead conversion rate is around 3%, this means if your website gets just 5 000 people per month from Google then you are looking at over 150 of them becoming your customers. Some will not be immediate customers but approximately 150 of them will make contact with you with an intention to hire you. That’s a lot of people.

A website doesn’t have to be expensive; you can get a well-designed website from Promta Web Services for only R1 200.

Tips on how to be successful

1. Market your business

Marketing will likely determine the level of success of your business. First and foremost; build a website. It’s the first and last point of marketing, it will contain all information about your business, including the gallery of your previous work, pricing and clear sales funnel.

The next thing you should do is invest in social media marketing, create a Facebook page, Twitter and Instagram, yes, all three of them. They are all powerful in their own way. Twitter can make your business trend in no time when done correctly. You should try promoting some of your work on Facebook, just spend R5 000 on a single marketing campaign and see the remarkable results that you will get.

It’s important to invest in Google ads, you can do this while waiting for SEO to come into full effect. From my experience, Google charges around R15 per click on an advert, that’s a lot, way more than Facebook but it is usually worth it.

2. Deliver excellent service

Delivering excellent service is a form of marketing, happy clients will start recommending your event planning company to other people.

3. Work on deposits

Do not do any work unless for the event until the party deposit has been received. Do not book anything in advance if you have not received a deposit, it doesn’t matter how much the client promises to pay.

Conclusion

This was a guide on how to start an events company in South Africa. Here is a more detailed guide for How to start a business in South Africa. It contains a lot more things not covered here. Do you have any thoughts or questions? Comment below.

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