Episode 105: Five things I Learned Behind the Scenes of My First Event

Hello, hi! Today’s episode is a behind the scenes reflection on the five things I learned from hosting my very first event. Typically all episodes that end on the 5 I do my “five things saving my life” series but this episode is a switch up, 5 things I learned putting together the “Chase the Good” Event which happened live and in person on June 8! The event was incredible and surpassed all of my expectations. This episode I’ll break down a little of what it FELT like to plan, prepare and deliver on a huge (and public) step outside of my comfort zone.

 

Thoughts and Musings

• In the last year I’ve felt my ideas and curiosity growing about putting together a paid offer
• After speaking on a panel at the Healed Hearts Empowered Voices, hosted by Jam Gamble, and felt awed by the impact of an in person event
• Jam challenged me on Instagram to host an event - and because of this external accountability I felt like I could follow through or I “had” to follow through
• Then people who saw Jam on Instagram started asking me about my ideas for the event: when you speak things out into existence you engage other people in participating in your vision
• “When you speak things out loud, you call other people in, to help you achieve your dreams”

• Once the ball got rolling and people were aware that I was planning the event it started to come up in conversation and that allowed me the opportunity to receive encouragement, and advice and ideas from other people. This became a supportive context where I could do something outside of my comfort zone while feeling encouraged. 
• Chasing the Good for me is about gratitude and presence while balancing the experience of being a millennial woman and mother. Understanding that we were heavily conditioned to want a specific kind of life and now coming of age to recognize that we’re not sure what we REALLY want, and what we’ve been taught to believe we want. Chasing the Good is about how to go after MORE of what you truly want, and to filter out what you’ve been conditioned to think you want.
• The event was an incredible success with a great group of women
• I had to do a lot of inner work to prepare myself to step outside of my comfort zone and share a paid offer with my audience

 

Things I learned

1. Picking a date is hard: Eventually I had to realize that there was no perfect date for the audience (especially busy women and mothers) and I had to go with the choices that felt right and easy to me.
2. Food is hard to plan for and will eat up your event margins: I ordered 50% more food than I needed! But even though food is hard to plan for it’s absolutely essential to make people feel cared for during the event.
3. Events are not for making money - at least not your first event! And even though making money wasn’t the goal for me, I was still curious to see what would happen from hosting a paid event.
4. Gift Bags are not a big deal and they make people really happy. Even though I spent way too much time overthinking what to put in the gift bag, they are an essential part of any future events that I might have.
5. Hosting your event comes hand in hand with a lot of hard work on your mindset. Thankfully with guidance and coaching from Siobhan France I was able to work on understanding this mindset. I gained trust that my offers will find the people they are for and the people they aren’t for are still served by other kinds of content that I offer. While I’ll still have to work on this for future offers, the barrier to entry is way lower now that I’ve built trust from this first experience.

 

What will I do with this package of content? WHere can I take it and modify it for other audiences? I’m going to wait and see before I decide but I do want to do SOMETHING with the content. If you have any ideas within you to share content and passion with an audience - You CAN do it, of COURSE you can. 

Other Episodes referenced

The Happiness Challenge with Ellen Wong

Episode 74 How to Be a Human with a Voice with Jam Gamble

 

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• Email: mediumladytalks@gmail.com 
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