Whether it’s an annual conference, webinar series, or one-off panel discussion featuring industry experts, events are likely a cornerstone of your association’s member engagement strategy. However, ensuring your events go off without a hitch can be complicated, especially tech-heavy ones or events hosted in virtual and hybrid environments.
An event run of show is a helpful tool for planning and executing these types of events. In this guide, you’ll find everything you need to create a run of show for your association’s next event, including:
Run of show documents are especially useful for incorporating audience engagement elements into live event sessions, which significantly improve the member experience. But before we dive into how this works, let’s begin by reviewing what a run of show is and why it matters for association event planning more generally.
An event run of show is a planning document that outlines the actions that your team will take during a live event in chronological order and explains how they should be executed. It serves as a schedule and a roadmap for your association’s internal team before and during the event.
Many different organizations and types of events benefit from a run of show, from live TV broadcasts and concerts to religious services and wedding ceremonies. For associations like yours, this document is useful for any synchronous event that requires extensive technical coordination to create the desired experience for attendees.
Besides improving the attendee experience, a run of show can provide several benefits for your association’s event planning team, such as:
To maximize these advantages, keep your run of show in a shared digital space (a folder, your association management system, etc.) and print physical copies for each staff member and volunteer. Having both formats available ensures team members can always access this document at any given moment during your event.
After learning what a run of show is and how it’s used, you might be thinking, “If I already make agendas for my association’s events, why do I also need to create runs of show?”
While an agenda and a run of show are both event schedules at their core, they differ in a few key ways, including:
It’s usually best to create your event agenda first to establish a high-level overview of what will happen (and publish it to get members excited about attending!). Then, break down each element into smaller pieces to develop your run of show.
While every organization’s runs of show will vary somewhat in content and format (and your association might produce slightly different documents from event to event), there are a few details you should always include to make this resource as useful as possible to your team. Let’s look more closely at where to put those elements and why they’re necessary.
To keep your team and your documents organized, always put a few general details at the top of a run of show. These include:
Making all of this information accessible for quick reference throughout the event will help everything run smoothly, particularly because your event planner will have to answer fewer questions about what room the next session is in and what the WiFi password is!
The majority of your run of show document will consist of a table-style schedule for each session. This table should have columns that cover:
These columns should be as detailed as possible to keep the event running smoothly. Using time slots as an example, let’s say a conference session is slated to run from 2:00-3:00 p.m. Here is how you might explain the timing of activities in your run of show:
Timing activities down to the minute like this ensures everyone knows exactly how much time they have for their portion of the session and helps your event production team to execute technical aspects of the experience right on cue.
Depending on your event’s structure, you might include a few extra elements in your run of show template to fine-tune its execution. For example, you might discuss what to do about:
Since this document can quickly become unwieldy, write as concisely as possible and use bolding, italics, and bullet points to make the most important details stand out at a glance.
To help you create your own event run of show for your association, the team at Clowder has put together an interactive template you can use to build this document. Once you’ve added everything you want to it, click “Download Now” to print your run of show or save it as a PDF.
If you’re looking for tools to share public-facing event agendas with members or incorporate different types of audience engagement activities into live sessions, Clowder has you covered there, too! Our customizable mobile app has everything you need to enhance the member experience at association events, from interactive schedules to gamification tools to push notifications. Plus, Clowder’s platform is designed for year-round engagement, so members can access all of their benefits in one place long after your event ends.
More than 150 professional associations and community organizations trust Clowder to bring members together by meeting them where they are—on their mobile devices. Explore our case studies to discover what Clowder has done for real organizations and how it can help your association boost member engagement!
A detailed run of show is critical for keeping each of your association’s events on track from start to finish. Use the tips and template above to get started, and remember to always keep the attendee experience at the forefront when developing these documents.
For more information on association engagement through events and beyond, check out these resources: