Eventprofslive – Venue Showcase with Leading Hotels of The World & Mortimer House

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We Event Managers are a busy lot so last night’s event was a dream.  We had presentations from six different properties in a property none of us had been to before so it was a double win!

Last nights event was held in conjunction with Leading Hotels of The World and held at Mortmier House. Leading Hotels have their London office in the stunning Mortimer House and what a fab members club it is.

Mortimer House is located right in the middle of London in Fitzrovia and just a short stroll from Tottenham Court Road Station.  It is a hub for those who wish to create, work and unwind and find a balance between the three.  Its classic design over a variety of meeting and event spaces is well worth a look whether it be to take on a membership or, hire one of their unique spaces for one of your events.  As well as the various meeting and event spaces, the ground floor of the building is home to Mortimer House Kitchen servicing Mediterranean cuisine to the public as well as their members…  You can find more details on Mortimer House here.

On arrival our guests where checked in an taken up to the sixth floor where champagne was waiting.  After a quick catch-up with new members and old, it was time to meet our hotels and listen to a brief presentation on each.  Leading Hotels have 375 uncommon properties in 75 countries (worldwide) each one more stunning and unique than the next and we were fortunate the hear from the following properties each of which were all gorgeous and would all make wonderful properties for your offsite retreats, conferences and events.

You can click on below property links to find out about each property.

Hotel Plaza Athénée – New York
La Réserve  – Genève
Majestic Hotel & SPA – Barcelona
Okura  – Amsterdam
The Lowry – Manchester
Waldhaus Flims Alpine Grand Hotel & Spa – Switzerland

We learnt that The Lowry is the place to stay in Manchester (which we will be seeing on Friday), that the Hotel Plaza Athénée is refurbed every six months, that the Majestic Hotel & Sap in Barcelona is in the best location in Barcelona and that the Waldhaus Flims property is basically like a fairy-tale, it was out of this world gorgeous.

After our presentations, we had some pretty perfect bowl food and canapes.  A truffle ravioli, my all-time favourite arancini balls and the ever popular mini burgers finished off our evening wonderfully and we all had a great night.

A huge thanks to Leading Hotels of the World (Mickael) for allowing us the opportunity to see so many wonderful properties in one evening and to Mortimer House for their fabulous hospitality.  It really was a great Tuesday.

If you would like further information on any of the properties please reach out to us and we can put you in touch!

Eventprofslive – The Goring

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Iconic and fabulous is how I would describe The Goring and it’s hard to believe when you exit the tube station at Victoria in just a five minute stroll you stumble upon it…  Not that I have anything against Victoria but you really do feel like you are a million miles away.

The Goring was the location of last week’s networking event and not to be outdone by England’s wonderful result in the World Cup that same night, it was a great night.

Our event started with champagne on arrival in The Drawing Room where we met a new member (welcome Victoria) and had a fab catch-up. Splitting into two small groups we then had a site visit of all the fab meeting and event spaces and, the bedrooms.

In regards meeting and event spaces, The Goring can accommodate 4 to 100 in any of their private rooms.  The Garden Room is the largest of their private event spaces and features its own conservatory, leading out onto The Goring’s gardens.  The Drawing Room has the most stunning woven wallpaper designed by Fromental and can host up to 12 for an event.  The Goring has a further two event spaces The Silver Room and The Boardroom both equally as stunning. You can read more on the meeting and event  spaces here.

Up next on the site visit was to see the bedrooms.  There are 69 in total with five different categories, each one individually designed and radiating the best in English design. The most luxurious being The Most Splendid Garden Rooms, overlooking The Goring’s private garden and with Gainsborough silk-lined walls, crisp Italian linen and lovingly crafted bespoke furniture, the Most Splendid Garden Rooms offer a touch of glamour.

After our site visit it was back to our private dining room for some pretty stunning canapes, more catching up and then our own private dinner.  The Goring has a Michelin Star and it’s Dining Room is one of the most admired London restaurants for fine dining.  The food was AMAZING and our group loved it.

Thank you so much to Sarah of Pineapple and Chiara from The Goring for hosting out group and showing us all of the wonderful meeting and event spaces The Goring has to offer.  It is truly stunning and we know a lot of our members can’t wait to use the private dining rooms for some pretty special corporate dinners.  Please reach out to Sarah for any further information. ​

Eventprofslive FAM – Sopwell House

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We all agreed that Sopwell House is one of those hotels that you have heard great things about but for some reason you have never actually seen it and when we did, we were a little cross with ourselves…

Located in the stunning Hertfordshire countryside on 12 hectares of picturesque grounds, Sopwell house has 128 rooms and suites and over 300 years of history and… it is only 20 minutes from St Pancras international or, less than one hour from Heathrow by car.
We had a lovely group for our FAM with one new member joining us who was (quite rightly) a little nervous about her very first event with us but I am proud to say, loved it! Ha ha

We started our event by checking into our gorgeous rooms and then meeting Dina (Sopwell House’s wonderful Key Account Manager) in the relaxed lobby for a quick chat before commencing our site visit.
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Sopwell House has 18 meeting and event spaces, all with that important natural daylight and each one furnished to a high spec. We loved the private access to the main meeting rooms with a purpose build registration desk that would be very impressive on welcoming your groups to your event. You can see full capacity charts here.

One of the stops on our site visit was The Mews which is are something dreams are made of (for both leisure or corporate). The Mews are separate from the main hotel, located within secure gates and offer greater privacy. All of the suites have access to a hydro pool and communal gardens (designed by RHS Chelsea and Hampton Court Palace Flower Show Gold award winner Ann-Marie Powell) as standard some feature fireplaces, four poster beds and their own double ended romantic baths! There are 16 in total and would be perfect to take all of them for your board level meetings. Totally private and very high-end. We were fortunate to have our own private waiter within the stunning gardens where we sipped on champagne and some lovely canapes whilst on our site visit, we felt like proper celebrities.

After our site visit, it was off for an interactive BBQ on the terrace which was a great and would also be a great idea for your delegates, something different rather than the normal private dinner, in a meeting room (not that the meeting rooms weren’t lovely).

After dinner, we had a few wines in the main hotel bar, with more gossiping and then off to bed ready for a early start at the spa. Partnering with my favourite (Clairns) and ESPA (also one of my favourite spa brands), the spa offers a fitness centre, indoor pool and an abundance of treatments that you could add-on to your guest experience.

We loved Sopwell House, it is very well priced for events and the located to London makes it perfect for away days and conferences. For more information you can reach out to Dina here and for more information on Eventprofslive, you can email us here.

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Eventprofslive

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Kate and I started Eventprosflive, a networking group run by us (Corporate Event Managers) for Corporate Event Managers and we grow bigger every day!

It is hard work working in a full time, busy Event Manager role then spending your evenings, lunch breaks and weekends working on our group but it is so worth it.

We love our members, we love our events and are so grateful to all those lovely venues who host us month after month.

If you are a Corporate Event Manger and feel daunted by the thought of attending a networking event don’t be. We promise the people you will meet will soon become friends, you’ll see some amazing venues and will come to love our Whatsapp chat to bounce ideas of other Event Managers.

We have an exciting rest of 2018 planned and you can read all about our upcoming events and membership options here!

GDPR for #eventprofs

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The date for the introduction of the new GDPR legislation from 25 May is becoming quite imminent. When it first came to light last year we are pretty sure we were not the only ones didn’t fully appreciate the gravity of the new laws or think about how they would affect our roles.  How wrong were we and evidently a lot of other fellow event mangers too as in the last few months, the introduction of the GDPR Legislation is a hot topic at any of the networking events we attend not just buyer side but supplier side too. Now, we are clued up and ready to go but you can always learn more right? 
 
If you have been living under a rock and still think I am talking about Gross Domestic Product (but not sure what the R stands for), let me give you a brief overview.  GDPR stands for General Data Protection Regulation and is specific to the 28 EU member states centring around the way members have their data handled and more importantly, the way it is used and stored.
 
For us Event Managers, we are privy to a whole range of personal data and share this data with third parties almost daily.  The more data we have on our guests and attendees the better, more tailored and personalised event experience, right?  We share everything from passport details with travel agencies to sharing dietary reports with restaurants, hotels and venues and we share personal information on those all important rooming lists.  All of this is part of our role so, it will affect us and quite a lot.  If all of that isn’t scary, what about the actual way all that data is stored and what do you do if you feel you have a breech?

Eventogy are hosting a seminar on 3 May with a panel of speakers whom, we hope, will help answer some of these questions followed by a drinks and canapé reception to be able to share what we have learned with each other.  You can register for the seminar via the link here. 

The tasting…

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I once took my husband to a tasting with me and he was in awe. We were in Barcelona and I guess to a non event manager it’s a pretty exciting prospect to spend all day eating and drinking…

We had to first taste canapés then two separate three course meals at two separate caterers with three options for each. We had to “taste” 18 separate dishes to suit the three courses and then choose from over 18 wines to suit the dishes we were going to select.

My husband was in heaven and I can see its appeal but as an event planner doing this sometimes twice a week it can be a tough chore. You have the responsibility of choosing the courses not based just on what you like but what will suit the event.  You need to choose based on the seniority of guests attending, you need to choose based on costs, theme of the event and the season your holding the event in.  You need to choose the menu based on anticipated dietary requirements, on the dominant sex attending the event and so on and so forth. Whilst it certainly isn’t a chore it is work and it is a responsibility, like the other million other responsibilities us event managers have that we take very seriously!

What are your tips and tricks when attending a tasting to ensure you choose the right menu?

Beating the Instagram Algorithm

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As an event manager, making sure your content is seen on Instagram to me, is so much more important than letting my friends see my #fitspo or #getinmybelly posts. Posts used to be seen chronologically however with the 2018 Instagram Algorithm change some reports suggest that only 10% of your audience is seeing your posts.  The new algorithm works on post engagement so how many likes, comments and general interaction your post is getting. By lots of interaction, Instagram determines that this post is engaging and thus more people will want to see it. Basically if those initial 10% engage, then the other 90% may see it. So, although my post is probably now two months old for those that stay on top of #eventtech changes for those that still need help, here are my top two tips to try and beat that algorithm.

Hashtags – I always thought loads of hashtags gave you more chance of being noticed by anyone searching for any of the 30 hashtags that Instagram allowed… This is wrong.  Apparently less is more and a couple of hashtags specific to the niche you are targeting will suffice. Instagram will see you less like a spammer and this may get more of your stuff seen.  Lots of hashtags also makes you look like you are just posting to get likes when instead, you should be sharing your posts with people who are genuinely  interested in your content.

In events we are lucky we have #eventprofs, #eventplanner and #eventtech which are of most interest to me. In theory, using these three with one of two in addition (#sitevisit #comeflywithme #production) depending on what I want people to engage on may be enough.

I have all my hashtags saved in my notepad and then copy and paste them into a post depending on the content. I keep them specific to travel posts and site visit posts, catering and food posts and general event planning posts.

Comments – try and comment and respond to your comments as quick as possible. I know this is not always ideal but to keep the momentum going it is suggested you shouldn’t really be leaving it more than an hour to respond to a comment.

Another way to boost engagement on your posts via comments is to use comments that provide a call to action. Ask a questions to start an engaging conversation but make sure they are relevant to the post. In events we could ask questions on catering, perhaps comparing two dishes, side by side at a tasting and asking for user preference to production/set design!

There is a great read here from Hootsuite that will give you more tips on how to write fabulous, engaging comments.

That’s my top two tips – let me know how you get on!

 

 

The Hospital Club – Eventprofslive Feb Event

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We at Eventprofslive are finally out of winter, we know this because this morning we had a breakfast event at The Hospital Club and we had 100 percent attendance! This would never happen in winter for an early start though it may also have something to do with the intrigue of our venue! Every one of our members had heard of it but never actually been.

The Hospital Club is based just by Covent Garden station and is a private members club for the creative industries offering the facilities it needs to connect, collaborate and create. Split over seven stories, the building has so many amazing spaces for hire from a fully equipped tv and music studio and screening room to different sized function and event spaces and to top it all off – 15 stunning hotel rooms. The spaces can be utilized for events from 2 to 300 and you can find out more about all of the spaces here.  The types of events that would suit the spaces perfectly range from general meetings to conferences, drinks receptions, lunches and dinners to private screenings. One of my favourite rooms is the Oak Room which has its own bar, lounge and adjoining balcony. The events you could hold in this room would be amazing with a capacity to take up to 125 standing, it even has its own DJ setup, ready to go!

Our event started at 8.00 am with a site visit of all the lovely event spaces followed by a tasty breakfast and catch-up with the group. I have hosted quite a few events at The Hospital Club and the food has always been outstanding. The restaurant has a three star rating from the Sustainable Restaurant Association which means their approach to locally produced food is always in season and will always (as I have witnessed) be fabulous. One of my favourite ever tastings I did was at The Hospital Club.

After a quick catch-up it was a tour of the bedrooms and then off to work which meant we all pretty much got to work on time! The bedrooms were launched in 2015 and where designed by Russell Sage Studios. They are stunning and range from standard rooms up to suites with state-of-the-art sound and vision AND rainforest showers. The best thing though is the evening turndown cocktail trolley.

We loved our breakfast and show round – big thanks to Simone and the team for hosting us. For more information on The Hospital Club or any of their meeting and events spaces contact them here.