#39 - Attracting media and effective promotional event timelines

President of Corbett Public Relations, Bill Corbett, breaks down the timeline of promoting events and building a personal brand. He includes advice on attracting media, as well as how to prepare for a successful media interview. 

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Savannah (Purplepass): 

Welcome back to the EventBuzz podcast where we are discussing all things events with industry experts. Our next guests, Bill Corbett is a seasoned PR and media relations expert. With over 30 years experience. He has promoted hundreds of events including business trade shows, carnivals, fairs, festivals, charity events, and so much more. 

All including development of promotional plans, crisis management, and event media coverage. He also serves as an executive board member of the Marty Lions Foundation, a not for profit organization that has granted over 7000 wishes for children with chronic and life threatening illnesses. 

Let's welcome our next guest to the show. 

Hey, Bill, thanks for joining us on the show today, we are really excited to have you and get to know more about your background and your experience with the event space. 

How are you doing today?

 

Bill Corbett: 

I'm doing great. Savannah, how you doing? 

Savannah: 

I'm doing great. I did a little intro for listeners about you. But why don't we have you just kind of tell us how you got started with the event space in general? 

Bill: 

Well, my father was involved in some very big events, you might have heard the Rose Bowl parade. And he used to run professional tennis matches in the 80s. Actually, the first women's tennis matches with parity with equal pay in the United States. That was pretty cool. So I used to go to those matches. And I learned a little bit from watching him organize them and said, hey, it's interesting to be with famous people. To be on events that are televised, and some events that got a lot of media coverage. And that kind of got the bug in me. 

And then we started a firm in the early 90s. And then from that point on, we've been doing PR work and promotional work for events, for you know, a variety of different things, everything from charity, golf events, to balloon festivals, concerts, poem shows, you name it, and I think about eight to 10 million people have attended events that we've promoted. 

And the vast majority of those people have purchased tickets. And we work with a lot of other clients that aren't just event related. But everybody has events from now and again, you know, from conferences, to retreats, to grand openings, you know, celebrations and galleries. So it's part of the whole PR, media relations package that we offer. And it's fun. Like we like to be out with people and create these exciting and interesting events. 

Savannah: 

Yeah, and luckily now that now we're finally seeing more and more events, again, after the whole pause of about two years with a pandemic, which was rough. But yeah, it's, it's finally starting to pick up which is been really exciting. Especially on our end to because we do events. So we're like, yay. 

Bill: 

I've had a lot, you know, we did a lot of virtuals. But now it's good to be back when people feel more excited about it happy to be with people. I was at an event the other day, everybody was really, you know, really jazzed up in business was happening and good vibes. 

Savannah: 

Yes. Okay, awesome. So I wanted to start out by asking, basically, it might be a really broad question. But when developing promotional plans for events, where do you start? I know a lot of people, especially new people in like, the event world don't really know what to where to start, because there's so many things you can do. 

Bill: 

Right? Well, my, my belief is, it's never too early to start, you have to start, you know, as far in advance as you can. And I like to create a calendar that starts literally, the the end date of the calendar is about a month after the event, right? Because there's things you got to do to wrap up the event, right? And then I work my way backwards to where I am today, you know, it could be six months could be a year can be a little over a year, right? And then we put some milestones in there for when we need to get things taken care of, you know, whether it's media announcements, or, or videos or things like that along the way. 

So that's the first thing is start start early. 

And then I like to set goals, and I work with my clients to set their goals, you know, so do we, what is our goal? 

How many tickets do we want to sell? 

How many people do we want to have at our event? 

What what type of event do we want to have? 

What what's memorable about it? 

Why should people come? 

You know, to put all that into a package or into a plan, and then that'll help you to have a little bit of a roadmap to follow along the way to get folks interested in coming especially if they're going to travel, you know from across the country. You have to plan that out well in advance and then start the publicity part of it and figure it out as part of your publicity you know, announcing speakers announcing what's going to happen at the event announced how to get tickets presale, all those interesting, newsworthy events that happen along the way. 

We're again, we're primarily the PR arm, the publicity arm of a event management. But we've done some event management ourselves. We've run many events, but we really our forte is the promotion of those events that put people through the gate or people in the seats, as we say. 

Savannah: 

Yeah, okay, exactly. And when it comes to public relations, which is, like you said, your area of expertise, where do events start with when it comes to attracting the media for the events? Because I know that alone can be pretty intimidating. Or, again, another thing where it's like the Where do Who do I talk to where do I go? 

Bill: 

You know, certainly, you know, there's so many different types of events, I've done everything from like, you know, ComiCon type events, to charity, golf tournaments, with celebrities there to, to comb shows, you know, so it depends on the type of event. 

But if you can get information ahead of time about who's going to be there, let's just say a celebrity, or an act of some kind, or the expert speaker, who's your keynote, or, you know, at your event, or maybe it's a home show, with some new technology for home installation, whatever it is, right? If you know that in advance, then you can start pitching that out to the media, well, certainly, you're going to do a press release, that announces the event. And little calendar releases that you can post online and, and get out. So you want to do that as early as possible to get on the calendar and, and let people know about it. 

And then you know, a few months out, at least I would say six months out, start contacting your regional media, if this is a consumer event where you know, local people are invited to come, if it's more of an industry event, it's more targeted, but if it's a consumer event, you want to reach out to your regional newspapers or regional TV and get them to understand what's happening, and why it would be interesting to cover it. And you know, from a newspaper perspective, if you can provide them with I did a balloon festival in the past, I've done concerts and other things, you know, you want to get them the photographs, you want to get them the information, you want to get them the key talking points, and how that event will be interesting for people from the region to come to. And then certainly how it how it connects into whether it's entertainment, but if it connects into any kinds of trends, maybe it's a technology show of some kind, obviously, there's so much home technology now. So that's an interesting trend, if you were doing a Home Show, or you know, if it's, you know, we're back, we're back connecting again, and even if it's a comedian, or a keynote, or you're going to you want to say that, hey, these people are going to be in person and educate them about when it's going to be and if you have limited ticket sales, you know, you want to start promoting that well ahead of them. 

Savannah: 

So when you are kind of pitching this idea to the media, or different outlets, you kind of want to connect with you would suggest with this pitch to include as much detail as possible about your event, including like demographics, who's going to be there, talent, etc. 

Bill: 

Absolutely. You want to you want you want to create some excitement, you know, I've worked with, with with celebrities and other others. And if, whenever possible, we try to get some interviews ahead of time. You know, I did work with William Shatner, you know, from Star Trek one time, he did some great interviews for us, Lou Ferrigno from back in the days of the Hulk and, and some other people, so they were very generous with their time doing 10 or 15 minute interviews, you know, well in advance. But same, same thing with some business speakers, I have a client speaking this week at a university there in the paper today to help boost some sales. 

So anything you can do ahead of time, and you can get those people who are your, your, the people that others are coming to see it with a band or with an actor, or whatever it is, they'll see if you can get them ahead of time. 

If they won't, if they don't have time to do it, which is not uncommon, you know, you can still get comments, you can still get a quote, you can still get information, you can still get their headshot, and you can get that information out to to the media, you know, well in advance. And obviously, as you get closer and closer to the event, the media is a little bit more interested in it, then it's six months out. So you want to think about the long term, the midterm, and then the short term right before the event and even the day of the event. You know, if you can get, you know, even the day right before I should say, you know, reach out to TV and other people to see what type of coverage you can get, especially if you have some visuals that you can present the day before. 

Savannah: 

Okay, that makes sense. And when it comes to the media and doing interviews or you know, talking about your event, are do you have any tips or some ways to kind of prepare to have a successful media interview? 

Bill: 

Oh, absolutely. So I don't and I've even done this. I've had clients that gotten opportunities to be on TV, and we've done a little practice session with them. And I've not let them go on television because they just weren't ready for it. You know? And that doesn't, that doesn't mean they're bad people. And that doesn't mean that they're not smart people. But it's, it's, it's some special skills that you need to have, or at least practice, you need to have to be prepared to do some of these to do an interview, especially television, it's a little bit more forgiving, obviously, if you're going to do a, you know, over the phone interview with a newspaper reporter. 

So one you want to prepare, I always think of interviews as like a performance, you know, a person actor wouldn't go on stage, if they weren't prepared, you know, to do their role or sing in their Broadway show, if they were, if they forgot the words, and they forgot their lines are the lyrics to the song and this dance moves on on Broadway, that they're not going to be a very successful performer. They're going to not be probably in the next show. So you want to practice this, you want to make sure you have all this information ahead of time ready, and very good. 

Television, we live in the world of sound bites, and most most events, most regional or local events, they're not going to do a long form interview, you know, they're going to do a, Hey, this is coming up at the Civic Center this weekend, right? And they're gonna get hey, you know, the person who's speaking usually has the opportunity to make three very quick points. And I call it the rule of three, it's not, you know, I didn't invent it. There's other there's other people who are trainers who use the same rule, but three, three key points. 

And very, very quick, the typical TV interviewer is about a minute and 30 seconds long. And a typical quote, is between eight and 15 seconds. So if your expert or your show producer, or manager is able to get two or three15 Second quotes, well, that's about half the story, right? So if they're, if they know those three points down, very, very succinctly, you know why it's the event is interesting? You know, what's the cause? What's the details? And when it's happening, and really, you're missing out? If you're not going to be there, it's throwing some FOMO. Right? And, and really get that out there in a clear, concise way. 

You know, don't be rambling. Don't be umming, don't be... 

Savannah: 

That's hard 

Bill: 

Well that's why you need to practice, right? Yeah. Even podcasts like this, you want to think about before you do them. And then you want to look at look at your notes and think a little bit about what you're going to say. So that's that's like a little bit of media one on one, the rule of three, then you want to do something, you want to teach them a little bit about length of the interview. Again, you don't want to ramble on too long, where to look and what to do. If you are doing a television interview, you don't want to be having crazy hands and looking all over the place, you want to make sure you concentrate on looking at the reporter or the TV camera. And and then you also want to be prepared to you know, invite the media down to cover the event itself. 

Television interviews, that's one animal, you know, if you're doing newspaper interviews, you can talk a little bit more, you can give a little bit more detail. And it's always important to I like to have somebody listen in on a call. And this is not like eavesdropping or anything. But it's when you're when the person is being interviewed, there might be a point where maybe they maybe they said the price of a ticket was incorrect, or the opening time was incorrect. Or just wanted to add add something, hey, we not we don't only have this great technology at the show, we also have x and y. So you want to maybe follow up with the reporter and give him some details. 

And maybe the person who's doing the interview doesn't have the images doesn't have the video clips. And that's really important too today is making sure you have we used to just we used to have so many different pictures of like say it was a trade show or a Comic Con type of show. And we have headshots of people and we have pictures of technology, or whatever some kind of product doesn't really tell the story nowadays, you can have a little little video clips of your speakers, video clips of maybe maybe this is an annual event you have past year, video and images, you know, bring that all together. It's very important to archive information from the event you're doing so you can use it to promote the next year's event. I can't even tell you how many times I get called and say hey, we need some images from last year. So we can promote this year. And then they use this year as you know, in a subsequent years, but I've even had stuff done three and four and five years before that was used. That's really, really important for for media interviews ahead of time and your your interviewee, your show producer really needs to know the why why why should people come to this event? 

Why is it exciting? 

Why is it interesting? 

And again, if it's an industry event, you know, the language would be a little bit different. But you know, if you're talking to accountants or you're talking to contractors or whoever you're talking to, the message is going to change a little bit. But you still need to express the why you know if you're not if you're not going to be there, you're really going to miss out on some opportunity or entertainment or whatever it is. 

So I thought we talked about the rule of three, it's important to have talking points, it's important to tell people what to expect at the show. And then I also like to make sure we have other people lined up like other your experts, who are going to be at your show or at your event, your speakers, your exhibitors, if you're doing a home show or a conference, and have those people all already well ahead of time as well, because that's the flavor of the event. 

If you're doing a conference, for example, and there's going to be, again, new technology there, maybe it's solar, or, you know, new applications that can do different things. If they want the publicity to write, so you want to work as a team you want to show to help the people who are the exhibitors bring their product to the television stations, because that makes it interesting. And then that's ahead of time. And then then they're going to want to come down to the show and see that you know, that new technology in, you know, being used, I can give you a quick example if we have time. 

So I have a client that invented the first vape detector for high schools, right? They they put vape detectors in these high schools to catch the kids vaping and a kid vapes and then the alert goes off. 

Savannah: 

What! 

Bill: 

Yeah. And then it goes to school security, or the principal or somebody and they come down, and they, they tell the kids not to vape or whatever, you know. So but it's pretty cool technology, right? So when they're at trade shows, we coordinate with the trade show producers, and say, hey, this is new technology. And then, you know, in Denver, in Miami, and all these other places where this company has been local TV stations have come down to interview them. So it helps both the show, it helps my client, and you know, and it creates a little buzz. And then it almost always still dealt, they won't be the only ones in the story, they'll talk to another exhibitor, or someone at the show or producer or something like that. So it's a way to leverage each other, to create a louder message. You know, sometimes you gotta, you gotta have some rules with your show producer. But in the big scheme of things, you know, you want to get publicity. And that's cool publicity for the entire show. 

And, and everybody, everybody wins, you know, and you got to, you got to be a little careful, sometimes things aren't that interesting. So, but people think they are, you got to be a little bit careful in that perspective. 

So you want to prepare, and you want to prepare your exhibitors and other people ahead of time to, if you're going to, if you're going to be promoting them as the show producer or show promotional company, you need video from them, you need pictures from them. And you need a little sheet for a press release for them that tells you what their product does. 

Is it vape detection? 

Or is it other other interesting technology that the media would want to know about? 

So collecting all this information ahead of time, that's why when I said at the beginning, it's never too early to start, you know, you want to be getting all this information and create your checklists, and really start promoting it, you know, ahead of time, so that people attend. Yeah, the media gains, gains interest. 

Savannah: 

Yeah, I feel like too, with presenting this information, and doing interviews and stuff, you kind of have to make it really digestible. And just like really fast, get to the point. I feel like our attention spans, at least the consumers are really short now with social media, and whatnot, we kind of expect to like know things right away. And what does it tell us? Why we want it really fast? 

Bill: 

Do you know what the average attention span of an American is today? 

Savannah: 

Probably really, really short. What is it? 

Bill: 

Six seconds, it's, it's the same as a goldfish. 

Savannah: 

That's, that's hard. It's hard to let people know what something is in 6 seconds. 

Bill: 

It's hard to get a message out in six seconds. That's one of those videos, little videos on Instagram are like, at the longest, they're 30 seconds, you know, so people. So six seconds, people can only remember really three things. That's why the sync points are very important. Think about it, even if you're at a trade show, and you're talking about shows here, and someone's walking down the aisle, right? And in your booth is 12 feet, 18 feet, whatever the distance is, there's someone's gonna walk by that quicker than six seconds, right? 

So you got to create something, you know, that's interesting, that they'll look over at you know, for that to catch their attention, so that they maybe step into the booth and talk with the, the exhibitors. So if you're gonna be doing a conference or a trade show, so I tell them, that's, that's my spiel when I'm talking to them to when you're doing when you're creating your booth. It's got to be something that's eye catching and interesting. For more than, you know, more than a few seconds because that'll do it or people just walk in. 

Savannah: 

Yep. That's the most challenging part with anything, when it comes to marketing and whatnot is catching their attention in that short amount of time that we have. And I feel like it's gonna it's going downhill because you these TikTok videos are getting shorter, and then you just scroll down like no. So, yeah, it's definitely a challenge. And I also wanted to just talk to you really quick, I was reading kind of about, I was reading your profile, and throughout your website and whatnot. And you mentioned, combining PR and personal branding, I was wondering if you could just expand on this and explain why having the two and having them together are really important. 

Bill: 

Well, you know, people, everybody has their own brand. And I don't care if you're a salesperson for a company, you're a CEO, or even if you're the cashier, you know, everybody, everybody has a reputation. Everybody has an image that they projected in the business world, right. So I believe that people must be cultivating and building their their brand at all times. So that we, and I know LinkedIn is one of the things you saw on LinkedIn is a very important place for a person that again, doesn't matter who they are. And if you're not belittling a cashier, cashier does a good job, that's usually a starter job, but you want to you want to be in a place like LinkedIn. And then that'll help you build your career. 

And, and it doesn't just mean externally build your career, like leaving from one company to go to another, it helps it can help you internally, within a company, because you create connections, you show people what you can do. And it projects it both to the internal audience and the external audience. So I believe that one, you need to have a plan, just like we talked about trade show or an event plan, need to have a plan for your brand. And to think about what you want to have for your career. What are your goals? What are your objectives, and you want to take a proactive approach to that we're in a pretty interesting world today where you know, employers are need employees, right. And that that's a good a good situation. And we need employees, but it's like it especially, you know, important right now, because we're having a challenge getting them. 

But for the employee or their prospective employee, this is a great time to you know, promote what you do promote what you'd like to do, put it out on social media, put it out on LinkedIn, and then tell people show people how you're motivated, interested, and knowledgeable. And that'll help you get a job. And that'll help you move up in the in your career. So I'm always a believer in maximizing your LinkedIn profile. That means cultivating it and curating it in a way that it talks to people about why you're a good person to work with are good person to hire, perhaps, or a good person to work with in terms of like, work with a PR firm like mine, you know. So you always want to answer the question why, and you want to integrate a lot, a lot of things into it. 

I say your personal your, your LinkedIn profile is where your personal brand lives. But your content in your posting is how it comes to life. Right. So your, your, when you curate content in the, in the blogging platform there that you know, the that you can write long form content, which is great. You can share videos on LinkedIn, and YouTube and everywhere else, and do all that with that with, with with goals in mind, where do you want your career to be? 

What do you want to be when you grow up? 

Or how big do you want to be? 

Or if you're a CEO already, or a manager or owner, you want to be building that brand? 

Because people are attracted to leaders. And in this world of challenging hiring, I'm being I'm being asked by CEOs to say hey, how can I revamp my LinkedIn profile to help show that I'm a good leader, our company's growing, and I'm good to the people that work for me, you know, so we're doing that in a couple of occasions in a couple of situations right now. So that's, that's really important. So you always want to be building your brand, you always want to be getting out there I call it ABC always be connecting, you know, want to be connecting with as many people as you can, and growing that network that's very, very valuable. Those people that are in your network are the people that you're going to get business from, you're going to get opportunities from, you're going to build relationships with and who knows, who knows where it goes, right? 

But someone who sits on the sidelines and doesn't do any of these things, is not going to have those opportunities presented to them. You know, it's you have to create your own opportunities in the world, you know, and that's what people have to do. And that's why that's why going to events is is great, because you're interacting with people now like face to face, which is awesome. And you can build those relationships, and then you can then those people that you meet at trade shows and networking, well, those that people that you want to integrate into your LinkedIn and integrate into your social media, you may not see them again, maybe ever, if you meet them at a trade show, and they just never cross paths again. 

But you could become lifelong, you know, LinkedIn contacts and do business with each other, even if you're in different parts of the country, even if you're in different industries, or who knows and sometimes I've even seen people I know and LinkedIn and like maybe met a couple of times, but they're in different parts of the country. And you know, if I'm In Miami or I'm index, you know, Austin or something Place those that people I would I would potentially look up, you know, and see if they want to get together for lunch, because I'm not normally in those areas. 

Savannah: 

Yeah, and now you have a contact. 

Bill: 

You know LinkedIn is a great such a great place if you are, you know, doing a podcast like this or if you were in an article in the newspaper or your you an interview on television, you know, if it's business related, you know, you want to share it on on those platforms to show and reinforce, that you're knowledgeable, you're an expert. And you're, you're worth listening to. And that's really why podcasts and TV interviews, interview experts, and then you need to do whatever you can to expand that audience and have more people listen or see or read the information that you're sharing. 

And I'm a big believer in sharing. There's a great book by a fellow named Adam Grant. It's a book called "Give and Take". 

And he describes the world as people as givers, takers, and matchers. And this gives people who give and share and, and help others along. And there's the people who take who really don't care about others. And there's the people who match and the people who match are networkers and facilitators and people who bring people together. Interestingly enough, we know that takers eventually meet their demise in most cases, facilitators usually go along pretty well and interact with people. And givers do very well, the ones who are given, you know, given think about others, but also givers can take it a little bit too far and give a little bit too much of their time and effort. And don't focus on their careers a little bit. So that's a little bit of a warning sign. 

Some people like a really nothing wrong with charity, but you know, you should focus on your career focus on what you do. And, you know, certainly charity can be a component to it, but don't give too much to charity, and let your career suffer, you know, so that that's the point he makes in the book, and I concur. So the so that's a little bit about personal branding, and all that when you build your brand, then the media does become interested in you and your area of expertise, maybe it's an industry, or maybe it is a regional newspaper, or regional business paper. 

And they'll call you and and ask you for your commentary, but usually PR activities are proactive, you have to reach out to the media, and, and plant the seed, if you would have the idea. And that's a little bit about that. 

I do want to make one quick point about special events and promoting them. I'm a big fan of a local connection. You know, and this really helps, you know, we used to do a lot of trade shows, home shows. So whenever we did those home shows, we frequently would partner up with a local charity, like a Habitat for Humanity or something like that. And we would, we would, we would build homes, you know, on the property of the Home Show, and, you know, or do the framing out part of it. And then they would take that framing part back to the back, you know, back to where they're building the home, you know, and then partner with charities and charity partnerships and a local connection usually, it's almost irresistible, you know, to the media. They know their local charities, they see a visual skies, hammering and gals hammering, you know, a framework of a home together, doing other proactive things to promote charities. We did, we did like a sensory room for folks with on the autism spectrum at a show one time. So think things like that, you know, are different and they create that visual and local interest. And, and I would be remiss without saying, you know, anytime you can be part of a trend or news, it's, it's, it's helpful. 

So we talked about the hiring trend. But if when you when you're doing an event, if your speaker is talking about hiring, or HR or diversity, you know, those are really hot topics right now. And I would think the media would cover them in advance and perhaps come down, you know, the day of the event and cover that as well. 

Savannah: 

Yeah, that's a that's a great point. I feel like people are really attracted to events that are connected to a nonprofit or giving back or even, you know, partnering with local vendors or sustainability. Those are all other really important topics, I think. I don't know, I think it's just people want to help. And they want to contribute the way they can and, and events that partner give them an ability to do so. So that's a really good point. And another way that you can attract, like you said, the media as well. 

And you so for your clients that you work with, I just wanted to touch a bit on, you know, what you do and who you are with before we leave, but do you is it worth is it throughout the states or? 

Bill: 

Yeah, I worked I worked with clients in the really North America, Canada, United States. I havn't done anything in Mexico a long time and occasionally we do stuff overseas, but for the most part, it's North America. In that we've we've had stories in Hawaii. haven't hit Alaska yet. But no, we've worked with clients pretty much in every state, most of our clients are in the New York Regional market, and we help them grow out from here. But we also have clients come into here, you know to because it's a desirable market, we're on Long Island where it's 3 million people. We're right outside of New York City. So it's a you know, it's a, it's a good market for a lot of different types of businesses competitive market, but a good market. So we kind of go bring people out and bring people in. We have clients in other parts of the country. And it's, it's good to get out to Florida and Texas, places like that, to get the media to cover them and tell their stories, because as we love to do is, we love to tell the stories of entrepreneurial focus companies and promote their events. 

And, you know, when you talk about personal branding, we love to promote entrepreneurs, and CEOs who are visionary people who create interesting things like vape detectors, for schools and interesting lighting, you know, displays and our clients range from a railroad to, I work with a great guy who is 25 year old gentleman who has down syndrome. His name is John Cronin. He's has a company called John's Crazy Socks. He's been all over the country spoken at many events, he's, uh, you know, he and his dad are keynote speakers. So we're working with them, to bring them into events, he's talking about diversity, they, they talk about, you know, employing people with differing abilities in the workplace. 

And it's really a, it's a pleasure to work with them. And they love to be sharing their message. And whenever they travel, like we were talking about before, if they're in, they're in Wisconsin, or if they're in California, or they're in Florida, they attract attention. 

So that's a lesson that event planners can use is to leverage the power of your speakers, because oftentimes, they'll they'll help you get that coverage for your event, and they love to do it. It's a good, it's a good good partnership to have. But you have to plan it out in advance. So it's important for the speakers and the event promoters and the management companies to be in good close contact ahead of time that know what expectations are. 

Savannah: 

Yeah, I totally agree. It's a, it's a, you're reaching a whole new audience with your speakers or whoever you're collaborating with. So like you said, the more advanced and advanced you can do it, the better. These have been amazing tips and advice. And I know they're really going to help our event planners, because the media and the PR world can sometimes be a little intimidating. So this will help them know kind of where to start. And you know what it might look like for them moving forward. But I really appreciate your time today and hopping on this podcast with me. I really enjoyed it. Is there anything else you wanted to add before we part ways? 

Bill: 

No? Well, I guess one last thing, it was really, really good. And I just want to let people know that there are you have to be prepared for problems. You know, and we've done a lot of crisis management over the years. And a lot of that really related to a lot of events we've done. But as part of that planning process, please think about what could go wrong, and have a plan to deal with it. 

Because, you know, these a lot, sometimes they're large events with 10,000, 20,000 people and things do happen today. So from a security perspective, we've dealt with the health perspective. But you know, a little bit of pre thinking, like, what would you do if something were to happen is super, super important. 

You know, I've had situations of weather events and power outages and even some criminal activity with it with a stabbing one time, you know, so you want to really be understanding what to do, who to call, and what the what the event staff should do in that event. 

A lot of times, if you're at a venue, it's one thing but if you're at a maybe you're in rented a field or something, or you have a concert or you have a you have some other other situation, you just want to make sure you know how to get in touch with law enforcement, police fire, and be prepared. If the media starts covering, you know, something that was negative, when you've spent all this time through long time to run a great event. You know, five minutes of bad stuff can can ruin you can ruin an event for the if it's a multi day event. That's one thing but if it's a one day event, it shuts down. You know, that's that's not good. So have to think, think ahead of time. I think the pandemic taught us a lot about thinking at a time and being flexible and being being that way. But I do want to make that point before we ended because, you know, we talked about planning, but you want to be prepared, you know if something bad were to happen, and you know that that a little bit of preparation makes a big difference. 

Savannah: 

Yeah, that's an excellent point, because you never know like you said you had a stabbing an event, an event and a little bit of coverage and now you're an event that had a stabbing and that's what you're known for. 

Bill: 

Yeah. 

Savannah: 

So, which is so unfortunate. Yeah, you never know especially in the world we live in today. You never know what could happen. So plan for everything. And again do in advance! 

Bill: 

Do it in advance, so that's the lesson for today. Very good. Thanks Savannah, appreciate it! 

Savannah: 

Thank you so much. I appreciate your time.