How to Find the Perfect Event Venue Online

Finding the perfect event venue can turn out to be a tedious task, especially when you have to hunt for ideas online. Considering that the event venue can prove to be a make-or-break factor and one that will have the largest impact on your event, suffice it to say that every aspect of the event – from speakers to food to ambience – depends on the event venue and location you end up choosing.

While all this may sound a bit intimidating, we are here to help you understand the best way to find the perfect event venue online. Just a set of simple rules to follow and you can have the best and most reliable venue that will bring your event to life.

First Things First – Begin Looking Early

When it comes to event venue hunting, the earlier the better. Once you have clearly formulated the budget, estimated event size and spatial requirements of your upcoming event, it is best to get onto the event venue search immediately. Ideally, you should try booking a venue at least 8 months in advance so that you have enough time on your hands to plan around other critical aspects, including speaker and attendee mobilisation, creation of event program or website and its promotion on social media, sponsorships, ticket sales, attendee engagement, and so on.

The Location: Convenience is a Must

The first and one of the most important factors that you should consider right in the initial planning stages itself, event location matters a lot when it comes to costs and convenience. For a local event, for instance, you might want to host your event at a reasonable distance from most attendees’ homes or workplaces. For an event that will see maximum attendees travelling from afar, the venue could be situated near the airport for ease of access.

The idea is to visualise convenience and costs for event attendees in terms of traffic, transport, parking, and accommodation, and then arrive at the venue location. At the same time, the location should be aligned to your own budget and logistics constraints.

The Numbers: Venue Capacity and Rooms

When deciding on the perfect event venue, the next step would be to carefully assess its capacity and compare it with your requirements. Always overestimate your needs rather than underestimating to avoid any event day hassles.

Therefore, your event venue should have sufficient breathing room for not just the number of attendees you are expecting, but also any additional attendees that might show up and register on the day of the event. In any case, additional breakout spaces or rooms will only give you additional flexibility that will not be wasted and will help attendees feel more at ease.

Digital Connectivity: WiFi Capabilities

These days, events and conferences demand high-speed digital connectivity not just for facilitating presentations but also keeping attendees connected. WiFi connectivity has today become a necessity for productivity for all forms of business alike. This is why the best event venues will have high-speed WiFi access available for use on the day of your event.

You should enquire beforehand about the capability of the WiFi facility to handle all of the traffic for your guests. Most hotels have a dedicated WiFi signal for events, but it is always a good idea to check. Data transfer speeds must stay above 8 to 12 Mbps to allow smooth internet usage even with higher levels of traffic. You might even want to run a test on the event network of the venue to be sure. The last and undoubtedly most important factor to consider would be the cost of the WiFi, for it is usually not free during events. However, make sure you do not have to spend a fortune for it. You can easily sell sponsorship of WiFi to an advertiser or add a fee on guests using the facility.

Logistics: Transport and Parking Options

When coming down to making the perfect venue choice, it is important to consider what transport options you are giving to attendees and speakers to arrive at the event. If possible, your event venue must be well-connected to rail services, bus routes and ridesharing facilities. It would be ideal to have a hotel at walking distance from the venue that could house some of the attendees or speakers on request.

While some delegates would choose public transport or walking to the venue, others will still prefer driving to the event, which is why it is important to note the parking facilities available at the venue. The venue must have its own designated parking facility or at least some local parking options, car parks or street parking facility nearby. You can easily get in touch with the local options available and reserve the required number of spaces. The costs can be included within the ticket prize of those who wish to drive to the event.

Comfort: Amenities, Services and Accessibility

Apart from offering the basic requirements, your event venue must also be able to cater to other important amenities and services.  Accessibility is a key factor for any successful event along with factors such as A/V equipment (lighting, speakers, microphones, video equipment) Make sure that the venue provides tables and chairs and quality catering services so that you can get everything in a combined package. You can arrive at such decisions after carefully comparing rates with local vendors for all the above.

Important Factor: Flexibility

One of the most important factors that goes into the decision for choosing an event venue is how flexible venue owners are to cooperate with you and accommodate flexible schedules in case anything goes wrong on the destined date.  It is important to select a venue that gives you some sort of flexibility in rescheduling your event to another date.

You might have to pay extra for the rescheduling policy, so make sure you arrive at a discounted rate already. This way, neither the venue loses any money for holding an extra date for you, nor you are caught up in a fix in case things don’t work out on the pre-decided date for you.

Where to Look for the Perfect Venue Online?

With so many considerations and factors playing a role when it comes to choosing the perfect event venue online, you need to be sure to look at only the right places for the best experience. This is where Function Fixers can help! With total priority given to your event and the desired experience you want out of it; Function Fixers brings you only the best options keeping all the above-mentioned criteria in mind. So, if you are looking for the perfect event venue in London, throughout the UK and across Europe, you know where to look!