Budget-Friendly Event Ideas

Want better participation? Tell people what to expect in advance. This is a simple and powerful accessibility practice. (and Free!) Some people need more time and information to prepare for meetings, events, or new situations. For example: Autistic people may have a hard time with uncertainty, and knowing what to expect ahead of time is important. Others with ADHD may need more time to organize their thoughts or plan their schedule. Knowing what to expect can help us prepare and reduce anxiety. This is not just for neurodivergent people. Clear information in advance helps most people focus and participate at their best.... including those who may be new to the company, the culture, or who simply prefer details ahead of time. Example: The Museum of Flight in Seattle practices this by sharing a "Social Narrative" on their website. It is a PDF guide that uses photos and short descriptions to show visitors what they will see, hear, and experience before they arrive. (available in English, Spanish and Chinese) Social Narratives are an accessibility tool developed to support Autistic visitors, but also benefit many others. Examples of how you can apply this at work: - Send a meeting agenda before the meeting - Tell people in advance if you want them to present - Share photos of a venue or check-in location before an event - Give new employees a written overview of their first day, including where to park, where to enter the building, who will meet them, and who to call if they get stuck. 💬 What examples would you add? When people know what to expect, they can show up more prepared to participate at their best. This is your Minds of All Kinds tip of the week. For more cognitive accessibility tips, read my chapter in "Digital Accessibility Ethics: Disability Inclusion in All Things Tech" edited by Lainey Feingold, Reginé Gilbert, MBA and Chancey Fleet. #Accessibility #CognitiveAccessibility #NeuroInclusion [Image description: A square black and white graphic. Headline: "Tell people what to expect in advance." Below the headline is an illustration of a map with a location pin and a dotted route. Three bullet points: "Send an agenda," "Share photos of the venue," and "Tell people if they will be asked to speak." Below the bullets in bold italic text: "What examples would you add?" The Minds of All Kinds TIPS logo]

🚀 12 Days to Promote a New Tool: Here's How I Spent $10K on LinkedIn Ads The Challenge: Driving maximum traffic & conversions for a new product launch with just 12 days and $10K budget. The Strategy: I knew success would require: ‧ Maximizing reach within our ideal customer profile (ICP) ‧ Creating compelling creative assets ‧ Rapid campaign optimization Audience Targeting: 1) Ultra-Niche Approach - Built a company list with specific titles (~3,700 prospects) - Goal: Maximum frequency to this core audience 2) Expanded Reach - Created broader targeting using industry, titles, company size, revenue & groups - Reached ~52K potential prospects Campaign Structure: ⃗> Website Visits Campaigns for niche & broad audiences > Single-image ads to both audiences > Split-tested LinkedIn Audience Network (LAN) for niche segment > Use LAN with a controlled budget while expanding reach but highly excluding categories > Brand Awareness campaign to optimize for pure Reach of the niche audience > Brand Awareness campaign for MOFU reach > Later swapped BA campaigns with video content for TOFU/MOFU > Text Ad Support - used for niche TOFU & MOFU audiences (won’t spend daily amount) > Text Ads act as "digital billboard" for additional impressions Retargeting Setup: ✅ 90-day website visitors ✅ 90-day company page visitors ✅ 30-day ad engagement audience (of TOFU ads) Results (12 Days): 💰 Spent: ~$9K 👀 Impressions: 199,045 🖱️ Clicks: 412 ✅ Conversions: 8 💵 Deal Value: $1K each 💰 LTV: ?? (this is a new product but estimated long-term) Key Learnings: While results were promising for such a short window, several factors limited our success: ❌ Limited content assets at launch ❌ New product with minimal brand equity ❌ No existing funnel campaigns ❌ Insufficient time for retargeting maturity The Verdict: With a 30-60-day runway, we could have significantly amplified these results. Even with tight constraints, we proved the concept's potential. *the flow map is a general idea of budget distribution but doesn’t reflect the ongoing adjustments made based on the campaign data* #linkedinads #marketing #strategy

It’s off-site season… and here’s the uncomfortable truth: A slick agenda won’t make it a success ... if only five people do all the talking. Your ExCo won’t rave about it. Your team won’t remember it. And your bonus won’t thank you. My top tip. If you want people to speak up ans contribute, you have to design for it. Harvard Business Review (HBR) has said this for years. Meetings shape culture, trust, retention… and yes, your leadership reputation. If you don’t make meetings inclusive, they won’t be. We all know the 'usual suspects' who grab the mic first. But what about everyone else? The introverts. The new joiners. The shy-but-brilliant thinkers. The colleagues from minority or underrepresented backgrounds. The people whose first language isn’t English. They’re sitting on insights that could make your strategy sharper and your team stronger. Now here’s the kicker: HBR found that only 35% of employees feel able to contribute “all the time” in meetings. That's two-thirds of your team... sitting in silence. Imagine what that’s costing your business £$£? Imagine what it’s costing you. So here’s the fix. - Don’t go to the loudest voice. - Deliberately give the first question to someone who wouldn’t normally speak. - Agree it with them beforehand so it feels supportive, not like a live ambush. And yes ... the research backs this approach. Leaders who intentionally make space for quieter contributors get better ideas, stronger trust, and higher leadership ratings (Bain et al., HBR). You can also use tools like Mentimeter where people submit questions anonymously (in real time) and the room upvotes what they want answered. HBR’s been saying for years that anonymity boosts participation.... especially for introverts, multilingual colleagues and people dialling in remotely. The moment you do this, the power dynamic shifts. You signal that every voice matters. And slowly but surely, those who usually stay quiet start stepping in. Good facilitation isn’t about blasting through slides. It’s about creating a room where people feel welcome, valued, and confident to contribute. HBR calls it “inclusive meeting design”. I call it a smart career move. Because leaders who run inclusive off-sites? They get better ideas, better decisions, better feedback… and usually a better bonus. So when you run your next off-site or townhall… pass the mic with intention. Bring in younger colleagues, older colleagues, multilingual colleagues ... everyone with the different ideas your strategy needs. Talk soon, Annette P.S. was this a useful post? Worth sharing with someone planning their off-site right now?

Panel discussions don’t work. Here’s what to do instead 👇🏼 Whether you're hosting 50 or 500 people, panels often fall flat: they’re dry, overly scripted, and painfully one-way. And here’s the real missed opportunity: The conversation stays on stage, while the audience, often a room full of insight, stays silent. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Whether you're online or in-person, here’s a tried-and-tested format I use for large conferences and meetings to unlock participation and spark better dialogue: 1. Start by learning who's in the room Before anything else, invite the audience into the space. Use interactive check-ins, stand/sit questions, hand-raises, or, for online, a Mentimeter, to surface who’s in the room and their interest/knowledge on the topic. 2. Invite each panelist to give a tight 5-minute presentation Give each speaker 5 minutes to present their case or position. Then, ask them to share one challenge they’re currently facing in their work. This makes it real, not theoretical. 3. Turn the tables, literally Ask the audience to form groups of 3–4 (in-person or online). Give each group one of the challenges the speakers just shared. Have them discuss: How would we approach this? What follow-up questions do we have? (Pro tip for in-person: Print the panelists’ challenges and place them under chairs ahead of time for faster starts.) 4. Bring the speakers into the audience Let the panelists roam the room or hop into breakout groups. They listen, ask questions, offer quick context, but mostly, they observe and absorb. 5. Capture insights collectively Use tools like Mentimeter to gather group takeaways, or (for smaller groups) have a few people share key insights live. 6. Come back together Now bring the panel back. But instead of asking more questions, ask them to respond to the audience's insights and reflections. This isn’t a Q&A. It’s a conversation. ✅ What you get is a format that’s energising, participatory, and memorable. People feel heard. And speakers walk away with fresh thinking. Curious to try this at your next event? Let’s talk. ♻️ Repost if you’re ready to retire the tired panel format. 👋🏼 Hi I'm Perle Laouenan-Catchpole I share ideas on how leaders can design online gatherings that feel human, connected, and energising (even at scale). 🎥 Video source: @domanizer on Instagram

I'll never bet $100k on a marketing strategy without first risking $1500. Call it cheap, but that has saved me from a lot of GTM fails like this... I see it all the time: A team gets excited, they build a full product. They plan the $20k conference booth, hire the agency, and launch into dead SILENCE. They bet the farm before they knew if the soil was fertile. My method is different. It's not about being cheap. It's about being smart with risk. Here’s the exact playbook: Step 1: Shrink the Bet. What’s the smallest, fastest version of this idea? Launching a new product? → Build a pre-order landing page. Entering a new market? → Sponsor one small event where your ICP actually hangs out. (Cost: ~$1,500) Testing a new channel? → Run a micro-campaign for two weeks with a minimal budget. The goal is to learn first. Step 2: Define the "Signal." What will tell you this is working? It's not revenue at this stage. It's: - Email sign-ups on the landing page. - Quality conversations at that small event. - Engagement rates on the micro-campaign. Step 3: Run the Scrappy Test. This is where you get creative and frugal. Test a new employee travel benefit by going to local HR meetups, not global conferences. If the signal was weak. Lots of "cool idea," zero "let's do this." That was the data. Step 4: Decide with no emotions. Pivot: If you get a strong signal, double down. Kill: If you get crickets, have the guts to walk away. Your job isn't to be right on the first try. Your job is to find out what's wrong as fast and cheaply as possible.

Here is how you should use event apps to drive engagement. See, a branded app is a time saver. It can simplify finding the right people, setting up appointments, scanning badges, enabling live chats, and capturing leads. Event apps, done well, can shorten the time to value for attendees - which is why they're a must-have, especially for large conferences. HOWEVER, launching a mobile app only doesn't mean an increase in engagement. First, a mobile app isn’t adopted until the merits are sold to an audience. The biggest mistake I've seen is planners assuming people will download the app and innately know all the benefits. There will be plenty of first-timers. Thus, you need to intentionally market the mobile app hard to your audience. It’s also important to realize that you need a certain critical mass to have adopted the app to reap the networking benefits. If less than 20% of attendees have the app on their phones, you’ll have a hard time driving engagement through it. Therefore, it’s wise to keep tracking downloads too. The best channels to promote an app that we’ve seen include:  ✅ Post-registration confirmation emails  ✅ Dedicated pre-event email campaigns  ✅ Social posts with promo videos  ✅ Prominent flex banners at the event itself And no - your callouts shouldn't just say "Download here." You need to explicitly brief what the app will do for attendees. But the tech piece is only part of the engagement puzzle. Other areas that need attention: 👉 Market your event to the right ICP audiences. Having focused attendees builds stronger networking circles (better than just high numbers). 👉  Create dedicated onsite spaces where like-minded attendees can converge and have downtime to naturally chat. It’s hard to connect when you just have an auditorium or lobby to play with. 👉 Use highly readable badges with "interests" clearly printed to spark conversations. 👉 Realize several introverts won't directly approach others. Teach them to use the live chat to create soft intros that can warm into coordinated onsite meetups. 👉 Collect "interested in" info during registration. Surface that on attendee app profiles as icebreakers. Highlight that in your pre-event collateral. 👉 Don't overload the agenda - schedule enough buffer time for attendees to explore and make new connections organically. 👉 Use timely push notifications to surveys and polls connected with a speaker topic that just wrapped up to get people to participate. In other words, event apps aren’t plug-n-play engagement drivers. Instead, plan the ideal attendee experience and leverage the app to facilitate and accelerate that journey.

The most expensive supplement mistake: building before validating. I have watched hundreds of founders spend $15K on product development, $8K on labels, $20K on inventory. Then nobody buys. Here is the order I use instead. I call it the backwards launch. Step one: find the angle first. Who is this for, and why does it solve a problem better than what exists? Step two: test with messaging, not product. Build a simple landing page. Run $200 in ads. See if anyone clicks. Step three: sell before you manufacture. Pre-orders, waitlists, or a no-inventory model where the product ships only after the customer pays. Step four: only invest in custom formulation after you have proven demand with a stock product. Most founders do these steps in reverse. They spend months on the product and zero days on the customer. The backwards launch saved hundreds of brands on our platform from expensive mistakes.

Engaging virtual event attendees requires creativity and innovation to foster meaningful interactions in a digital environment. Here are three specific interactive techniques I've used to effectively engage virtual event attendees, along with examples of their impact: ✅ Live Polling and Q&A Sessions: Incorporating live polling and interactive Q&A sessions encourages real-time engagement and participation from attendees. For example, during a virtual conference session on industry trends, I used live polling to gather audience opinions on key topics and then facilitated a dynamic Q&A session where attendees could ask questions and share insights. This not only kept attendees actively engaged but also provided valuable feedback and sparked insightful discussions. ✅ Virtual Networking Breakouts: Creating virtual networking breakouts allows attendees to connect and engage with each other in smaller, more intimate settings. For instance, during a virtual workshop series on professional development, I organized breakout rooms where attendees could discuss workshop topics, share experiences, and network with peers. By fostering meaningful connections and facilitating peer-to-peer interaction, virtual networking breakouts enhance attendee engagement and create opportunities for collaboration and relationship-building. ✅ Interactive Gamification Elements: Incorporating interactive gamification elements such as quizzes, challenges, or scavenger hunts adds an element of fun and excitement to virtual events while encouraging active participation. For example, during a virtual team-building event, I organized a virtual scavenger hunt where attendees had to find and collect items within their own homes based on clues provided. This interactive activity not only energized attendees but also promoted teamwork, creativity, and friendly competition, making the event memorable and enjoyable for all participants. By leveraging live polling and Q&A sessions, virtual networking breakouts, and interactive gamification elements, virtual event organizers can effectively engage attendees, foster meaningful interactions, and create memorable experiences in a digital environment. What interactive techniques have you found effective in engaging virtual event attendees? Share your experiences and insights in the comments below! 

Let’s talk about small budgets. Because not every event has a six-figure spend behind it — and that’s okay. We work with a lot of teams who are working with tight budgets but still want to create high-impact, memorable experiences. And here’s what we’ve learned: - Creativity > cost. You don’t need a $20k activation to surprise and delight attendees. Try a custom coffee cart with branded cups, seat drops with local goodies, or handwritten place cards at dinner. Small moments, big impressions. - Partner up. Team up with a brand targeting the same audience and split the cost of your happy hour or wraparound event. Double the exposure, half the spend. - Go smaller. Host something intimate for 10–15 people instead of trying to reach 100. Quality conversations > quantity of RSVPs. - Focus your spend. Invest in one high-impact moment — a custom gifting experience, an impactful speaker, or a unique evening event — and keep the rest simple. - Rethink content. Instead of flying in speakers, tap your customers or internal team to lead roundtables. Peer-led content is often more engaging anyway. A big budget is great. But a small budget with a sharp strategy? That’s where the magic happens!

If I had to start over and build a brand new AI product with only $50,000, here's exactly what I'd do. I’ve seen technical founders pour it all into product and get zero traction. And business founders pour it all into marketing with nothing real to sell. Here’s a lesson I learned that applies to any founder: A startup is only as strong as its weakest link. If your product is a 10/10 but your go-to-market is a 2/10, your overall outcome is a 2. You only get paid for the area where you did the worst job. So, here’s my rule of thumb for that $50k budget: 𝗦𝗽𝗹𝗶𝘁 𝗶𝘁 𝟱𝟬/𝟱𝟬. → $𝟮𝟱𝗸 𝘁𝗼 𝗚𝗼-𝘁𝗼-𝗠𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁: This is for Marketing and Sales. Finding your first customers, building an audience, and creating a path to revenue. → $𝟮𝟱𝗸 𝘁𝗼 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗰𝘁: This gets split again. Half for Market Research (figuring out 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 to build and for whom) and half for the actual MVP build. You have to invest in everything. At Hal9, we help founders make that $25k product budget go a 𝘭𝘰𝘵 further, turning that MVP build into a real, scalable product in weeks, not months. If you’re interested in chatting, just dm me or drop a comment and I’ll reach out! How would you spend $50,000 if you were building an AI product?