"These are unprecedented times.”
“The situation is fluid.” “We need to pivot.” (Yep, we said the 'P' word!) Like you, we have been adapting to the ever-changing event landscape. It has been a challenging year, yet full of creative innovation. Events are the heart and soul of our communities…how we all do business and how people engage and connect. The on-screen content needed to visually tell a story, elicit emotion, motivate an audience and spur action is more important than ever. We have been listening, watching, producing and learning how to better engage audiences in this virtual world. The transition from face-to-face events to on-screen communication requires attention to experiential detail, especially now in this web of webinars. As we embraced all of the change, we quickly realized that our unique partnership of 20+ years of broadcast television production and B2B event management experience make us exceptionally suited to the 'new normal' of online events. At Executed Events, our television production team of writers, cinematographers, graphic artists and director/producers create video content that will emotionally connect with your audience, while our event team of conference, meeting and event planners and producers will keep audience demographic and event goals prioritized. We recently produced our most ambitious live-stream event to date, where we worked with a client to move their planned dinner ceremony to a virtual gala. By employing a broadcast television approach we created a flowing, entertaining, informative 75-minute presentation that combined live music, live host, and pre-taped content including custom graphics, an archival documentary, and tributes from across North America. Interactive platforms were employed to engage the audience before, during and after the presentation, and the feedback speaks for itself: “Thank you for a wonderful production this evening. We all miss the togetherness of a gathering, in person. To be safe we had the next best thing, a virtual gathering. To feel the warmth and togetherness virtually was welcome. Bravo to you and your production crew.” “It was a superb presentation this evening. Beautifully orchestrated, choreographed, written, flowing, and every other positive adjective one could think of.” It’s clear to us that a well thought out plan, professional experience, and thoughtful creative are critical to virtual event success. People are experiencing burn-out from all the hours in front of devices; you need to make your virtual event easy to use, fun and informative to be a part of, and worth the screen time. And we can help you do that. To discuss your needs and explore our custom solutions, drop us a line or give us a call…no hand sanitizer required! The last few weeks of work have been intensely focused on COVID-19. The kids call my office the ‘war room’. The business of live events has taken a hit on an unprecedented level, as many industries have.
We have been marching forward and preparing contingency plans. But those plans changed weekly, then daily - and the past 6 days EVERYTHING changed hourly. Lots of coffee. No sleep. The emotional toll cannot be put into words; planning for our large-scale events started a year ago. We work closely with suppliers and they become our partners, and our work family. I cannot express how gut-wrenching my phone calls have been the last 48 hours. So many are having to lay off entire teams. So many organizers having to pull the plug at the 11th hour. There is no cost-recovery. It’s difficult to put it all into words and hope we can all remember it costs nothing to be kind. And in the words of Scott Stratten "How we treat people in a short term crisis has a long term effect'. Well, hello! We’re Jen & Kristen and we're excited to launch our joint production management venture, Executed Events Inc! A little about us and this new brand:
Our story begins as a client and supplier relationship; Kristen was the client in need of multimedia content and Jen was the service supplier. With more than 15 years working together, we just really got along and felt a strong creative connection. There was a moment at a summer evening social, when Jen’s husband was juggling fire (literally) with Kristen’s husband (you can’t make this stuff up), and it became evident that we had become moved into the friendship sphere. For 20 years, Jen has operated her media content company while also working as a freelance producer in the television industry. Her TV projects have been nominated for multiple Canadian Screen Awards, a Canadian Cinema Editors Award, and even an Emmy. Her love of 'live' television ("10 seconds to air!") was what attracted her to the live event space. Kristen held a long-term position as conference and event manager for a well-respected trade association. She brought fresh ideas and exuberance to long-standing events; consistently reinventing and goal-smashing year after year. In 2018 she was ready to redirect her energy to take on new challenges, with her true love of live events in mind. We had a lunch date during that transition time. Sushi. The prospect of joining forces came to life. Over the next several months, we studied the market and built our business plan. There are a lot of great event management companies out there, so how would we stand out from the crowd? We determined that the singular act of joining forces would be our greatest asset: Kristen's vast B2B experience together with Jen's theatrical and entertainment background is unique in the industry. We made the decision to leave weddings and bar mitzvahs to others, and focus on business-to-business clients with neither the time, staff or creative expertise to execute a successful event. Clearly, our best brainstorming happens over a platter of sushi, for it was at another lunch that our brand was born. Our table was littered with scraps of paper with name ideas... what name would clearly describe what we do, but stand out from the pack? Maybe we were getting a bit punchy - the dark humour started to emerge. We kept coming back to the idea that our company would "execute" events. Jen said, "We kill it!". Kristen said, "We'll bring your event back to life!" Jen said, "We'll slay your deadlines." The puns were endless, and so we are EXECUTED EVENTS INC. We are dying to work with you and bring fresh blood to your team! (Sorry - the puns just write themselves, they're almost out of our system...) |
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