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There’s no such thing as a free lunch, or is there?

February, 2024

In which we consider why it can be a good thing to host a networking event.

We all know the phrase “there’s no such thing as a free lunch”, but let’s all be honest: if you’re offered a free lunch – unless there’s something really iffy about it – you’re likely to accept it, aren’t you?

Which is why this article is to tell you it might be a good idea for you to host a free lunch (or drinks and nibbles) event for stakeholders and/or new and future customers.

Essentially, if you’re looking to develop good relationships with stakeholders or customers, you need to meet them. You could wait around for them to visit, but that can be rather slow going, so taking the initiative and inviting them to an event can be a good way of getting their attention.

Lasting connections

If you’re looking to strengthen relationships with organisations and make lasting connections, a lunch is the way to go. This tends to involve smaller numbers of carefully selected attendees and is a good way to ensure you have a conversation with those people. However, inviting four or five people who you’ve never met to come and have lunch isn’t the easiest thing, so expanding the list can be more effective.

Inviting a room of around 20-30 guests to a stakeholder lunch and then bringing along enough of your own staff to ensure you have at least one representative on every table can put less pressure on you and gives more reason for your main target invitees to say yes. Group X may not be sure about meeting you, but if they hear Y is on the list they’ll be more tempted. Then on the day you make sure you introduce yourself to both X and Y, and if you’ve done your preparation then both should be pleased they came along and made the connection with you too. This is where a table plan is important, to ensure as many people as possible feel they benefit from the time spent at your lunch.

Mingling opportunity

However a sit down lunch for 30 people has to be paid for by someone (you the host) and it can get costly, so as attendees increase in number you may instead consider a getting to know you drinks and nibbles event. This could take place in the afternoon or evening, depending on who you’re inviting and where you’re inviting them to. For example, you’d save money on venue costs by inviting people to your headquarters, so afternoon would work for letting people see how you operate. In contrast an early evening event in a chosen venue (some offer free room hire if you spend £X on canapes and drinks) might appeal for people who may wish to loiter for longer and possibly turn it into something more sociable.

For drinks and nibbles events there’s more freedom for you to wander around the room welcoming guests, either as the friendly host or as you make a point of checking if X has spoken to Y and perhaps Z might be interested in this introduction too.

For a stakeholder event, you may wish to give a short presentation on matters that are relevant for your attendees. This doesn’t have to be a sales pitch, but an update on the business and how people are working together, or perhaps even announcing some plans for the future can go down well. If this is a B2C event then there’s no harm in being a little blatant and making the presentation more specifically about your goods or services – just don’t go on too long: the main aim is to develop relationships, and the best way to do that is to have a lot of conversations.

This article originally appeared in Kent Director.

Erica Jones - Account Director

Erica Jones

Maxim / Account Director

posted in: advice, marketing, public relations,

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