Event Management

Click here to register on 11/11/24

The Event Management Course is designed to assist bookstore owners, booksellers, and key staff in learning how to develop a successful store events program. We include a wide variety of event types including author events, author visits to schools, festivals, school book fairs, virtual events, creative non-author events, and building event partnerships with other businesses. We also teach students how to write effective Edelweiss event grid pitches, how to create a publicity/press kit, and how to work with publicists. From the very beginning of the course we emphasize collecting data to understand your store, staff, demographics, and budget so the event program is built through strategic planning.

Space in this certification class is limited to 40 people. Only one staff member per store may enroll to be certified.

Our 2025 Course Instructors

Core Faculty

Dean Elliott batTzedek, Main Point Books, Wayne, PA

Instructor Kit Little, Little Extra LLC, Barre, VT

Instructor Molly Olivo, Barefoot Books

Instructor Julie Stravinsky, Warwicks, La Jolla, CA

Instructor Julia Davis, The Book Worm, Powder Springs, GA

Guest Instructors

Candice Huber, Tubby & Coo’s Traveling Bookshop, New Orleans, LA

Kathy Ellen Davis, NAIBA, Sterling, VA

Meet Our Teaching Team

Membership

Being an active member of the bookselling industry is a critical step in growing a bookstore and shows commitment to your chosen profession. Stores with students in all Professional Booksellers School courses are required to be current members of their regional trade association and/or the American Booksellers Association. To enroll, students must also create a PBS account, which is free.

Course Components & Cost

This course will consist of live classes via Zoom, office hours, communication on a Discord server, and a live publicity speed dating event. Homework is assigned for each class. Students are expected to attend the live classes and complete and pass all homework in order to be certified. The course is $375, with discounts available for current members of regional trade associations. Find out what support your Regional Trade Association offers on our website.

2025 Course Syllabus Preview

Course Objectives

The Professional Booksellers School Event Management Course provides booksellers with the skills and tools to:

• Create a balanced and successful event program
• Understand how to use ROIs and metrics to create a strategic plan for your event program
• Create an effective data management systems
• Understand planning, hosting, and marketing needs for a variety of events including author, non-author, live, virtual, on-site and off-site
• Build and use partnerships to expand your event program
• Plan and manage school-focused events
• Build a publicity kit and learn to pitch your store to publishers via publicity speed dating
• Strengthen management skills to create events that are welcoming to authors, guests, customers, and staff

Major Project Deliverables

• Events Capacity Analysis

• Event Data Management System

• Publicity Kit & Pitch

• Live Publicity Speed Dating Presentation

• 6 Month Strategic Plan

2025 Course Schedule

01/13 Class 1: Overview of a Successful Event Program

01/27 Class 2: Measuring Success: ROIs & Metrics

02/03 Class 3: Finding Patterns & Using Data

02/10 - 02/16 Office Hours: Help with Events Capacity Presentation

02/17 Class 4: Live Presentations: Events Capacity Analysis

03/03 Class 5: Managing Event Program Data

03/10 Class 6: Author Events

03/17 Class 7: Community Events

03/24 Class 8: School Events

03/31 Class 9: Developing Partnerships

04/07 - 04/13 Office Hours: Present Your Event Management System

04/14 Class 10: Marketing & Analytics

04/21 Class 11: Partnering with Publishers

04/28 Class 12: Creating A Publicity Kit & Pitch

05/05 - 05/11 Office Hours: Help with your Publicity Kit

05/12 Class 13: Live Presentation: Publicity Kit & Pitch

05/14 - 05/20 Office Hours: Preparing for Publisher Speed Dating

05/21 WEDNESDAY Class 14: Live online Publicity Speed Dating

6/02 Class 15: Make Your Program Stand Out

06/09 - 06/15 Office Hours: Preparing your final project

06/16 Class 16: Live Presentation: Moving Forward 

Learning Outcomes

As a result of this course, you will have the knowledge to:

• Understand all the elements of a successful bookstore events program

• Learn to use ROIs and metrics to track and measure the success of your store’s events

• Know what data to gather in order to evaluate your store’s current event program capacity to help shape an effective growth plan

• Understand the best tools and channels/platforms to market your events and how to use analytics to evaluate which promotions are working

• Know  how to run a successful author and community events from proposal through after-report, including best practices for scheduling, planning, ticketing, and hosting all types of events

• Establish a system to effectively manage event program planning and data, including making information available to key stakeholders such as buyers, frontline staff, and partners

• Understand how to identify and use social media metrics to build event audience

• Understand how to build effective and rewarding relationships with publishers/publicists

•  Create a Publicity Kit and pitch that will highlight your store’s personality, customer base, marketing, and event programming

• Know  how to use a Publicity Kit to pitch the store’s event program quickly and efficiently through participating in Publicity Speed Dating

• Identify and evaluate community partners to increase options for event space, event partnerships, and/or promotion

• Know best practices for working with school-focused events, including author visits and book fairs 

• Understand how to use events to make your store stand out in your community

• Understand how to make your event program stand in the industry

• Build a strategic plan to help you meet your event goals, including data-driven, actionable goals and including all stakeholders

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