AI for Event Planners

Event planning is mostly information work: collecting options, turning decisions into schedules and documents, and keeping many people informed. General assistants like ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini, plus AI features built into event and email platforms, can speed up each of these steps. They can also add a new kind of error. Venue research is a good starting point but a bad endpoint. A model may suggest venues from its training data or a web search. Capacities, prices, renovations, closures and availability change, and the model may be out of date or simply wrong. Treat an AI shortlist as leads, then confirm directly with the venue and get it in writing. Run-of-show drafts are where AI helps most. Give it the fixed inputs (start time, sessions, speakers, breaks, meals, room changes) and ask for a timed schedule with cues and owners. Then check it the way a stage manager would. Do the times add up? Is there buffer for late starts and room turnovers? Did a speaker get double-booked? Budgets need special caution. AI is useful for suggesting categories you might forget, like insurance, permits, gratuities, accessibility services or a contingency line. But arithmetic in chat replies can be wrong, and invented unit prices look convincing. Real numbers come from vendor quotes, calculated in a spreadsheet. Attendee communications (invitations, reminders, FAQs, dietary and accessibility questions, translations) are easy to draft. A shared fact sheet keeps them consistent: one confirmed source for date, time zone, address and policies, which every draft is checked against. Two misconceptions are common. First, AI output is not a confirmation. Nothing is booked until a human has a contract. Second, attendee lists hold personal data, so check your organization's policies and any privacy laws that apply before pasting them into a consumer tool.