An event ROI template is the record you fill in after an event closes: what it cost, line by line, what it returned, and the ROI, margin, and cost per attendee calculated from those totals. It carries its assumptions with it, so someone else can rebuild the percentage from the same records.

[Download the event ROI template (CSV)](https://eventiq.io/templates/event-roi.csv). No email required.

The template works for an organizer, whose return is registration, exhibit, and sponsorship
revenue, and for a company that exhibits at or hosts an event, whose return is closed-won deals
credited to it. Each side has a filled example further down.

## How is the ROI template different from the calculator and the P&L?

The calculator, this template, and the P&L do three different jobs. The
[event ROI calculator](https://eventiq.io/md/tools/event-roi-calculator) is the planning model: you enter assumptions before the event and see the return they imply. This
template is the record: you enter what happened, once invoices have arrived and the crediting
window has closed. Its Plan column can take the calculator's figures, so the plan and the record
compare line by line.

The [event P&L template](https://eventiq.io/md/templates/event-profit-and-loss) is the full financial statement,
with variable and fixed costs, three result levels, and a flexed budget. The ROI record holds the same total cost in six lines
and adds what a P&L does not carry: the attribution rule and window behind revenue that arrives
as deals. The [post-event report template](https://eventiq.io/md/blog/post-event-report-template) is the narrative
for readers outside the team, and this record is the page behind its cost and revenue section.

## What goes in the event ROI template?

The CSV lists six blocks in this order. Fill in only the revenue block for your side.
| Block | Lines | What it holds |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Header and assumptions | Event, role, currency, snapshot date, crediting window, attribution rule, cost basis, attendee definition | The rules that make the figure reproducible, written before the actuals go in |
| Cost | Venue and production, catering, marketing and promotion, travel, staff time, other | Every cost of the event in one currency, with the source of each line |
| Revenue: organizer | Registrations, exhibits, sponsorship | Revenue the event earned directly, net of refunds and discounts |
| Attributed revenue: exhibitor or host | Closed-won deals inside the window | Deals that meet the attribution rule and closed inside the crediting window |
| Pipeline, memo only | Open deals linked to the event | Count and amount on the snapshot date. Never added to revenue |
| Results | Profit, event ROI, margin, cost per attendee | Calculated from the blocks above |
Each row has Plan, Actual, and Variance columns, plus Source and Notes. Freeze Plan at approval
and fill Actual on the snapshot date.

## Which cost lines belong in it?

Six lines cover the whole event:

- **Venue and production:** room rental, staging, audiovisual; for an exhibitor, booth space
  and build.
- **Catering:** food and beverage, including any shortfall against a contract minimum.
- **Marketing and promotion:** paid media, email, design, and agency fees for this event.
- **Travel:** staff and speaker travel and lodging that you pay for.
- **Staff time:** the days your team spent on the event, at a loaded rate.
- **Other:** insurance, permits, technology, materials, and anything not listed above.

**Staff time = Staff days × Loaded day rate**

**Event cost = Venue and production + Catering + Marketing and promotion + Travel + Staff time + Other**

A loaded day rate includes salary, employment costs, and overhead. Take it from finance. Count
planning, delivery, and follow-up days, not only days on site. Leaving staff time out is a
legitimate choice if the cost basis says so, but it breaks any comparison with a year that
included it.

## How do you record revenue as an organizer, or as an exhibitor?

**Organizer.** Revenue is what the event earned directly: registrations net of refunds and
discounts, exhibit space sold, and sponsorship at contract value. Reconcile each line to orders
and invoices before you calculate. A sponsored reception goes in as sponsorship revenue and
catering cost, on two rows, never as a smaller catering bill.

**Exhibiting or hosting company.** Revenue is attributed: the closed-won deals that meet your
attribution rule and closed inside the crediting window. Write both before the event. One
workable rule is "opportunities linked to the event's CRM campaign and created on or after the
first day of the event", with a window counted in days from the last day. The
[event marketing attribution](https://eventiq.io/md/event-marketing-attribution) guide compares rules, and
[Salesforce campaigns for events](https://eventiq.io/md/blog/salesforce-campaigns-for-events) covers the campaign
link itself.

Open pipeline goes in its own block, with its count and amount on the snapshot date. It never
enters the revenue line. An open deal can still be lost, and a percentage built on it changes
every time the CRM does.

## Which formulas does the template use?

**Revenue (organizer) = Registration revenue + Exhibit revenue + Sponsorship revenue**

**Attributed revenue (exhibitor or host) = Closed-won deals that meet the attribution rule inside the crediting window**

**Profit = Revenue − Event cost**

**Event ROI (%) = Profit ÷ Event cost × 100**

**Margin (%) = Profit ÷ Revenue × 100**

**Cost per attendee = Event cost ÷ Attendees**

**Variance = Actual − Plan**

ROI and margin divide the same profit by different totals: ROI by what the event cost, margin by
what it earned. The ROI formula is the standard one the organizer tab of the calculator uses, so
a plan made there and a record made here compare directly. Define attendees once in the header,
for example people checked in, and keep that definition from event to event.

## Which assumptions must sit beside the figure?

In a budget review, finance sets aside a percentage it cannot check. Write these down before the
actuals go in:

- **Crediting window:** how many days after the event a deal can close and still count.
  Re-reading the same event with a longer window is fine; changing the window without saying so
  is not.
- **Attribution rule:** which deals count toward this event, in one sentence a sales lead would
  sign.
- **Currency:** one currency for every line, with the rate and date for anything converted.
- **Snapshot date:** the day the CRM and the invoices were read. Deals keep moving after it.
- **Cost basis:** which lines are in, which are out, and where the loaded day rate came from.

## Example: an organizer's ROI record

All figures are hypothetical. A two-day association conference planned 450 paid registrations
at $500 net, 30 booths at $4,000, $60,000 in sponsorship, and 400 attendees. It closed with 420
paid registrations at $490, 28 booths, $72,200 in sponsorship, and 380 attendees checked in.
Staff time was planned at 60 days and recorded at 64, at a loaded day rate of $600.
| Line | Plan | Actual | Variance |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Venue and production | 120,000 | 126,500 | +6,500 |
| Catering | 54,000 | 51,300 | −2,700 |
| Marketing and promotion | 36,000 | 38,400 | +2,400 |
| Travel | 14,000 | 15,200 | +1,200 |
| Staff time (days × $600) | 36,000 | 38,400 | +2,400 |
| Other | 10,000 | 10,200 | +200 |
| Event cost | 270,000 | 280,000 | +10,000 |
| Registrations | 225,000 | 205,800 | −19,200 |
| Exhibits | 120,000 | 112,000 | −8,000 |
| Sponsorship | 60,000 | 72,200 | +12,200 |
| Revenue | 405,000 | 390,000 | −15,000 |
| Profit | 135,000 | 110,000 | −25,000 |
| Event ROI | 50.0% | 39.3% | −10.7 points |
| Margin | 33.3% | 28.2% | −5.1 points |
| Attendees | 400 | 380 | −20 |
| Cost per attendee | 675.00 | 736.84 | +61.84 |
The event ROI is $110,000 ÷ $280,000 × 100 = 39.3%, against 50.0% planned. Profit fell by
$25,000: $15,000 from revenue and $10,000 from cost. Registrations account for $19,200 of the
revenue gap. Thirty fewer paid places at $500 is $15,000 of volume, and $10 less on each of 420
places is $4,200 of price. Sponsorship came in $12,200 over plan, more than the $8,000 lost on
exhibits.

Cost per attendee rose by $61.84. At the planned 400 attendees, the actual cost would have been
$700.00 a head ($280,000 ÷ 400), so $25.00 of the rise is spend and $36.84 is the 20 people who
did not come.

## Example: an exhibiting company's ROI record

All figures are hypothetical. A company exhibits at a trade show. Its costs are booth space and
build $30,000, marketing and promotion $6,000, travel $9,600, staff time of 20 days at $600 or
$12,000, other $2,400, and no catering, for an event cost of $60,000. Its
rule counts closed-won Salesforce opportunities linked to the show's campaign and created on or
after the first show day. The window runs 180 days after the last show day, which is also the
snapshot date.
| Line | Amount | Note |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Event cost | 60,000 | Six cost lines |
| Attributed revenue, 3 closed-won deals | 84,000 | 28,000 + 36,000 + 20,000 |
| Profit | 24,000 | 84,000 − 60,000 |
| Event ROI | 40.0% | 24,000 ÷ 60,000 × 100 |
| Margin | 28.6% | 24,000 ÷ 84,000 × 100 |
| Open pipeline, 5 deals (memo) | 150,000 | Not in revenue |
Adding the open pipeline would print an ROI of 290.0%: ($84,000 + $150,000 − $60,000) ÷ $60,000
× 100. That figure rests on five deals nobody has signed, and it moves each time one of them
changes stage. Keep the pipeline in its memo block, and read the event again at the next
snapshot with the same rule and window. The [event ROI guide](https://eventiq.io/md/event-roi) covers comparing
events read at different points.

## What mistakes make an event ROI record unreliable?

- **Dividing by marketing spend**, which leaves venue, catering, travel, and staff time out of
  the denominator.
- **Adding pipeline to revenue.** Open deals stay in the memo block.
- **Changing the window between events.** A 90-day and a 365-day window cannot share a column.
- **Mixing currencies in one total.** Write finance's rate and its date in the header.

## Where EventIQ fits

EventIQ sits on top of the tools you already use and connects to 15+ platforms, including Cvent, Zoom, and
Swapcard for events, Salesforce, HubSpot, and GoHighLevel for CRM, and Google Ads, Meta Ads, and
LinkedIn Ads for advertising.

Each event in EventIQ has budget fields your team enters: total, marketing, venue, catering, and
other, plus a revenue target. The ROI figure in the product is profit divided by cost from those
fields, so its revenue is the target you entered, not measured revenue. Salesforce deals, with
stage, amount, and close date, link to an event through a campaign relationship a person
confirms; those are the deals the attributed revenue block records. Daily spend, clicks, and
impressions arrive from Google Ads, Meta Ads, and LinkedIn Ads, plus conversions from Google Ads
and LinkedIn Ads, and that ad spend does not feed the ROI figure. Marketing spend entered by your
team or imported from CSV sits by event and channel, with the author of every change. Report
exports are Excel and CSV files.

The template has more cost lines than the five budget fields, including staff time, which has no
field of its own. The crediting window, the attribution rule, currency conversion, and the
pipeline memo stay in your spreadsheet. EventIQ does not merge one person across sources, so
check any attendee count built on two of them.

[Book a demo](https://eventiq.io/#early-access) to see the budget fields, the ROI figure calculated from them, and
the Salesforce deals linked to an event campaign on a sample event, in a 30-minute demo.

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HTML version: https://eventiq.io/templates/event-roi