Every year, our leader, Ryan Hanson, takes a step back from his desk to attend the BizBash Leadership Summit. This summit gathers the industry’s top voices and visionary minds to align in thought leadership, discuss new strategies, and foster industry-wide collaboration. The insights from these discussions are captured in the highly anticipated Memorandum of Understanding.
A standout concept highlighted in this year’s Memorandum is Prioritizing Purposeful Attendee Engagement. This principle emphasizes the importance of viewing attendees as key stakeholders. By deeply understanding demographics, diversity, motivations, and needs, we can create curated experiences that are relevant, timely, and resonate with those in attendance. Purposeful attendee engagement adds a strategic layer to the planning process, going beyond just having a fun event.
Here’s how industry leaders build this strategy into their events:
Develop Attendee Personas
By knowing and understanding who is in the room, you can tailor your offerings to be relevant to them. Develop and utilize attendee personas to guide decisions on content, design, and other event elements you feel would suit their wants and needs.
Conduct Focus Groups
Engage with attendees through peer focus groups, similar to how you would with other key stakeholders, to gather direct feedback and insights for a better understanding of their preferences and expectations.
Thoughtful Co-Creation
When attendees see themselves reflected in the experience, they have something to look forward to. Use surveys before the event to inform your decisions, allowing attendees to co-create the event by crowdsourcing elements like which band they want to dance to, or what specialty cocktail they would most likely indulge in.
Curated Touchpoints
Ensure touchpoints are memorable and impactful interactions at every step of the attendee journey. Tap into this by exploring new formats and ways to engage, such as interactive education sessions and gamification.
Engage Actively, Not Passively
Guests are there to participate—encourage active engagement instead of allowing attendees to remain in the background. To enhance engagement leverage technology, activate hands-on experiences, or even reward interaction to keep them involved and interested.
Pause for Reflection
Establish checkpoints throughout the event planning process to ensure you’re considering the attendees’ needs, not just your own.
Don’t be Afraid to Show Off
Once the event is over, share your work with peers, join industry associations, and apply for awards to continually redefine and redevelop what “best in class” looks like in the event industry. Foster a community with industry peers to share knowledge and continuously set higher standards as we move forward.
Prioritizing purposeful attendee engagement not only creates memorable experiences for guests but also helps you to better meet your objectives, and ultimately execute an event with impact. Designing with the attendee in mind is critical, by putting them at the center of your design plans, you set the stage for success.
At BeEvents, we understand that guests are central to the experience—they are the most important asset. Designing for the people who will be in the room is not a new concept for us, but it is as profound as it has ever been. If you genuinely care about providing your guests with an exceptional experience, we invite you to partner with us.
