Tips for Increasing Audience Engagement at Events

Increasing audience engagement can be a challenge even for the best #eventprofs. The good news is that your attendees crave engagement more than ever. So if you have the right message and content to deliver, you’re golden.

In order to increase audience engagement,  you need to first capture their attention. Start with your event invite emails by using killer subject lines. Next, make registration and check-in a breeze. Finally, deliver engaging content via interesting talks, awe-inspiring entertainment, pleasantly surprising promotions, and top-notch AV.

Speaking of top-notch AV, we’ve whipped up a free webinar to help you fulfill the five senses via AV so you can wow attendees right from the start.

Your Guide to Event Registrations

Registration is the first opportunity for attendees to form a concrete opinion about your event.  Which is why it’s a must to make registration as smooth and impressive as possible. This guide gives you the lowdown on event registration. This includes learning what type of software to use, steps to increase registrants, and making a killer event registration website. It also gives an idea of the various ticket tiers that you can use to break down your pricing.

 

The Current State of Event Best Practices

Because the events industry is an ever-evolving field, what might have worked yesterday may no longer work today. One of the most important tasks of an event professional is to stay on top of best practices so they can be applied for maximum effect. Are you getting personal enough in your marketing techniques? And are you being tactful enough in your communication? What are you going to do when your AV breaks down? What’s you’re plan when you’re slapped with the GDPR limits? This handy guide will keep you up to date on the best practices that will set you apart from the rest.

 

Surprise, Delight, Succeed to Win at Events and Promotions

People love surprises. But not all surprises can make a splash at your event, so it’s important to know what makes for a “pleasant surprise”. As always, the best way to learn is by example. For instance, Marvel had the cast of Avengers: Infinity War deliver merch in person. The LeadDog Marketing Group took to the airports for the first National Business Travel Day. They installed luxury lounges that gave travelers a chance to win various raffle prizes. And the hit TV show Mr. Robot had an event that was highlighted by cast performances and a surprise screening of the season premiere.

It's a must to make registration as smooth and impressive as possible. Share on X

 

How to Best Collect and Manage Event Data

Event data can be a goldmine of useful information, but only if you handle it correctly. The fact is that there are so many ways to get this wrong. For example, you can focus too much on the tech side without considering its impact on the whole event experience. This guide deals with the various aspects of data management, such as when and how to collect it, and how to process it into something useful. It also talks about the tools an event professionals can use to weave the data into a story to improve future events.

 

The Stress behind Event Management

According to Forbes this 2017, being an event coordinator lands squarely in the 5th most stressful job in their ranking. Aside from rapidly moving deadlines and stiff competition in the industry, event marketers also suffer from the strain of travel, constantly keeping up with the trends, and the taxing setup during event day itself. Fortunately, with the right tools and smart planning, there are ways to take the stress down several notches. So keep calm, stay in the know, and carry on!

 

Be Heard via Influencer Marketing

Whatever field you’re in, chances are there are so many events happening that you might find it hard to get your message across. But if you want to considerably up your impact on your attendees, you should get into influencer marketing. Influencers in your event not only give better exposure among the influencer’s fan base but also magnify your message. They can bend their corner of social media to their will, and when that coincides with yours, you can reach more people and stand out in your niche.

 

Lessons from Coachella 2018: Lighting up the Desert

This year’s Coachella was a haven of experiential marketing. Various brands had gimmicks to turn the desert into a surreal experience. HP brought down the stars through colorful light displays. T-Mobile and Pandora created lounges and game areas to bring the oasis to the desert. W Hotels redefined glamping through VIP yurts. Google brought to bear its technological know-how in extending the Coachella experience far beyond its physical borders. Read about all these experiential lessons and more at one of the world’s grandest festivals.

An event coordinator lands squarely in the 5th most stressful job Share on X

 

Make Your Audience Pay Attention

Getting people to take home the best bits of an event is difficult enough without having them lose focus during important talks. And while the guests and speakers will always have their way of getting people to listen, what can you as the event planner do to help? First, striking an emotional connection is a surefire way to get them to pay attention. The “show-don’t-tell” technique is also great for inviting focus. Of course, you need to be authentic. Put yourself in the audiences’ shoes to know what they really want to get out of the talk and what would make them want to listen.

 

Grab them by the Subject Line

While the body of the email is extremely important, it’s the subject line that’s the welcome mat which invites people to read on. A poor subject line would cause even the most receptive person to miss your email altogether. This article contains some tips on how to craft killer subjects, from offering promos and discounts from the get-go to getting down to the personal level.

 

Break the Borders of Your Event

Holding events in a foreign land brings with it a completely different set of complications. It should all start with choosing the perfect location, preferably one where you already have an audience. The venue itself should be something representative of the city, while also sharing the same ideas as your brand. You need to understand what and who you can rely on once you on the ground, and you need to have a good line of communication set up. All these tips and more can be found in this HubSpot guide, which is geared to help your event break even more borders.

 

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Running events in a new city can be a challenge. Sure it’s the same event but it’s a different crowd, with a different local culture and different expectations. What’s your experience scaling events to new cities?