What Attendees Want: 5 Tips to Elevate In-Person Events in 2022

The impact of a global pandemic has made attendees re-evaluate why they go to events and the playbook for what makes a truly engaging attendee experience is still being written. 

In this post we highlight 5 forward-thinking tactics you can use to tap into what your attendees value about in-person engagements. Use these tips to craft relevant and engaging experiences that keep your conference or event on the cutting edge.

1. Invest in microevents ‍

After the industry experienced $30 billion in losses during the initial stages of the pandemic, many event professionals are struggling to find the funds to put on large-scale events. This, coupled with attendee’s elevated emphasis on health and safety, position microevents as a budget-friendly solution.

While this requires more time on the strategy and planning front, microevents present unique advantages as well, including:

1. Higher quality engagement & networking for attendees
2. Budget friendly for event teams
3. Easier accessibility for attendees (less travel, less investment, less time)
4. Health & safety conscious for attendees

When it comes to these events, they don't need to be overproduced. Consider hosting a happy hour, an intimate user group of a fun community meetup with attendees based on region. Beyond the cost-savings, these smaller-scale events will give peace of mind for your more hesitant attendees. It's a win-win.‍

2. Leverage your post-event strategy to build a year-round community‍

Major companies have historically held one yearly conference or event and allow the momentum that is created post-event to fizzle away. How are you engaging your attendees between these annual gatherings? The truth is, your attendees are still highly engaged at this stage and curious and want to retain and apply what they have learned.

‍According to Vimeo, 68% of event attendees rewatch content after an event concludes.

There’s no limit to the different ways you can keep the buzz alive and engage attendees post-event. Get creative about how you can curate the massive volumes of content you worked so hard to package up for your event. You can start small, with something as simple as a dedicated landing page that curates the content from your event. Consider creating a youtube playlist with recordings of the sessions, this example from Saastr has over 5,000 plays alone. Turn the recordings into podcasts that you can splice and produce on a weekly basis.

These assets not only provide value to attendees, but serve as promotional tools to continue to generate interest in your event for future years and expose your event to new audiences. 

3. Create content sessions that emphasize connection & entertainment over education‍

User experience needs to be #1 - attendees have heightened expectations, shorter attention spans and a desire to authentically connect now more than ever before. According to Event MB conferences are prioritizing connection and entertainment before content. It’s not to say content isn’t crucial, but the approach is more organic—allowing for the experience to guide the content rather than the content to guide the experience.

Use your attendees to help inform the agenda. In fact, they should be shaping the narrative—and for you to deliver on their expectations, you need to put yourself in your shoes. Consider surveys of past attendees or social media polls to pulse check different topics and understand what they want from your event. 

Push the envelope with your speakers and think outside of the box from your traditional lineup. Find social media influencers in the community, top podcast hosts or other content creators who are challenging the status quo in your industry. 

As for the structure of sessions—aim to keep it more freeform, and consider breaking up the space between sessions with entertainment. You don’t need to overdo it with the technology here—in fact attendees are more receptive to the raw, unfiltered and authentic content. Consider hosting open mics, improv comedy or performances in between sessions, opening keynotes, etc. 

Embracing more of those unexpected moments of connection is what your attendees crave. Encouraging audience engagement throughout the session, exploring creative formats and keeping the agenda fluid will be critical for success.  

4. Double down on unique networking & professional development opportunities

‍Networking is vital to attracting and satisfying audiences and your attendees want to walk away feeling more connected than when they arrived. That's why it's crucial to demonstrate the value you can provide for professional development—so they feel confident to build a business case and justify the investment to attend to their boss.

Authentic networking often requires you to give attendees a bit of a nudge with relevant conversation starters or activities.

Here are few simple ideas to get the ball rolling and encourage mingling outside of the cocktail hour (that doesn’t feel forced):

• Set up 1:1 mini coffee dates for attendees - explore developing a slack channel for attendees to join specific to your event. Within slack, there is a feature to set up random coffee dates with members of the channel - each member gets a notification they have been matched and then they can coordinate a date and time to meet if they please.
• Host intimate networking roundtables - Take the pressure off attendees who are not as comfortable networking by putting them into a group setting. This works best for smaller scale events, where you can keep the groups under 10 people total. Host an hour long roundtable and give each group 20 minutes to share thoughts around a hot topic specific to the event. For success, crowdsource these topics at the beginning of your event.
• Survey ahead of time and group attendees based on common interests - Put the networking into the hands of your attendees—run a survey before your conference and ask for the attendee’s specific interests (expertise, areas of interest, goals for attending). Use the answers to create segments based on common answers and develop a custom networking list for each attendee.
• Incentivize networking opportunities with your event speakers - Give attendees the ability to win a private 1:1 competition with a speaker in a certain session or topic. You can get creative and weave this into the session with that desired speaker - have a few chosen attendees come on stage for a contest to win a lunch date or mentor session with your speaker. 

5. Serve up swag with some soul - focus on sustainability, mindfulness and utility

‍Attendees are becoming more mindful and are seeking meaningful ways to connect to your event and the attendees around them. Rather than invest in plastic chachis that create waste or hosting open bars that breed headaches—it's time to get more creative and considerate.

The good news - you don’t need to break the bank. Explore something simple like a “Pay it forward” campaign. Can you make donations on behalf of attendees? Try partnering with a local organization at the city you are hosting or give them an option to donate to a cause on their behalf. Provide meditation classes, wellness packages or gratitude journals. Sustainable homegoods like reusable cutlery, grocery bags or planting seeds are also favored over plastic throwaways. 

Reimagining Your Approach to In-Person Event Planning

While the conference and event landscape is ever changing and adapting, these tips provide the foundation you need to stay on track. As you continue to refine your strategy in 2022, re-evaluate your approach to these different aspects of the attendee experience. You know your audience best and what change will drive the largest impact, but don’t overlook the feedback they can provide as well. Consider sending out a survey to get a pulse on where they see the biggest opportunity for improvement and prioritize that aspect first.