If you were to ask most event managers what their greatest challenge is relative to event management, the majority would respond with “attendee engagement.”
Trust us (we have asked). These event planners do not even hesitate or give their response a second thought.
For that reason — and all the conversations leading up to it — our team decided it was worth publishing a blog post about how to engage your attendees. Our goal is to offer some fun suggestions and out-of-the-box ideas to help you drive attendee engagement at your next event.
Of course, a list of ideas — no matter how good they might be — is only as helpful as a plan or tool to execute them.
That’s why we’ll connect each of our attendee engagement ideas into the common theme of a mobile event app.
Ultimately, by integrating the right mobile event app with your existing event management strategy, you’ll be able to implement new ideas for attendee engagement with less fuss, and more fun!
So, let’s take a look at some of those ideas in order to illustrate how a mobile event app is the partner in planning you never knew you needed.
Engage your attendees with real-time relevance
Attendee engagement has always been a tricky task.
How do you create ways to engage your audience that aren’t:
- A) tired
- B) cheesy
- C) without value?
Although this question was relevant before the pandemic, certainly the additional challenge of striking the right note with both virtual and in-person audiences has only complicated the answer.
And we know event planners just love it when the goal of satisfying these distinct attendee types is further stretched by designing ways for them to meaningfully engage each other during the event.
It’s attendee engagement overload.
Regardless, as an event planner it’s your job to make it happen.
Here are some popular and proven ways to do it!
1. Get chatty
By using mobile event app tools like chat and messaging, you can encourage attendees to engage with one another, as well as your content. Sure, there’s one-to-one messaging or group chats, but you can also get super social and organize forums and community threads to get attendees talking about what’s going on at your event and within their industry. Remember, they’re attending to learn something. They have a goal for being there (even if they’re there virtually). Supplying them with innovative and easily accessible tools like chat and messaging features will ensure they’re connected where and when they need (and you need them) to be. Support these connections by creating a unique hashtag for attendees to use when sharing interactions and stories about your event.
2. Keep it real
And keep your finger on the pulse of what is actually going on, on the ground, or virtually. Leverage live polls, Q&As, and surveys to gain insights into how your attendees are actually experiencing your event in the moment, from moment to moment. A quick show of hands online or a lightning round style live poll gives you data about attendee behavior and your event, overall.
3. Make it a game
Think about it: When we’re kids, just about everything is a game, a competition, a challenge. The challenges are plentiful enough in professional pursuits, but carefree competition is what’s missing. “Double dog dare” your attendees with gamification, presenting them with quizzes, trivia, and the chance to bag a few prizes in the process. (Pro-tip: Tap your sponsors and exhibitors for free (branded) swag and protect your budget from prize purchases. Your exhibitors and sponsors will see this as a win-win, we assure you).
4. Stay in their face
Okay, don’t be a nuisance but do keep your event offerings top of mind with push notifications and friendly reminders about session start times, games, and giveaways. In all seriousness, most of us welcome reminders about just about everything. Given how hectic most events and expos can become, your attendees will appreciate quick pings to their phones, reminding them that something worthwhile is on their agenda.
5. Surprise them!
Sure, push notification reminders are helpful and absolutely nurture attendee engagement. Definitely ensure those are in place. And also consider setting up a few fun surprises, like announcements about incentives, raffles, and even where (or how for virtual attendees) to pick up free swag. Whenever possible, connect these surprises to your event location. For instance, raffle off dinner for two to a landmark restaurant or offer passes to a local museum or other tourist attraction. You can do the same for virtual attendees by incorporating local flair in the form of branded items or content from these vendors and attractions.
We can guess what you’re thinking… Can a mobile event app really help me manage all of this?
Well, only the right mobile event app offers you all these capabilities (and then some).
Presenting Pathable: the event platform made for event planners.
What puts Pathable ahead of the pack?
Plenty! However, there are also plenty of mobile event apps on the market that can do much of what’s suggested above to engage your attendees.
Pathable, however, also offers full on-demand and live video, as well as the space to warehouse additional event content which attendees can access at any time — even after the event is long over.
Additional features of the Pathable mobile event that help engage your attendees include:
Mobile App Customization
Whatever your audience needs, you can design your app accordingly using Pathable’s widget-based app builder, which helps attendees isolate the event content they actually care about.
Personalized Agenda and Session Schedule
It doesn’t matter if your event is a simple single-track or complex, multi-track expo, all event stakeholders can easily access the event content you’ve created.
Profile + Meeting Attributes
This is event networking made simple. With this mobile event app feature, attendees are able to see other attendees’ schedules to see when they’re available to meet versus when they’re busy. By using this tool, attendees can schedule one-on-one meetings or book meeting spaces like tables or virtual conference rooms.
Interactive Maps
Returning to our earlier point about alerting attendees to places where they can pick up free swag, the interactive maps feature is a navigational tool, ensuring that attendees know of important locations, as well as how to access sessions and meetings.
At the end of the day (but before the end of your event), you can easily engage your attendees by prioritizing convenience and connectivity.
Pathable’s mobile event app is simple to set up and allows attendees to register onsite or online. From there, they can scan their own badge, dodging a potentially lengthy in-person check-in process. That covers convenience.
From a connectivity consideration, between Pathable’s intuitive dashboard, real-time updates, email, and push notifications, attendees are constantly connected to the colleagues and content that they care to engage with.
Engage your attendees better than ever before by partnering with Pathable and leveraging our mobile event app.