Keeping Your Attendees Entertained

Today, we’re going to be addressing a question which has doubtless plagued many event management professionals in the past: how does one keep their guests entertained without sacrificing the value of an event? How much novelty does one need to keep people interested – and how can one tell they’ve crossed the line and lost sight of their event’s original purpose?

It’s not an easy question to answer, but I believe I’d like to start with a simple truth: presentation is everything. Every single factor, ranging from what sort of equipment you use to how the conference hall looks right down to how your guest speakers dress influences how your attendees engage with your events. If even one of them could be considered dull, drab, or unimaginative, then there’s a very good chance you’ll be dealing with at least a few bored guests.

This problem can be largely remedied by providing attendees with a constant feed of information, facts, and details while they’re at your event – and by ensuring that your guest speakers are both charismatic and entertaining. A few great vendors can make all the difference here, while providing guests with a place to sit down and chat at a networking event is always a good plan. Of course, all of this stuff is pretty much event planning 101. We’re here to talk about novelty.

We’re here to answer the question of what you can do to make your events more exciting without sacrificing quality.

To that end, this post on Tweak Your Biz offers up a number of fantastic suggestions regarding how you can inject a bit of extra life into your event. Ideas such as “lost” venues, an agenda-less itinerary, and knowledge cafes could serve mix things up a bit, while Open Mic Jams and Soundclashes could inject some much-needed life into your events. While concerning yourself with all these bells and whistles, however, you need to be certain you don’t lose sight of your actual reason for running the event – whether it’s to entertain, network or inform.

See, that’s the point at which I think it’s safe to say you’ve too much novelty and not enough substance. When you’re focusing more on how your event is presented than its actual purpose. You don’t want your event to basically becomes akin to a hipster: stylish, sure; but also boorish and lacking in any substance whatsoever.

The core of your event, your reason for hosting it; that should always come first.

All the other stuff? That’s just window dressing, which is effectively useless if you don’t have anything at the core to dress up. Novelty is well and good, but only in moderation.

Keeping your guests interested in your event isn’t exactly an easy task. You need just the right balance of novelty and usefulness, just the right mix of entertaining and informative or they’ll very likely check out. That definitely isn’t something you want.