The success of an event is judged on many factors but one stands out more than any other, attendee satisfaction. It’s difficult to measure satisfaction, but you can attempt to quantify it with post-event feedback surveys asking these sort of questions: Did your event attendees have a stress-free day, did they find what they need, was it easy to get to, did they meet great contacts, did they leave having had a great day?
Increasing attendee satisfaction and ensuring attendees had a good time and a useful experience is crucial to the success of your event. The higher attendee satisfaction, the more likely they are to share their event experience with friends and colleagues, promote your event in their social media, and most importantly plan a return visit next year.
With hundreds of events under our belts, here are some suggestions for improving attendee satisfaction at your next event:
- Clear communication
Clearly communicate throughout the build-up to the event including during the promotion, registration and invite process. Giving your customers a complete heads-up on what to expect and a frictionless booking process makes everyone happy. After all, perception is reality, so prepare guests on what to expect accurately and honestly. No-one should walk away from your event expecting something other than you promoted. You don’t want to be the person who ruins Christmas! - Leverage your speakers
Organise great speakers and have them available post-speaking for meetups and arrange for their notes and presentation to be distributed. Their content can live on after the event and be permanently attached to your branding. - Interactive exhibition stands
Encourage interactive stands and promotions by your exhibitors. Help them to communicate and share their attendance at the event with related hashtags and a collective social media presence. The more everyone promotes, the more likely the event is to attract visitors. Enable exhibitors to store and distribute their brochure and literature digitally before, during and after the event, so if a guest misses a booth, they can still connect with an exhibitor. They’re just as likely to gain the information they require, and nobody walks away unhappy. - Meeting Points
Create areas for guests to sit and meet during the day. Industry gatherings are as much about networking as they are about learning, so encourage guests to meet in cafe seating, VIP rooms, and meeting points. Your event will be remembered for the great contacts that were made. - Transport connections
Think about how your guests can travel to the event smoothly. Provide maps and clear instructions in your communication, including emails and in your app. Should you be providing minibuses to and from public transport hubs? Attendees arriving without the stress of transport worries are going to be more likely to engage and contribute on the day, increasing their overall impression of the event. - Great catering
Good food means a good day. Nobody likes you when they’re hangry! - On-site assistance
Clearly marked signage and branding with helpful, visible people to provide support and assistance as required. If you have an app running, put up signs with assistants to help with downloads and instructions. Visibility applies to management too, so don’t hide in an office on the event day. Be seen and be available. - Prepare for the worst
Bad weather, accidents, electricity outages – anything can happen. Have a backup plan for everything, and you’ll be the talk of the town for how you coped with a crisis (if they even noticed). - Have an app
Create useful material in your app to complement the event experience. Enable users to help themselves by encouraging networking in-app, providing help including maps, speaker and guest profiles, plus exhibition information in it. Encourage interaction with Q&As via the app for seminars, social media updates, push notifications, surveys and polls. Make sure you promote its use before, during and after the event. - Follow up post-event
Send out emails with seminar answers to questions, results of polls, and feedback surveys. Find out how your event went and use that feedback to address issues for the next year. Using the data you’ve gathered from guests during the event, you can begin to promote next year’s event and pre-sell tickets.
These are just a few ways you can increase attendee satisfaction for your event. Having a mindset of ensuring your guests benefit the most will ensure your event stays focussed on creating a great experience.
If you’d like to discuss increasing attendee satisfaction for your next event, get in touch with the Event Builder team on 0121 796 5800.
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