How to Touch the Core of Your Audience to Design Better Event Experiences

In today’s world, consumers overwhelmingly choose brands, communities and experiences based on shared values and purpose. People want greater connection and seek more substantive forms of gratification in everything—including their events. To meet your prospective guests’ needs, you need to make a bigger effort to know them intimately. And, organizations that are making a conscious effort to uncover the human needs that experiences can and should fulfill are outperforming those who are not.

Old thinking won’t bring new results

Most event survey tools take a “rear-view mirror” approach to measuring attendee satisfaction. Just doing a post-event survey to gauge attendees’ opinions on the superficial features of your event won’t provide you with the information you need to truly understand your audience. Great experience design is rooted in empathy, according to Tim Simpson, brand & engagement strategist at Maritz Global Events.

In today’s world, consumers overwhelmingly choose brands, communities and experiences based on shared values and purpose. People want greater connection and seek more substantive forms of gratification in everything—including their events. To meet your prospective guests’ needs, you need to make a bigger effort to know them intimately. And, organizations that are making a conscious effort to uncover the human needs that experiences can and should fulfill are outperforming those who are not.

Old thinking won’t bring new results

Most event survey tools take a “rear-view mirror” approach to measuring attendee satisfaction. Just doing a post-event survey to gauge attendees’ opinions on the superficial features of your event won’t provide you with the information you need to truly understand your audience. Great experience design is rooted in empathy, according to Tim Simpson, brand & engagement strategist at Maritz Global Events.

Design Study provides the answer

The goal of going deeper through a design study is to empathize with the values of the attendees. With that knowledge, organizations can build the foundation of experiences where brand values and purpose intersect with those of attendees. Simpson says this connection holds the key to unlocking deeper economic value for guest and brand alike. And conversely, failure to foster that connection can lead to brand erosion, a failure to draw new guests or the loss of repeat attendees.

How do you know it’s time for a Design Study?

Tammy Smith, research director at Maritz, cites four scenarios that necessitate adding a Design Study step to your design process:

1. Stagnancy – Organizations that need to make their events more impactful or have declining attendance need to ask tough questions like: does your model appeal to the next generation of attendees and are there legacy aspects of your event that attendees no longer value?
2. Declining Budgets – Organizations being asked to deliver a better experience with fewer resources need to know what’s most impactful to attendees as they make decisions and trade-offs.
3. Focus on ROI – Event professionals are constantly asked to demonstrate the return for their programs. A Design Study that is closely linked to business outcomes can measure the impact the event has on the organizations’ strategic priorities.
4. When You Think You Know – New leaders of event programs have an opportunity to gain a fresh view that’s free of expectations.

Especially in cases like those listed above, organizations need insights that can’t be gleaned from standard post-event surveys. According to Smith, this calls for undertaking a deliberate Design Study with a wider scope and deeper focus. New insights often reveal different directions that can lead to transformative change, greater ROI and other benefits.

How do you know it’s time for a Design Study?

Tammy Smith, research director at Maritz, cites four scenarios that necessitate adding a Design Study step to your design process:

1. Stagnancy – Organizations that need to make their events more impactful or have declining attendance need to ask tough questions like: does your model appeal to the next generation of attendees and are there legacy aspects of your event that attendees no longer value?
2. Declining Budgets – Organizations being asked to deliver a better experience with fewer resources need to know what’s most impactful to attendees as they make decisions and trade-offs.
3. Focus on ROI – Event professionals are constantly asked to demonstrate the return for their programs. A Design Study that is closely linked to business outcomes can measure the impact the event has on the organizations’ strategic priorities.
4. When You Think You Know – New leaders of event programs have an opportunity to gain a fresh view that’s free of expectations.

Especially in cases like those listed above, organizations need insights that can’t be gleaned from standard post-event surveys. According to Smith, this calls for undertaking a deliberate Design Study with a wider scope and deeper focus. New insights often reveal different directions that can lead to transformative change, greater ROI and other benefits.

A Design Study can have big payoffs

Simpson cites the success of a recent Design Study performed for an association trying to grow its event. The results were breakthrough in every way. “You could see the board’s faces and demeanor change as they heard the results. The findings set the tone for the design lab that followed by validating some of the group’s beliefs and challenging others,” he said. “In the end, the Design Study helped them overcome internal disagreement. The facts about people led to a lot of decisions about how to alter big characteristics around networking, education and the event’s overall length.”

It just goes to show how in the face of differing opinions and long-held assumptions, the customer is always right. Know the customer and you’ll know the path to success. This is true for organizations of all size and event types, whether corporate, association, government or live event. The starting point should always be people.

That makes design study an essential precursor to experience design today. The good news is that design studies can vary to suit your bandwidth and your budget—from simply adding additional questions to your post-event questionnaire to launching a broad-reaching survey of your audience members’ values and perspectives. If you need help determining the scope and form for your gathering, our Design Studio team is here to assist. Book a 30-minute design consultation with one of our experts.