by Lydia Kamicar
June 02, 2022
Now more than ever, the competition for your participant’s attention at your association’s live events is fierce. Attendees at meetings and conferences are rarely disconnected from their home and work lives, which means they may have one eye on their phone during the educational sessions.
Engaging with the audience can be done in a variety of ways, and options exist for all budgets.
It Starts with the Speaker
When preparing presenters for an event, ask how they typically engage the audience. Beware of the speaker who stays glued to the podium – if they don’t move for 45 minutes, the participants will naturally get bored because their eyes don’t have to follow any new activity beyond the screen and the podium. Encourage the speaker to use the full stage, and – if the size of the room allows – walk into the audience to physically be near the person sharing an insight or question.
Customization also goes a long way to make an attendee feel a connection to the speaker and content. There is a reason everyone cheers when the band screams, “Hello [insert name of city here]!” Ask the presenter to refer to the organization and industry as much as possible to tie their content back or introduce them to key volunteers or members who can be referenced during the session. A great speaker can seamlessly integrate the name on an audience member’s nametag into their talk to the point it feels like they knew the person ahead of time!
When a speaker uses an icebreaker for the first five minutes of the presentation, it can also help set the stage for an interactive experience. This might mean starting with a poll question, turning to their neighbor to answer a proposed question, or closing their eyes to self-reflect on a scenario the speaker describes. Presenters can easily fall in the trap of using their first five minutes to justify why they are on the stage: a rundown of their biography and credentials. Encourage them to flip it, and have them describe why the audience is there, list out the learning objectives, and ask to be held accountable for hitting those objectives by the end of the session.
Before They Arrive
Sending a survey or poll to the registrants ahead of the event, between one week and one month out from the date, not only prepares the presenter but also helps the audience be a part of the content development. This could be as simple as the open-ended question, “What questions do you have that you hope will be addressed during this session?,” or a way for attendees to self-identify within set categories so that the presenter can tailor their content to the audience’s responses. For example, to best prepare for a roundtable session on CRM systems, asking what platforms the registrants use can ensure you have the right tables assigned, so each audience member can discover their network of fellow attendees all working with the same vendor.
Format Matters
A session does not have to be 100% lecture or 100% audience participation. Chunk up the session topic into different formats to keep the participants energy levels up and reset about every 20 minutes. One Smithbucklin client association recently developed a program with the most relevant topics split into 75-90 minute blocks. After a 20-minute presentation from an industry leader on trends and available data, the event facilitator conducted an interview on stage with another subject matter expert. The facilitator then directed a small-group exercise and invited report outs from the audience to showcase a few takeaways and notable ideas.
Attendees are also hungry for sessions that invite them to bring their challenges and get real-time advice. These could be solicited ahead of time via a survey tool and integrated into the session as more general examples, or you could set up a Solutions Marketplace for attendees to come prepared to present an issue they are dealing with and discuss it with a table of peers.
Lean in to the Device
Although “raise your hand if….” is an old standby, the opportunity to use technology to guide engagement has never been easier. Through free or low cost tools like sli.do or Poll Everywhere, participants can ask questions, up-vote, and answer questions. Logistically, the speaker just needs a mechanism to easily view results or employ the help of a moderator to organize and share questions and poll responses. If your event is using a mobile app, it may have an integration for a polling/Q&A tool at an included or extra cost. Keeping your attendees engaged within the app itself not only helps train them to use the app, it also keeps response data all in one place as opposed to a variety of tools.
Leaving enough time for Q&A at the end of the session is imperative if providing a method for the audience to write in their questions. Many are uncomfortable with raising their hand to ask a question, but the allure of an anonymous question collection tool may allow them to be more confident and articulate in their question to the presenter. And once others see the types of questions being asked, more questions may spark. A moderator familiar with the content can be a great addition to the session, assisting the speaker with organizing the questions and weeding out hyper-specific questions or logistical questions that can be answered privately.
With just a few small tweaks centered around audience engagement and a willingness to adapt to their responses and needs, you can shift your event from a canned program that could have easily been consumed in an on-demand format to being a “living thing.” That unique value proposition will keep attendees coming back year after year.
Lydia Kamicar is in Education & Learning Services at Smithbucklin.