How to Personalize Event Experiences

Event Personalization is a Marketing Must

Understanding what your audience wants, and delivering on that, is critical to standing out. In the event industry that means understanding what the attendee wants, what their interests are, what their goals are in attending your event, and tailoring the event experience to those categories, not just delivering a one-size-fits-all approach. Personalization drives higher engagement as attendees feel that your event met their individual needs. Each attendee is different, so create a unique experience for each of them. A 5000-person event with 5000 unique experiences is a powerful vehicle for your organization. Sounds hard to do, right? It’s not!

The main way to achieve personalization is through event technology. Your online registration platform, your event apps, your post-show reporting … they all can be used to tailor the experience, resulting in happy and loyal attendees who are fully engaged. It’s just a matter of delivering the right technology and accumulating and using the right data.

Here are our top 5 ways to deliver a personalized user experience, and take your event to the next level.   We’ve got the first one right here.  Download the full guide for free to get all 5.

Take Full Advantage of Your Online Registration Process

Gathering Information on the Type or Interests of Attendees is Crucial

With a powerful online registration platform, you can identify the the type and interests of attendee coming to your event, and offer customized registration features that deliver one-to-one experiences.

By defining the type of attendee within the platform (i.e. Speaker, Board Member, Supplier, Student), you can offer questions, activities and other options tailored specifically to that category. For example, when your attendee registers as a Board Member, your online registration platform can serve up additional options for that attendee like a golf outing that only Board Members can participate in. If your attendee is a Speaker, you can offer discounted hotel room rates, or other discounted pricing in recognition of the hard work they are about to undertake on your behalf. And, most powerful of all, you can even suggest sessions to each attendee based on his or her interests.

Branding is Important

Brand the registration landing page so attendees identify your event from the very beginning. Make use of event colors and logo and create a consistent look and feel to your event that survives from registration all the way to post-show communications. That builds a personal connection right from the outset. Your registration platform should make this so easy to do.

Ease of Use is a Necessity

Make the registration process easy. Don’t make it hard for attendees to attend your event. Don’t ask a billion questions; make everything easy to input and answer. Take every opportunity to make your process easy for the attendee. It’s the first impression you give, and a hugely important one that will start a connection between you and the attendee. If it’s hard from the outset your attendee will think every aspect of the event will be complex.

Thanking Attendees is Huge

After the attendee completes the registration page, shoot them a personalized thank you page. And then send out personalized emails that tie into some of the things an attendee checked off when they first registered, like dietary considerations, type of job function etc. Send out personalized reminders as the event gets closer. And with each email, make sure to use the tone, imaging and colors that you used on your registration page, keeping your look and verbiage consistent. A good online registration platform will do the heavy lifting for you to make it easy to personalize communications and add the right look and feel.

Keeping Up the Email Marketing Until the Event is Primary

Make sure to keep in touch with attendees up to the event (and after, but we’ll get to that later). You want to get them excited about your event, and tie things into the email that are personal to them. One great suggestion is to send them an email that talks about the first session they have registered for to generate excitement.

This is just the beginning!  There are 5 more great ways to create personalized event experiences for your guests.  Check out the full guide below for free.