5 Facts You Must Know About Event Attendees

In order to create a truly successful event, conference, or meetup you must understand your event attendees. When a company builds a product, the first thing they think about is the potential customer. An auto manufacturer spends millions on focus groups before they ever design a car, a paper towel brand will interview parents before creating a new super-absorbent role.

As an event organizer, you must first and foremost take the time to understand who your event attendees are, even before you build an event website, select an event registration platform, or market your event on social media.

The more you know your event attendees, the better prepared you’ll be to keep them happy and increase your ROI in the years to come.

So before you try to round up a few event sponsors, take the time to learn these 5 facts about the average business event attendee so that you’ll be more prepared to great events that satisfy their needs.

1. 78% of corporate Americans report being sleep deprived to some extent (click to Tweet)

It’s likely that many of your event attendees are chronically tired. We know that event day features a plethora of fascinating speakers and great networking opportunities, but if attendees aren’t well-rested they may not get as much value out of the event as possible.

Consider pushing the start time of the event a bit later to allow attendees to rest-up, especially if many people are traveling from different time zones. If your event is crammed into a one-day session starting at the crack of dawn, consider splitting it to two days to allow for later start times.

2. More people own a mobile device than a toothbrush (click to Tweet)

There are 7 billion people in the world, about 4 billion own a smartphone, about 3.5 billion own a toothbrush. It can no longer be denied that the world is going mobile.

It’s reasonable to assume that all of your event attendees own a smartphone. That means that many attendees will expect you to provide an event app for the event.

After all, most of their lives are in some way connected to their phone; they send text messages to loved ones, email colleagues, and connect with old friends via social networks. Why shouldn’t they be able to make new business connections on their phone as well?

Consider using an event app so that your event attendees can make meaningful business connections, follow your event’s agenda, participate in live polls and post to social media. Plus, it’s a great way to go green and eliminate your printing costs.

3. People sitting in uncomfortable chairs have been shown to be less agreeable (click to Tweet)

In general, the feeling of firmness makes people inflexible, which is not the way you want your event attendees to feel at your event. It is important to have comfortable seating at your event so that attendees get the most out of your speakers, sessions and networking opportunities.

You want event attendees to open themselves up to new ideas, and to new people. Think about spending a day in the office with one of the chairs your attendees will be sitting on in order to decide if it is suitable for your event.

4. 9% of Americans carry no cash, and half carry $20 or less (click to Tweet)

With Applepay, Venmo, Paypal, and other mobile payment services, cash is becoming increasingly obsolete. If you’re offering food or beverages, hosting vendors, or selling merchandise, make sure you and your vendors accept digital payment. If you don’t, you may lose out on potential customers, which ultimately means less revenue.

5. People tend to remember 3-4 things at a time before becoming overwhelmed (click to Tweet)

Be sure to share this statistic from Business Insider with your event speakers. While your speakers might think that what they’re sharing with your attendees is easy to remember, research shows that we are far worse at handling new information than most people think.

In order to create an event experience that will have a true positive impact on attendees, ask your speakers to share 3 or 4 actionable insights that will motivate attendees to make positive changes for themselves or for their businesses.

Conclusion: What To Remember About Event Attendees

The next time you’re planning a conference or event, keep in mind that your event attendees are overly tired, smartphone carrying people, who are sensitive to their environment and require short presentations in order to feel in control of what they just learned.

To help event organizers gain deep insights into who their attendees are, Bizzabo created an all-in-one event success platform that allows users to see the kinds of people who have registered for an event. See the demographic information of your guests that can help you to plan an event catered specifically to their needs and desires. Click the button below learn more about Bizzabo.