Corporate events can be a great way to connect with your employees and give them some much-needed time away from their desks.
But if you’re not careful, they can also make it seem like you care more about the food and entertainment than the people who are attending.
That’s why it’s important to think about how you present information and engage with your audience when planning an event—especially since there’s no shortage of distractions these days!
If you want your event to be more authentic, here are some tips for making sure everyone feels involved:
Start with basics for your corporate event.
You should start by knowing the basics. The first thing you should do is make sure that you know your audience. What do they want? What do they need? How can you provide them with an experience that will meet their needs and expectations?
The next thing to consider is your message, which can be as simple or as complex as you want. Be sure to keep it in mind during the planning process so that it’s not forgotten or ignored once event day begins.
And lastly, consider the budget and time constraints of your event—you don’t want either one of these things taking away from what makes an event authentic!
Reimagine the way you present information at a corporate event.
Now that you have strategized, it’s time to go out and make your vision a reality. But before you can do that, you need to be able to communicate your idea to your team.
A corporate event is an opportunity for staff members and clients alike to experience something new, exciting and different from the usual day-to-day activities of the workplace. Your audience isn’t going to want a canned presentation with PowerPoint slides; they’ll want something more engaging and interactive. So, let’s look at some things to keep in mind when creating an authentic experience for them:
If you’re trying to find a way to present information at a corporate event, there are a lot of ways you can do it. The first thing you want to do is figure out what kind of message you want to convey—is your purpose going to be educational or motivational? Once you know that, think about how best to convey that message.
If you want to make sure your audience is engaged and listening closely, consider using props. If they’re visual learners or they just love seeing things with their own eyes, then a prop might be just what they need to keep them tuned in throughout your presentation.
If, on the other hand, your audience isn’t as visual as some other groups might be (i.e., if most of them are auditory learners), then consider using music or sound effects during the presentation. You could also try using video clips from movies or TV shows related to your topic—this will help make it more relatable for everyone in attendance.
Finally, don’t forget about humor! Humor can go a long way toward keeping people interested in what’s being said onstage—and if someone laughs out loud at something funny (even if it wasn’t intended), then chances are others will start laughing too!
Experiment with different formats.
How you experience an event can be just as important as the content itself, so don’t be afraid to play around with things like music, lighting and even audience participation.
Sometimes a simple playlist or live band can make all the difference in how your corporate events go over with your employees or attendees (and their families).
Make visual impact work for you instead of against you.
At The Event Planner Expo, we like our audience to be engaged, so we make sure they can see the content.
If you’re going to put on an event, it is incumbent upon you to make sure that the attendee can actually see what’s happening. It sounds obvious, but it happens all the time: an event will have a room full of people and no projector or screen for anyone to look at in order for them to understand what’s going on.
This means that if someone needs their eyesight checked and doesn’t want glasses or contacts (or failing those options), they may not be able to see clearly enough from their seat in the back row at your conference center or auditorium venue.
If this happens multiple times during any given presentation, it creates an experience that is both frustrating and distracting—and nobody wants either of those things!
Mix it up by highlighting multiple perspectives.
Give your audience a chance to connect with each other. You might be planning a panel discussion that allows participants to offer their views on the topic of choice.
But it’s also important to give them an opportunity to interact with each other as they discuss this issue, so consider adding in some breakout sessions where attendees can get together in smaller groups and discuss what they’ve learned from the main presentation.
This will help create an atmosphere of community at your event and will encourage attendees to share information about themselves and their businesses—which is great if you’re looking for ways for them to collaborate later on down the road!
Give your audience a chance to connect with other speakers. If one person speaks at length about his or her experiences without giving anyone else much time for questions or commentary, then listeners could come away feeling like there was nothing valuable left behind after listening.
In other words, the speaker didn’t really give them anything new or special from which they could draw inspiration or ideas for later use in their own lives/careers/businesses/etcetera (or whatever).
Tip: Encourage interaction between presenters by offering breaks between speakers where everyone gets equal amounts of attention before starting up again afterwards. This way nobody feels left out because someone else got more airtime than they did.
Make sure they feel connected.
The most important aspect of any corporate event is making sure your audience feels connected to the brand, the event and its content, as well as its location.
This can be achieved by ensuring that you have a well-defined audience profile for your participants (which we’ll cover in more detail later), and then designing an event experience with them in mind.
If you’re planning a large conference or trades how, consider using technologies like video conferencing so attendees feel like they’re right there in person.
Conclusion
So, there you have it—our best tips for creating an authentic corporate event experience. We hope they inspire you to take risks, think outside the box and get creative with your events!
For more inspiration on what to implement into your corporate events, join us at The Event Planner Expo 2022 in New York! Click here for more information.
