The Event Industry is F#%ked: What do we do now?

By Ben Smereczniak and Beck Wentz, Event Success Pros

We are currently at a fork in the road and it looks nasty to some people.

Certain stakeholder groups around the event ecosystem have uncertain futures and others are deciding there’s no value in it for them if it’s all virtual. Woe to those waiting for a return to normal.

During the past year a lot has changed. Some change was already underway and accelerated by COVID. The smart money in the game is glad for that. Other changes drive opportunity and/or risk; some changes are head scratchers. What so many of us can say is we got involved in something new. We took on new roles, tried new formats, innovated tools and technologies and crossed lots of fingers...and toes.?

Around all that; the fork took shape. Will we go back to normal? Will we be emphasizing virtual/digital formats going forward with the new promise of broader reach and ease of entry? Or, will HYBRID, the format of duality, be our gravitational center? To some this is the promised land. Dogging much of our efforts to change direction in 2020 has been the admission there is something uniquely valuable and irreplaceable about the way we did things before in the face-to-face format. We cannot abandon what worked well. Are we fully agreed on what that was exactly??

So, where do we turn at this fork; add virtual, shift to hybrid or revert to F2F?

Opinions abound and data is sparse to be honest. Very few have tried hybrid as of now. Plenty of digital or virtual events have come up short in serving value to exhibitors and attendees alike. We think most have failed. Organizers are prone to offer them no more than links back to their websites after a 50 word blurb. Is that a brand experience? A microsite page with logos on it is a poor imposter for an expo. Brands are refusing en masse to invest further in virtual events unless they can control the timing, content and audience, so some produce their own.?Webinars have been held by brands for years and are ubiquitous. 100’s of event technology companies popped up this year. Some will help while others will misfire on grasping critical engagement or the behavioral science of events. Many will misdirect audiences’ attention away from content and instead to tech, even if inadvertently. Many of these suppliers came from outside the business event world and came seeking new revenue streams. All of this moves momentum around different kinds of virtual events for different constituencies.

We are into tectonic activity here. It’s hard to see the path forward with so much smoke in our eyes, so much “thought leadership” content exploding around us, with the ground literally falling out from under some event professionals and lifting others up abruptly. Nothing will disrupt our industry as deeply and widely as the NOW we are experiencing. Private equity is flocking in as the degree of change is so significant to appetize them like never before. They’re placing bets along the prongs of the Fork.

Whatever happened in the last 14 months, the coming 12 stand a chance at being crazier. We might say 2020 hit us all with a relatively level playing field, that it happened to all of us. But the way we each lean in at this fork, commit to a path and push and pull others with us, will create very diversified experiences, outcomes, opportunities and risks. We see lots of those factors as self-evident. Some though, are only being spotted by those looking in the right directions and from the right footing.

What we all need to be doing is watching, listening, studying, sharing, adjusting and moving. To those who might be on the sidelines temporarily, (furloughed?), our advice would be to spend your time learning and reimagining. Learn about digital events tech, tools and formats from exhibitors, attendees and organizers. Learn how they’re done and how peers have adapted to revised roles and built new skills. Reimagine your skillset. Identify transferrable skills. Get help from people in other professions who can help you see outside the box of the event industry. Communicate abundantly. Hibernation will not pay off. Stay in the mix even as a spectating fan. Get ready to turn at the fork because there is no staying put. Staying put leaves us F$@ked.

We think about what our north star ought to be and which path from the fork orients toward it. For us, we are convinced the greatest pillar of value in face-to-face formats is networking, H2H connection. While we can’t do it as well virtually, giving up is not an option. We must start from the necessity of connectivity and then engineer tools and methods to enable engagement and not succumb to the temptation to start from tech. That inverted approach degrades the human to human dynamic. We still need in-person events desperately and we can much improve how we do virtual ones.

What’s the best format then for the second pillar of event value – education? We don’t need F2F to push learning and content. It’s very do-able digitally. Therefore, when we are F2F, should we forfeit 2/3 of each day to locking ourselves in session breakouts with eyes forward to the podium and hands folded on our laps or should we imagine new agenda time blocks that further the networking and human exchange options? Organizers should replace many session hours in their live events with human exchange opportunities. Roundtables. Workshops. Peer exchange. More.

As for the final value pillar – shopping – the dual approach of live and digital looks best to us. If pre-event days are spent preparing for high quality F2F encounters, via research done digitally and appointments being set, then we can be more purposeful when in-person together. We can crank up the value of an event’s overall contribution to our business productivity. After the F2F event, the digital format makes for an extension of lead nurturing, of connections, of partnerships and of learning. One could digitally explore every session, every connection and every sponsor they missed in-person.

As two event professionals who have been event marketer, exhibitor, event organizer, attendee, agency rep and providers of exhibits and event services, the F#%K looks easy to navigate. Align formats, agendas and usage of the F2F and digital mediums with their most optimal values.

Whether we see you on the ground or via screen, we look forward to seeing you all again. Connecting, buying, selling, learning, teaching and getting back at it…better than before. That day is coming for us. We already feel it. It will be F#%Kin’ great!

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