Trends in the Delivery of Live Events

According to a recent survey by the American Society of Association Executives, professional member conferences in 2022 experienced a 30-40% drop in attendance over 2019 numbers.

Anyone who has delivered in-person events has been monitoring trends as to how conferences are delivered during this “new normal.” In the advice industry alone, we’ve seen various innovations, including outdoor expositions, hybrid live + livestream programs, and fully on-demand programs. In-person events range from intimate, invite-only gatherings to large-scale conventions.

Most of us have learned by now that while in-person interaction can be emulated, it cannot be replaced. Sure, who doesn't like wearing sweatpants to work and having pets nearby while we work. But this doesn't change several hundred thousand years of learning among groups of other humans. We are social animals by nature, and learning around other humans enhances retention of knowledge, increases self-reflection and personalization of content, and connecting with others is critical to learning and growing.

As an association of and for advanced wealth management practitioners, the Investments & Wealth Institute is monitoring several trends:

1)?????Technology has enabled professionals to learn and participate in a variety of ways, and ease of access has generally caused a spike in learning, and a drop in in-person conference attendance.

2)?????Evaluations scores at in-person events are running nearly 20 points higher than pre-COVID evaluations. (Source: NPS and relevance scores, Institute conference evaluations, 2022 and Q1 2023)

3)?????Professionals are still attending conferences, but are far less likely to attend multiple, in-person conferences per year. The selection criteria for which events to attend are varied and hard to generalize.

4)?????Content is no longer king.?It's the experience that matters. How?content is delivered and the experience of learning has become a primary differentiator.

Investments & Wealth Institute hosted 118 programs in 2022. This is twice the number of programs we delivered in 2019, and the increase has been almost entirely via online education. Still, between our executive education programs, seminars and live conferences, we hosted about a dozen in-person programs in late 2021 and throughout 2022.

We continue to evolve our conference-planning strategy.?Here are five innovations we are implementing at the 2023 Investments & Wealth Institute Annual Conference,?ACE Academy,?to strengthen our position as the most relevant provider of education and credentials to address contemporary investment and wealth management challenges:

?1)???Technology to Expand Access to More Learning—We are launching a new Learning Experience Platform to support a library of one-hour “micro-courses,” short-form courses developed in partnership with specialty providers of education, and long-form courses on key topics such as?Private Markets for Advisors. This platform will make it easier for conference attendees to “dive deeper.”

?2)???Quiet Spaces, Happy Places—Many attendees don’t want to be pressed against a mob of other attendees, and prefer a more intimate executive education format of learning. For attendees, that means more breakouts, small pre-conference workshops, VIP functions with authors and speakers, networking events for international, NextGen, and Elite membership tier attendees. Our exhibit hall has a higher attendee to exhibit both ratio (18:1) than most industry events - we prioritize the attendee experience over sponsor revenue.

3)?“Bricks and Clicks” Options—Nearly all sessions are video-recorded, repackaged, and available online and on demand. Registration for the in-person event includes access to this on-demand product, or professionals may elect to register for the on-demand product only. This allows one to economize time and attend those sessions that work best for them in person, while saving others for review on a mobile device or desktop.

4)???Money-Back Guarantee—Few conference organizers stand behind their product like we do. Investments & Wealth Institute net promoter scores for its live events averaged over 70 in 2022. We are confident that if advisors attend one of our conferences, they will come back. We began offering the money-back guarantee on our conferences in 2013; to date, we have had fewer than a dozen who have requested a refund.

5)???100% Peer-Directed Content—To remain relevant and address topics of interest to the profession we serve, conferences programs are designed by practitioners, for practitioners. We have begun to feature crowd-sourced content at our programs, in shorter 20-25 minute segments — called “EdTalks.” This is in addition to the online “micro-courses” that offer one hour of CE each. In addition, unlike most advice-industry conferences, presentations that are delivered by product or service companies have been peer-reviewed and selected on their merit—and we are committed to balance a program like ACE Academy with no more than one in four sessions from a product or service provider.

For ACE Academy our goal is to deliver Ivy league-quality education, with practical education. Our staff and volunteers continue to innovate and provide exceptional experiences for our members, tailored to fit their needs around learning and connecting, with an emphasis on actionable ideas to benefit their practice and their service to clients.

Topics:?ACE Academy 2023