Name: Soundings Connect
Start: 2018-10-15T10:00
End: 2018-10-18T12:00
Location: Soundings Connect

This is part five of the Revive & Innovate: Vision for the Future blog series, written by Soundings Founder & CEO Tracy Judge, MS, CMP. Follow Soundings on LinkedIn to stay up to date on all of our posts!

With the idea of building communities on the rise in the workplace, and event professionals having the skills for the role, will community building become the responsibility of event teams?

In this article, I’ll share how leading organizations in the industry are building community and the implications for the attendee experience and the future of events.

Innovating the attendee experience

Over the past few years, event professionals have been pushed outside of their comfort zones and forced to learn an array of technologies to keep communities (event attendees) engaged remotely. With events going back in person, professionals have been challenged to take more innovative approaches to build long-lasting brand loyalty. Event professionals know how to leverage digital engagement tools with live experiences to respond to the changing relationship between people and technology.

A great example of this type of innovation is the Break Free experience, presented by Encore in partnership with IMEX, at IMEX America 2022 at Mandalay Bay. The experience utilized multi-channel engagement tools to engage participants in the experience by creating a calming environment, utilizing technology to engage with data and other participants, collecting data to connect with participants post-engagement, and leveraging the environment and video to create an emotional connection.

The experience offered three different ways and environments to engage with the brand simulating the diverse engagement experiences that are also needed in today’s workplace.

Prioritizing customer engagement

At PCMA EMEA, the #1 trend Kim Kopetz, President and COO of the The Opus Group, spoke about was: "Brands are investing more in content, marketing and community building more than ever before”. Using Salesforce as an example, she explained how the company is creating year-round engagement with customers by integrating initiatives into their overall strategy like Salesforce Plus (original digital content), a print magazine, and an expansion of their Trailblazer community.

Thoughtful community

Tracy Judge, Fay Sharpe, and Olivia Salvage present at Cvent CONNECT Europe 2022

At Cvent CONNECT Europe, I presented with Fay Sharpe OBE, founder of Zibrant – one of the UK’s largest Meetings & Events companies (now the globally recognized BCD M&E). She is also the founder of Fast Forward 15®, a not-for-profit mentoring program to elevate women to top-level positions in the meetings and events industry.

Fast Forward 15 held a session for their mentees, mentors, and alumni during the event. It was so refreshing to see a community genuinely focused on helping to raise women up in the events industry. The camaraderie I witnessed was beautiful, and they even introduced me to women in their community that I could collaborate with.

Fay was able to leverage her experience building communities around events to create a community and help elevate women in the events business.

With the idea of building communities on the rise in the workplace, and event professionals having the skills for the role, will community building become the responsibility of event teams?

At Soundings, we highly value community building. That’s why we created Soundings Thrive, a vibrant members-only community for freelancers and independent talent, in the wake of the pandemic. We saw the need for community among independent talent and the need to connect talent with organizations. So, we doubled down on the promise to help people achieve professional success by helping organizations pivot and providing career resources – including virtual event platform access for freelancers and independent talent to upskill and thrive.

Implications for the future

As I bring this blog series to a close, I can’t help but feel immensely proud of how resilient our industry has been, and continues to be, in these unprecedented times. What I appreciated the most about my three-week journey traveling was spending time with people in the event industry. I saw old friends, made new friends, fostered new partnerships, and nurtured existing ones. It made me realize why our industry is so special - we can be authentic as ourselves, show our vulnerabilities, connect on a personal level, educate each other, and do business at the same time.

I have grown personally and professionally from these experiences. I learned about global event trends and got a peak at what the future may hold. Experiences like these are how I gain a vision for the future. I hope you’ve gained insight too!

Questions

What role does community building play in your events team?

How can you create meaningful community in your organization and in the industry as a whole?

How can you create more engaging attendee experiences?

How can you integrate engagement with customers in your overall marketing and content strategy?

Resources

I've curated a list of resources to aid your efforts in addressing the talent shortage. Access the resources list here.

Event professionals are community builders

With the idea of building communities on the rise in the workplace, and event professionals having the skills for the role, will community building become the responsibility of event teams?