Here’s How to Make Guests at Your Conference More Comfortable
The essence of making your conference attendees comfortable goes without saying.
When planning a conference or similar event, it’s easy to get obsessed with the logistics to give guests an impeccable attendee experience. Additionally, extraordinary moments such as an unexpected performance for entertainment can take the entire experience a notch higher.
However, many event organizers overlook the need to make guests comfortable at conferences and related events.
But…
Why is comfort essential when it comes to giving guests an exceptional and uplifting experience?
Conferences are both exciting and stressful. Attendees often experience stress related to logistics. For instance, guests may wonder if they’ll find the venue. Other stress-causing issues include:
- Achieving correct registration
- The time it takes to check in
- Available seats – are they spacious, ergonomic and comfortable?
- Are badges printable?
Although these issues seem minor, they can increase attendees’ stress levels, causing them tension and edginess.
Moreover, getting guests to work in groups also triggers fear of the unknown. This also happens when attendees are interacting with strangers and engaging in ice-breaking games.
The activities are purposed to benefit guests. However, they can increase guests’ levels of anxiety and minimize positive vibes. What’s more, most conferences require lots of mental energy on the side of the attendees.
Listen to conference speakers actively, take notes, memorize the most critical data, ask questions, and network with other attendees for optimal results. The activities are super-brain-demanding, meaning guests easily get tired at the end of a working day.
So…
How can event organizers ensure that attendees are more relaxed and comfortable at events with reduced stress levels? Here’re a few tips to get you started:
5 Ways to Make Event Attendees Comfortable
- Serve customers familiar food
Impress guests with exceptional catering services at national and international conferences. Surprise them with tasty treats, ranging from extravagant molecular cuisine to finger food.
Avoid unfamiliar food and serve what’s known to conference attendees. Whereas some guests enjoy sampling food at events, others prefer to eat something they’re familiar with.
Delight your guests with exquisite catering and mouthwatering foods without restricting yourself or service.
Provide familiar food options to ensure that your guests experience less uncertainty and feel more comfortable.
- Setup a lounge area
Prepare an area where guests can escape from the ongoing conference to recharge. Navigating business event environments or venue is usually tiring and confusing.
Therefore, provide your guests with a comfortable lounge area to relax and feel at ease.
Install warm lighting for a cozy look and comfortable furniture to enable event attendees to relax away from the event venue or area.
Make sure the lounge area is fitted with air conditioning systems to keep the area cool in summer. Find appliances and heaters like those at https://www.homeheatingheroes.com/ to fit in your venue, including the washrooms to keep guests comfortable.
- Create a guest-friendly program
An intense event schedule can easily exhaust guests. The more activities you include in the conference program, the more your guests are likely to get tired.
Creating a schedule that involves attendees running from one session to another without taking breaks is unfeasible. Guests get tired easily and feel uncomfortable at the conference. This means your event attendees won’t have a good experience.
As a result, they won’t enjoy the event.
Create simple conference programs with breaks in between for added guest comfort. Make sure that you include only a few activities in the event schedule for engagement purposes.
When choosing event activities, consider value and quality.
- Don’t force attendees to take part in conference activities
Event attendees don’t like being forced to participate in different activities or interacting with other guests. This is a major stressor for many conference attendees.
A mobile microphone may be thrown around the events seating area to randomly pick a guest to respond to questions. Guests who don’t like engaging in events in this manner usually experience heightened stress levels and feel embarrassed.
Don’t force your guests to take part in event discussions. Opt for different and more non-intrusive techniques to engage event attendees for increased participation or engagement.
Instead, use live polls.
- Don’t separate people into groups for group activities
Event speakers are usually advised to mix up guests into different groups for group activities. Therefore, this point may sound controversial.
Group activities allow event attendees to meet new people and interact with them. It’s a good way to get guests out of their comfort zones and improve their interaction experience.
However, some guests may find group activities uncomfortable. This is truer for guests not in attendance with colleagues, friends or new acquaintances.
Therefore, make it optional for guests to participate in group activities. This ensures that every guest is comfortable at the event. Shy guests remain in their seats while the extroverts freely move around to meet new people and interact with them.
Just as you work on the logistics of your upcoming event, make sure everything is in place to make attendees comfortable. Guests with low levels of stress feel comfortable and thus open to participating in event activities for a fun, memorable experience.