Meetings and conferences can be very monochrome in nature - colourless, officious and dare I say, boring. Two factors that stand out (in a conventional way), when refering to the attractiveness of a meeting/conference, are content and attendee profile. I am not going to address these here. Given the very competitive environment with meeting/conference organisers clamouring for the attention of potential attendees, the X Factor or Experiential Factor is now a "buzz" word when defining the attractiveness of one meeting/conference over another.
Meetings/Conference organisers need to pay close and careful attention to the overall experience of they attendees. Attendees are the best mouthpieces and their judgements (positive or negative take away from attending a meeting/conference) carry a lot of weight among their peers.
Some areas where EXperiential Factors come into play - the interface with frontline service staff (friendliness, efficiency, knowledgable etc); timeliness (sessions starting and ending on time); the ancillary activities like cocktail sessions, dinners, basically the fun stuff (with particular efforts made to showcase the uniqueness of the destination); friendliness of venue staff (something that organisers often forget to emphasise to the venue managers); and efforts made to accommodate special needs attendees.
Positive attendee experience leads to positive publicity. It is important to note that such publicity is not a one-time thing. People enjoy recalling positive experiences.....people enjoy reminiscing. So......as organisers we are in the position to create and delivery legendary memorable experiences to attendees!
Benjamin Cassim
Temasek Polytechnic
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