In the fast-paced industry of event management, you can’t afford to ignore the power of artificial intelligence (AI) for events.
Although AI is new for everyone, it is being adopted feverishly, with over 80% of businesses already integrating AI into their operations. With early implementation, this technology can make creative event management more efficient, innovative, and cost-effective. When it’s implemented correctly, AI has the potential to transform every aspect of how an event unfolds, from the way it’s designed behind the scenes and produced, to the way it’s experienced by attendees on-site. We are incredibly excited to see how AI in creative design, event production, and the attendee experience will impact our future services, capabilities, and offerings.
Now, here are 8 ways to consider using AI in events as the technology becomes more prominent.
1. Personalize the Attendee Experience
Using data analysis and facial recognition, AI makes it that much easier to curate a personalized experience for each attendee.
Before the event, AI can use data like demographics, professional interests, past experience, memberships, and more to suggest registration for specific events, panels, breakout sessions, and meetings. To complete the event experience, you can even use this data to customize digital swag or offer local dining and attraction recommendations.
During the event, AI can use facial recognition to guide attendees on their journey through the event. Upon arrival, a personalized welcome message makes each member feel unique and valued. From there, this facial recognition can track attendees through the space, meeting their needs more quickly and efficiently to improve the event experience. For example, providing “digital signage” through mobile notifications to redirect attendees who need directional support to get back to their room or to make it to their next session.
2. Streamline the Presenter Experience
On the other side of event management, you can also use AI in events to improve the experience for speakers, presenters, and other staff, especially using speaker management systems like MARQUEE. This system is pushing the envelope in event automation, giving more control back to speakers and presenters while reducing staff and labor costs.
Obviously, there will always be a human touch in speaker-ready rooms, but with the help of AI like MARQUEE, speaker-ready room staff can be cut down by more than 50%, significantly reducing costs and providing a more personalized experience.
3. Track Attendee Engagement
While AI can be used to track each attendee’s individual activities, it can also capture valuable data when all attendees are considered as a whole.
Thanks to AI’s immense processing power, it can take in vast amounts of data and make it easy to understand. This real-time tracking can tell you facts like the number of attendees, important demographics, peak attendance times, most popular sessions, and attendee feedback.
All of this contributes to a powerful data-driven approach that allows you to create a more meaningful attendee experience year over year.
4. Collect Marketing Insights for Your Expo Partners
The data AI collects during events may potentially increase the value of exhibiting at conferences. With advanced tracking and facial recognition, AI can even deliver detailed statistics, like the average length of time spent at each booth or the percentage of attendees who appeared engaged at each event. It can even measure the number of minutes spent by each customer who picked up a product to look at it.
These numbers tell marketing teams a lot about which demographics are engaging with what products the most or what style of event has the potential to engage the most attendees.
AI does more than just gather these statistics — it can break down and analyze complex data to create targeted marketing recommendations. These insights can save you time and money, letting you put your marketing budget where it can have the most impact.
5. Improve Event Experience Through Design
Before the event even begins, AI may be used to help lay the foundation for a better event experience. For example, using AI to build a more efficient set that replicates natural human movement, enabling us to see how people will move through the expo floor, and adapting our designs accordingly.
With so many variables at play, it’s important to be thoughtful when placing food vendors and communal lounge spaces, as well as determining where each activation and event will take place. Predictive AI models can let you visualize the flow of attendees, working out bottlenecks to improve the flow of traffic and make the experience as immersive as possible.
6. Optimize Event Logistics
Behind the scenes, AI may help event managers handle logistics more efficiently. Using historical data and real-time information, AI tools will be able to recommend the best dates, times, and locations for your events. It can also offer insight into the most efficient ways to allocate resources like staff and equipment.
AI may simplify the labor-intensive process of manually building an agenda; algorithms can quickly review speaker availability, historical attendance records, and attendee preferences to create the most logical and well-organized event schedule.
Even something as simple as event delivery could be improved with AI software. Companies like FedEx have already begun optimizing delivery by using AI-powered robots that instantaneously determine the most efficient ways to load packages onto trucks. This could be a huge win in the event space, helping both the organizations that put on events and the event production groups themselves save time and resources.
7. Generate Creative Event Themes
One of the best ways to use AI is for creativity. AI tools generate ideas that can inspire engaging new event themes, as well as more ideas to keep pushing your business forward. From scenic design to activations and branding, visual AI is a great way to get inspired.
8. Improve Efficiency and Productivity
With the power of AI, so much can be done with the click of a button. Everything from making spreadsheets to editing videos together can be done in seconds.
Over time, leveraging these tools makes event planning faster and more efficient, allowing you to explore new ventures and execute even more.
AI for Events: The Future of Event Planning
The next level of event planning and management could be just around the corner, thanks to advancements in AI technology. From automating time-consuming manual tasks to providing next-level insights, AI has the ability to transform how we run — and experience — events.
However, if you’re worried about the “AI takeover” in events, here is some consolation. Your event is a live show that rarely goes as scripted. Humans still have the superior knowledge and intuition to make judgment calls on how to get things back on track. And, they’re still necessary to apply AI and use its advantages. Until AI can do that and react and engage like a human, it will be difficult to replace a seasoned, caring professional.
At OVATION, we know how important it is to stay ahead of the curve on event planning and management technology. Learn more about how OVATION is revolutionizing AI planning to bring events to life or see the results for yourself.