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With the growing uncertainty surrounding events, keeping up with trends as you plan for the new year certainly helps. Let's explore a roundup of the top 6 trends for the events industry in 2022.
In early 2021, event planners and marketers around the world had high hopes for the new year. However, 2021 was a difficult year for many in the industry. While the industry has seen a return of events in person, with the discovery of new Covid variants, event professionals have received a new blow as they approach 2022.
But that's not all bad news. With the emergence of innovative trends that include advanced event technologies and solutions, planners can better equip themselves to face the new year. These are some trends for the world of events that we of Letz Fair we recommend keeping an eye on 2022.
Constant uncertainty
Our hopes for a return to some form of normalcy by 2022 have been dashed. Despite the in-person events that took place globally in 2021, there is an (undeniable) uncertainty that has led to the cancellation of large-scale events for the rest of this year and next. Omicron is the current disturbing variant of the coronavirus, but new variants are likely to emerge during 2022.
“As long as this virus continues to circulate, we will see new variants appearing in the community over and over again,” said Brian Labus, an epidemiologist and assistant professor at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas. His advice to event planners is to make sure the benefits of the participating in an event outweighs the risks.
Additionally, UFI CEO Kai Hattendorf believes in a full economic recovery of the events industry by 2024. Despite dismissing online trade shows as unsustainable, he is confident that technology will play a crucial role in the future of events and encourages organizers to adopt a mix of physical events and online events.
Involvement all year round
The importance of involving one's visitors and exhibitors in order to create a community that is always active and ready to participate becomes increasingly important in a scenario of stop and go events.
AI and Machine Learning offer ROI
The acceleration of technological progress during the Covid pandemic has meant that event technology can now use real machine learning and artificial intelligence, not just sophisticated algorithms. This technology is a game changer. Events with more than 50 sessions or 5.000 attendees benefit the most and you get a positive return on investment.
Involvement driven by insights
Regardless of event format, engagement is the metric that can predict the outcome of an event. By monitoring event metrics that act as a proxy for audience engagement, you can now continuously adjust and improve any event to increase engagement. Transitioning events into data-rich environments and adopting a hybrid event strategy could revolutionize the event planning playbook.
The fusion of the hybrid experience
With the extraordinary advancements in event technology over the past 22 months, hybrid events are now almost as easy to navigate as fully virtual events, at least from an audience perspective. This structure leads to the fusion of the hybrid event experience, when audience members can freely move between in-person or virtual engagement using devices, regardless of their physical location.
Ultimately, merging the hybrid event experience means hosting hybrid events becomes less a matter of serving two separate audiences and more of merging two types of technologies.
Moving towards the Metaverse
Currently, video games are the closest thing to the metaverse. But just because they're games doesn't mean we shouldn't take them seriously and the technology that powers them. The decision to host events in the metaverse will depend on whether an immersive online experience is a suitable venue for a specific event. While it has significant potential for specific use cases, it won't work for all types of events.
For now, potential metaverse event venues may be a little too extravagant for most business needs, and visiting them requires a bulky headset that is currently inaccessible to many non-gamers, but it's worth being wary of further developments of this one. technology.
Conclusions
As we move into the new year with so much uncertainty, organizers can use these 6 trends to better plan and make their events increasingly profitable, without however giving up a look towards the future.
