How to operate and plan an offline event?

I participated in a two-day and one-night offline event last weekend, which created a good user experience both in process design and user experience. Below I will analyze the three important factors that contribute to the popularity of an event from three aspects, which are also the three major skills that event operators can learn.

1. Build momentum

In essence, hype creation is a superficial layer, which is mainly used to highlight a person or a thing and make users feel "wow". The core keyword is: unexpected surprise.

In this event, the biggest hype was prepared for the sharing guests, which was mainly reflected in two aspects: the T-shaped stage and the guests' entrance.

T-shaped stage: The stage is very large, forming a T shape. The sharing guests start at the intersection, walk around from time to time, and interact with the audience. The stage is more than 1 meter high and about 10 meters long horizontally and vertically, and is covered with red carpet; the two different sharing guests created completely different atmospheres.

• Before the first guest entered, the audience stood up to welcome the guest. The guest walked slowly on the red carpet and interacted with the audience below, making users feel like "stars and the focus." At the same time, the game settings were used to guide users to applaud enthusiastically, and the pre-event hype was successfully created;
• Before the second guest enters, talent performers will come on stage for about 3 minutes to welcome the guests. The talent show is not ordinary singing or dancing, but the traditional "Pipa playing". After a piece of Pipa music is over, the audience's emotions can be said to have reached a climax. There was constant applause because of the sense of scarcity and unexpected surprise.

In a live event, the importance of “creating momentum” is highlighted. How can sharing guests differentiate themselves from ordinary audiences? How can the sharing guest become the key person that everyone pays attention to? There are more than 200 people at the event. How to successfully attract their attention?

"Creating momentum" is very common in the operation process. The main technique is "differentiation". The goal is to arouse the user's "curiosity" and guide the user to achieve "specific goals."

2. Sense of participation

There are more than 200 people at the event. How can we get them to fully participate and create a sense of interaction and stickiness?

When Xiaomi was first founded, it relied on its die-hard fans and continuously established positive interactions with them. It not only allows users to participate in the optimization of Xiaomi products, but also allows them to participate in the development and changes of Xiaomi.

How important is “user engagement”?

As the co-founder of Xiaomi, Li Wanqiang published a book titled "Sense of Participation". In this book, the author strongly states that user participation can maximize user attention to the product.

In this event, the sense of participation was mainly reflected in: frequent interactions, not neglecting the feelings of each individual, and allowing the audience to have a "sense of ownership."

Not being isolated from the group is the appeal of every individual.

How can we make more than 200 people feel a strong sense of participation? The practice on site is that each small body team has official service staff who listen to the lectures and provide services with the audience, while guiding them to interact; during the interaction, the guests walk off the scene and constantly motivate each individual and team; from time to time, audience members are randomly selected to go on stage.

When going on stage, almost everyone is rushing to go up, which is inseparable from the atmosphere on the scene and the guidance of the guests. The "sense of participation" brings the audience a strong sense of honor and being noticed. Not only that, it also creates a strong sense of connection with the event site.

The key word for sense of participation is “sense of ownership”, which ensures that the audience does not feel out of place at the event and that every audience member has a strong desire to go on stage, share and grow.

3. User Incentives

How can we prevent users from feeling aesthetic fatigue or burnout and keep them "passionate" for two days and one night?

At this point, "user motivation" and " instant feedback" are indispensable.

User incentives adopt a "points system". The top three in points can receive a certain amount of reward funds, and at the same time influence the top three people in the event. The more points they have, the more incentives they will receive. The means to obtain more points is "feedback". The audience can feed back what they have learned to everyone in the form of a WeChat group, and the audience can interact with the guests on stage in a timely manner.

Not only does the audience give feedback to the guests, but also the official staff of each small team give feedback to the audience, as well as the feedback shared by the guests to the audience, and the feedback between the audience. The satisfaction brought by "instant feedback" allowed more than 200 audience members to maintain their passion throughout two days and one night.

User motivation tells the audience that individuals influence the group, and that individual performance will bring a sense of honor to the group. Moreover, the method of user motivation is extremely simple, and at the same time, all that users have learned can be reflected.

Instant feedback tells the audience that everything you learn can be used immediately, and what you learn is valuable and usable.

From the above three major techniques, there are the following conclusions:

1. Surface image management: Whether it is the layout of the on-site environment or the personal image management of the sharing guests, it can make users feel "surprised and happy";
2. Don’t neglect every individual: Individuals follow the direction of the group, but at the same time, they also influence the group; the effect of “herd mentality” exceeds our expectations;
3. Make users feel cared for: Everyone wants to be liked and cared for;
4. Take what you want in exchange for what you have: what you want, what goals you want to achieve, who will help you achieve it, you need to give something to the other party; what the other party likes, give it if you have it, and create it if you don’t have it;
5. Pay attention to user feedback: When participating in an event, users come with certain expectations. Have their expectations been met? How do you know if you have achieved it? This is the core point. No one likes to waste their time participating in an event that has no meaning.

A good operation activity cannot just appear to be "extremely popular" on the surface; lasting combat effectiveness is more important.

The influence is short-lived, and the cheers within the "besieged city" may not remain the same outside the "besieged city". To determine whether an event is good enough, it is not only about whether it brings an experience beyond expectations, but more importantly, whether it truly creates value. All the techniques are routines, and their functions are just icing on the cake. If the content is not exciting enough and there is no core content as a foundation, no matter how good the routine is, it can only be "maintained". The key words are content + sincerity.

Source: Datong Xiaoyi