Cultivating Connection & Community At Conferences

"How do we make conferences more interactive and fun?"

That is one of the most common questions I'm asked as someone who speaks about play for a living. Well, being that I have been directly involved in some capacity (speaking, collaborating, coordinating, etc.) in 500+ events, this is my take on how we can cultivate more connection and community through play.

When you ask attendees what their favorite part of the conference is, most say connecting with people. So, a key question to ask is:

What opportunities are you and your event team creating for attendees to connect?

That isn't simply providing lunch, happy hour/networking events, or breaks between sessions. That's the bare minimum. If humans are designed to gather in a community, why do most events get in the way of fostering community? What are you doing to actually cultivate community?

We will explore where you can create opportunities for your attendees to make core memories. We will break them down into these five sections:

1. THRESHOLD EXPERIENCES

2. EXPERIENTIAL ACTIVATIONS

3. INTERACTIVE KEYNOTES

4. DELIGHTFUL SURPRISES

5. UTILIZING PARTNERS: ASKING MORE OF VOLUNTEERS & VENDORS

THRESHOLD EXPERIENCES

How Do You Want Attendees To Feel When They Arrive?

Greeters are crucial to shaping how attendees feel when they first arrive. So, how are you selecting these greeters?

How attendees enter a space and leave a space greatly shapes how they will feel about an event. So, how are people welcomed when they first sign in? Is it someone pointing to a screen? Or is there a volunteer greeting them, making them feel welcome, orienting them to the space?

I have rarely seen conference planners create a fun, interactive experience for attendees upon arrival. What is the current experience for your attendees? Are they simply standing in line? If so, is the "waiting around" tone consistent with what you want them to experience during your conference? If not, change it.

What are successful examples of greetings?

• World Domination Summit used to greet first-time arrivals with a tunnel of applause and high-fives by volunteers

• Daybreakers has specific greeters who give out hugs or enthusiastic handshakes when attendees arrive and leave

• Registration volunteers connecting with attendees in line, informing them of what is happening today, orienting them to the space, and/or helping them register through a mobile check-in to shorten the wait

• At tourism conferences held at hotels, guests are greeted with a signature beverage while in line for registration

• Circus/Street performers keeping attendees engaged while they are standing in line

Set the tone from the beginning of what vibe you want attendees to experience, and ensure you put the same level of effort into each threshold experience:

• Entering each keynote talk

• Going into lunch and leaving lunch

• Entering the happy hour party or conference networking event

• Leaving the conference on the last day

Not all of these have to cost extra money. You simply need a dynamic greeter team that is clear on their goals and have the right personalities and presence to actualize it.

EXPERIENTIAL ACTIVATIONS

Conferences provide activations, but often there isn't a clear through-line in how they connect to the event's overall theme. They may have a "playground" area with Jenga, arcades, a big chessboard, etc., but it is just sitting there, expecting people to just interact with it.

For an activation to be successful, it has to foster a certain level of positive energy and have volunteers in place who are enthusiastic about being there. For example, you could provide a LEGO Wall activation, but if you don't have someone there to encourage attendees to participate, the play is gone, and the place will remain bare.

PLAY ACTIVATIONS

Brainstorming Question: When you were a kid, you always wished you could create a certain experience, but you never had the money, resources, support, or the opportunity to do so.

Now that you have the money, the venue, and the opportunity, what would you like to create?

Nerdy & Nostalgic

• LEGO Activations

• Retro Arcade or Pop-Up Esports Tourney (Compete against a professional Esports Player)

• Experience Your Dream Come True In VR/AR or Relive Your Favorite Moment

• Lightsaber Sparring Area - LudoSports (Learn techniques from professional lightsaber duelers)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emrSVgJ_x5I

Connection-Oriented

• Campfire Connection Conversations (Facilitated Deep Conversation Connection Pop-Ups)

• Massive Puzzle Builds or Speed Round Puzzle Team Builds (Helps build camaraderie between team members or strangers)

• Care Package or Bike Assembly Station (Build a care package or bicycle from a local non-profit for a worthy cause)

• Puppy Petting Zoo - Working with a local ASPCA

• Easter Egg Scavenger Hunt (Find all the QR Codes hidden around the conference to win a major prize)

• Wisdom Walk (Instead of having a regular workshop, you pair up two people to go for a walk with a prompted question. This is for people who have trouble connecting in large groups at conferences but are good at connecting one-on-one when guided.

• Connection-Oriented Ball Pit Meetups - (Deliberate networking in a ball pit creates a more fun, ego-less atmosphere)

Active Play

• Augmented Reality Activations that are relevant to the area or the time (I.e., World Cup Activation during 2026 Summer or the ability to celebrate a championship win with their favorite team in VR)

• Office Olympics (Turn mundane office tasks into Olympic events and see who is the most efficient with them, such as desk chair racing, office bin challenge, responding to a passive-aggressive email, etc.)

• Batak Game Wall / Stop The Clock Reaction Game

• Big Wheel Race Obstacle Course

Big Risk Play

• Venting Work Frustrations Confessional Booth or Things You Hate About Work Board (Use ideas shared to create a pop-up problem-solving workshop)

• Gameshow Activations (Can be based on the knowledge of the conference)

• 90-Second PechaKucha Presentation (Impromptu presentation for prizes)

Personalized Activations

• Connect To The Right People Salon (Describe who you want to connect with at the conference, and volunteers help you find attendees that match those traits)

• Outfit/Wardrobe Consulting - Many Tech workers have trouble dressing well, so why not hire a personal stylist to give quick advice

  • If you are marketing a new AI note-taking tool, it can summarize the meeting for the attendee

• Onsite Career Coaching / Solve Specific Work Problem

• Typewriter Poetry, Aura Readings, Handwriting Analysis

Self-Care Activations

• At Mom 2.0 Summit, Dove sponsors an area where they provide mimosas, blowouts, and massages running from 10 AM - 4 PM.

• Many messages at conferences communicate about how stressed and overworked we are, and how we need to take care of ourselves more, so why not provide a self-care station that isn't simply a meditation/quiet room

• Cut some of that speaker budget and use it to take care of your attendees, and they are more likely to come back

UNIQUE INTERACTIVE WORKSHOPS

• Solve A Conference Problem In Community

  • Take a survey at the beginning of the conference where attendees share their biggest challenge, and a workshop is created in real-time where they can solve the problem in community with a facilitator

  • Gives an opportunity for attendees to speak up and be heard, which is memorable

• 20 Minute Speed Connection Pop-Ups (between breakout sessions)

  • A quick way to meet many people in a short period of time, which gives people confidence to connect with others throughout the day

• Debate A Subject Facilitated Conversations

  • Pick a controversial topic for that specific industry and facilitate a discussion between small groups where they debate and see if they can come to a compromise (I.e., Debate Question: Can AI be rolled out to companies more humanely, or are we doing the best we can right now?)

  • Gives an opportunity for attendees to speak up and be heard, which is memorable

• Reverse Shark Tank Pitches

  • Founders listen to critical feedback in real-time from users of their product/software

LUNCH EXPERIENCES

Competitive Lunch Options

• Have two local restaurants that make a specific local dish compete against each other in a taste testing, run during lunch

Introvert/Ambivert Lunch Section

• Some people want to be able to eat their lunch in peace and not have to do conference small talk, so create an area where people can go to eat their food in calm silence

Facilitated Lunch Section

• If during lunch, you would like to discuss a specific topic, there are tables where you can debate certain topics, along with normal tables for all attendees to gather

Lunch Entertainment By Vendors

• You could challenge any of the vendors that they have 1 minute to tell people who they are, but as an entertaining performance, with the best performance winning a free booth or first choice of booth placement the following year

INTERACTIVE KEYNOTES

The classic 60 Minute Keynote is done. There are only a few speakers in the world now who keep an audience captivated for an entire 60 Minutes, so we should adapt to the shorter attention spans of our attendees.

• Encourage your keynote speakers and breakout speakers to create interactive portions of their talk to practice what they are teaching in real time

• Measure how engaged an audience is in real time by how many of them are on their phones or distracting themselves with another task

• Shorten the keynotes to 45 Minutes and use the additional 15 minutes for people to discuss the talk in smaller groups, or use it as an opportunity for Q&A

• Assess the success of a keynote and/or workshop by how much people are connecting with each other during and after the talk

• A few months prior to the conference, an optional interactive training and assessment can be provided for speakers who are not used to running interactive talks

  • Speakers are informed that their talks will be assessed by the level of engagement of attendees, so speakers are less likely to "mail it in" or revert to a well-worn talk

DELIGHTFUL SURPRISES

A conference is a unique space where you have many people of one industry all together, yet we don't take advantage of this opportunity to surprise and delight attendees. There are many ways we can create opportunities for joyful core memories. Here are just a few examples of this:

• Flash Mob Cheering Experience That Recruits Random Attendees

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzVkMMt6i1A

• Hire Stormtroopers, Taiko Drummers, Capoeristas, or other entertainers to show up randomly during the conference

  • The location of the conference can inspire the type of performers you hire (I.e., in New Orleans, hire a Second Line)

• Hire actors and recreate a famous scene from a specific movie or show that most people at the conferences would recognize, or create an opportunity to celebrate a mundane achievement for an attendee

• Record-Breaking Opportunities

  • With so many people of a particular industry in one place, why not explore breaking a world record or trying to achieve a huge collective achievement (I.e., World Domination Summit T-Rex Takeover)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bx50BUOwp-8

The point of the delightful surprise is to break the monotonous pattern of conferences that attendees expect. It shows that you went above and beyond to create an experience that they can reference years from now. Most attendees don't remember the celebrity keynote speakers unless those speakers directly connected with them, but they will refer to the delightful surprises years later, especially if they were right in the middle of the experience.

UTILIZING PARTNERS: ASKING MORE OF VOLUNTEERS & VENDORS

VOLUNTEERS

• At many conferences, volunteers are underutilized, usually playing the role of being a living sign, informing people as to where to go, rather than utilizing their skill sets

• Should assess which volunteers are best at connecting with people and have a group of the most gregarious volunteers whose job is to reach out to people who have attended the conference alone or look like they want to connect

  • They are measured by how many people they can get off their phone, as attendees didn't come all the way to this conference to be on their phone, unless they are dealing with a work-related issue or handling a personal matter

• Choose the most energetic volunteers to run the most intensive experiential activations. Do not leave an experiential activation unattended, as then it loses its momentum

  • During slow times, these volunteers can focus on simply connecting with attendees

• Specifically, have volunteers who are excellent greeters to ensure people feel welcome, and also acknowledge when leaving the conference

• Identify a group of volunteers who are connectors and can assist attendees not only in finding "what they are looking for" but also "who they are looking for." Attendees usually come to conferences to meet specific people who can help them in the future, and volunteers can help facilitate these connections.

VENDORS

• We need to ask more of our vendors to create interactive, engaging booths.

• We should create incentives to have them create more interactive, fun experiences, not only to help them get more business, but also to foster a more festive atmosphere inside the vendor halls

• By creating a more interactive booth, they can save money on merchandise such as cups, T-shirts, pens, and tchotchkes, and replace them with memorable activations that give them more opportunities to build real relationships that may lead to profit, which is why they are there in the first place

• The conference can even provide a tutorial or online webinar, providing them with examples of how to make their booths more engaging and what the traits of the right staff to place at these booths are, rather than just any staff member

BONUS WAYS TO INCREASE INTERACTION

• Create name tags that list additional interests, so attendees can find things in common as soon as they read each other's name tags

• Provide a puzzle piece at registration that matches a corollary puzzle piece, which you can search for throughout the conference

• Design the conference for the mess of human life

• Create additional fun gatherings/activities outside conference times, sponsored by your major companies (pickleball, guided bike tour, wine tasting, roller skating, cooking class, etc.).

• Leverage the property (Take advantage of what the property has to offer and utilize it to create memorable events/activities that are unique to that property. Examples: S'more and wine in Napa, Camelback hiking with views in Scottsdale, Snorkeling/Dolphin Watching in Honolulu, etc.)

• Design the conference for the mess of human life

  • Why is there always so little time between sessions to go to the bathroom, get coffee, get over to the session to find a good seat, all while hoping you may randomly make a connection along the way? We need more downtime, not only for the attendees but also for the event coordinators.

  • By packing so much content in, you leave no room for error, creating a stressful environment for the event team and attendees, who feel rushed. Where can we find a place to cut to give us more downtime for organic opportunities for people to connect and rest?

• Think like a newbie / how to prepare people holistically

  • If you have been running the same conferences for quite a few years, we tend to mail it in a bit. Believing in the " if it is not broken motto. We forget what it is like to be in a newbie's shoes. If your goal is to have people return year after year and steadily increase attendance, the newbie experience has to be constantly on the events team's mind. Take the time to debrief the conference with first-time attendees and have someone shadow them during the conference to get that newbie perspective.

CONCLUSION

The intention to create is just as important as the content itself, as you can feel when a conference cares enough to craft an experience that is not only fun but also memorable and full of connection. Let's stop mailing in the same conference experience and take some risks to create a conference you'd be excited to attend.

Remember that time when you were a kid, when you couldn't create the experiences you always dreamed of. Now is your opportunity, so it's time to take it!

Good luck!