Give Event Goers What They Want.

If you are an event organiser you should always be aware of the latest trends to keep your customers satisfied and loyal. Even if you run a successful recurring event do not rest on your laurels and do your research and be prepared to meet changing customer expectations for your future events.  

There are plenty of resources you can tap into to garner information and data about industry trends to make sure your event changes for the better in the future. Assuming you have a proven formula that works year after year you should always be looking for evolution rather than revolution in how you run your event. Gain feedback form your customers to understand the positive and negative aspects of the event they attended and come up with an action plan to build on the positive aspects and iron out any negatives issue raised. 

The music event industry is exceptionally competitive so make sure you attend other events and understand how those events are run, what was good and what was bad. Try and create a good relationship with other event organisers so that you can work together on overcoming common issues.  

Some interesting data came out of research released by Mintel at the end of August last year on the state of the music festival industry in the UK. Overall, the report showed the music festival industry in a favourable light being quite buoyant, although a similar report run in 2020 will obviously now show an industry that has been decimated by the Covid-19 pandemic.  

Highlights form their research show that the key reason for attending a music festival are to see a particular artist (45%) enjoying time with friends/family (41%), meeting new people (19%) and to take pictures/selfies (15%). In addition (69%) event-goers say that the range of alternative activities available at a music event is important with 48% of those aged 19 and under attending music events for the entire experience. Of primary concern to all event goers is that the event they attend is environmentally friendly with minimal eco impact, clearly, they have an active interest in environmental issues.  

On the logistics front the main negative aspects of any music festival is the queuing involved for just about everything. From toilets to food and beverages queuing is an ongoing challenge at all events. Safety and prevention of crime (theft) remains an issue of concern for festival goers. There are no real surprises in the research from Mintel but it does highlight the same issues that have existed at music festivals for years.  

What practical steps can you take to adapt your event in light of this data? 

Diversify your event content to include other activities other than music, consider activities like dance, art, yoga and massage therapies for example. This will broaden the appeal of your potential customers and provide additional opportunities from more diverse vendors and sponsors opening up new sources of revenue for you. 

The queuing for toilet facilities may never be resolved and there have been no practical solutions provided by anyone in the last 40 years. However, queuing at food and beverage facilities and event access can be assisted by technology. Event entry can now be done using biometric scanning and bar/QR code scanning. For food and beverage purchases there is a move away from cash towards tap and pay with some event organisers using a contactless wristband that you can load up with money before the event and use to make purchases for everything at the event negating the need to carry any cash or cards.                         

If you use an event software solution like FestivalPro their functionality already uses the latest ticket and scanning technology to enhance the event customer experience. The guys who are responsible for this software have been in the front line of event management for many years and are performance artists themselves.  

Data courtesy of Mintel Goup Ltd (23rd August 2019). Raving Mad: UK Music Festival Attendance at Highest in 4 Years [Leisure Report]. Retrieved from Mintel Oxygen database. 

Photo by Marcin Dampc from Pexels

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