Don’t scare your people away! The Tricks & Treats of Event Personalisation

We all want to feel like we belong. It doesn’t matter if you’re a living, breathing human working in an organisation, or a trapped spirit wanting to spook your next unsuspecting victim. We all want to know that we matter in the workplace (even if that workplace is a haunted house). 

Event personalisation is a simple yet effective way to create this sense of value and appreciation to your team incentive event. Something as simple as personalising a few elements of your events can drive home your event goals, and boost employee retention and initiative. 

What is event personalisation? 

It’s a term bandied about a lot when it comes to events, but essentially personalisation can be defined as a way to quickly and effectively meet the needs of your attendees. By streamlining the ease and speed of the process, you’ll also be increasing the overall satisfaction of your guests in line with your event goals. 

If you’re hosting an incentive event for your team, it’s likely that your event goals look a little something like this. You want to: 

• Drive engagement. 
• Boost loyalty. 
• Let employees know that they are valued and appreciated. 

Personalisation is the perfect way to achieve all of this and more. But how can you know what event personalisation treats will engage your team, and which tricks will simply scare your talent away? 

Let’s look at some tricks and treats when it comes to event personalisation.  

Trick: Virtue Signalling and inconsistent bandwagon jumping 

Creating a culture that prioritises the values of your people is essential to retaining a talented team. However, if your cultural communications aren’t matched by action, you’ll be viewed as no more than another organisation jumping on the moral bandwagon. With examples of greenwashing on the rise, transparent and inconsistent actions only highlight to your people that there’s nothing personal about where they work, which might lead them to leave altogether.

Treat: Walking the walk, not just talking the talk 

Let’s take sustainability, for example. If you know that your team is passionate about protecting the planet, there are changes you can make to your event management that demonstrates your support of this. Things as small as providing reusable coffee cups instead of disposable cups, or offering shared transport to and from venues and activities are great ways to reduce the carbon footprint of your team event. Changes that show an investment in the values and beliefs of your team will positively affect the engagement of your team.

Trick: Cookie cutter event platforms 

Nothing screams ‘undervalued’ like a lack of effort. And nothing quite screams ‘lack of effort’ like an unengaging event platform. So let’s keep the screaming for the horror movies, shall we? Whether you’ve chosen an event website, an eshot strategy or even an event app, a bland and generic design will only make your teams want to hide behind the sofa and disengage with your event altogether! 

Treat: Bespokely designed websites & apps 

A bespoke and fully branded event platform can not only reflect the values of your organisation, but will speak to your people in their language to engage them in the right way. Our crack First Event teams of design and communication experts know how to create a personalised event experience right from the moment your team opens their event invitations. 

Trick: Assumptions and oversights 

One of the biggest boogeymen of event personalisation is making sweeping generalisations about your team and their interests. Right from the first event concept brainstorm, you need to know that the activities, entertainment and even the destination are going to work to achieve your event goals and keep your people engaged. Without speaking to your teams and collecting these valuable insights, chances are you’re going to create an experience that only speaks to a small group of your team, whilst alienating the rest. 

Treat: Collecting data & insights 

Using communications, feedback forms and analytical tools to collect data from your people ahead of your event is vital to ensuring that their needs and interests are met throughout the event. Things like dietary requirements, accommodation preferences can all be easily sought from your teams, reassuring them that their every need matters to their employer, and will be met and exceeded during their team event

Trick: Non specific celebrations & feeling lost in the crowd 

Particularly within larger organisations, it can be really easy to get lost within the crowd. Companies that don’t go the extra mile to recognise the individual efforts of people that aren’t department heads of team leaders risk losing them altogether. 

Treat: Individual recognition 

Celebrating as a team is important, but celebrating particular individuals within the team is what’s going to make your team event feel personal. Visibly rewarding and recognising the work of team members at all levels creates a positive work environment, and adds that extra competitive motivation for your people. Particularly in large organisations, this can be extremely gratifying and show everyone that they each have an important role to play within the business.

Here at First Event, we organise and deliver outstanding incentive team events that will excite and engage your people, and can be personalised to ensure that each individual feels valued and loved by their company. Find out more about how we can help you with your next event by contacting us today.