In event planning, creativity often meets practicality, especially when working within budget constraints.
But as Brian Kellerman, GoGather’s CEO, and Gary McCreary, our Executive VP, point out, the most impactful elements of hospitality—like a smile or a handshake—don’t come with a price tag.
In this episode, Brian and Gary explore how today’s event managers can create memorable experiences for a multi-generational audience. They also touch on how to navigate shortened attention spans and leverage helpful technologies like AI in your planning.
Gary McCreary, cmp fellow, cpce, csep, is the Executive VP of GoGather where he helps the GoGather team drive operational efficiencies and enhance the client experience.
Gary has received numerous awards and accolades, including 10 Gala Awards and 31 Gala Award Nominations from Special Events Magazine. He is also the recipient of Six ONE Awards from the National Association of Catering & Events and was named the 2009 Caterer of the Year by the National Association of Catering & Events (Las Vegas Chapter). Additionally, Gary has been featured on the Food Network Program "Behind the Bash."
Brian Kellerman: There's a lot of creative aspects that we can do inside of that budget, right? There is a smile, a handshake, a hug. Those are free. The level of hospitality we have the ability to communicate with our partners and our team members and sort of align them behind the objectives and the goals and inform them about our desire to be hospitable and to really welcome these people and even get them excited about another group that's coming in.
Those are things that don't necessarily cost or there's not a line item cost associated with those things, right? It's communication, it's understanding. It's connecting with your team. So I love what you're talking about there. I also like or understand and have heard a lot about that is this idea that we appeal across multiple generations, certainly.
But certainly in our case, from our perspective, the workforce continues to get younger, and therefore, perspective changes a little bit. Attention span is constantly talked about. How do we deal with a shortened attention span, and how do we sort of communicate to these folks who are maybe coming to an event for the first time?
We've been doing this for a long time. What about the person that this is the first or second or maybe even third year of participating in this sort of thing?
Gary McCreary: I think attention span, that's a huge one. In fact, this think tank that I was at this week, was one of the big topics. And one of the statistics that are gone should be the 45, the 90 minutes that the ideal was 20 to 25.
And the whole group was talking about that and then another perspective came up as like, well, you know, kind of depends on your workforce. You know, you can't just take and like, oh, now I've just got to do this because this is the fad or the trend or whatever.
I will say that one thing that I was really surprised at when I was there, was just a collection of some of the most impressive minds that I've known of in the industry. Some of the people I knew, some of them I didn't. When we come in and the table, like, literally has, like, stickers and markers and, uh, I was like arts and crafts for, like, kids?
And I was kind of like, wow, this is a lot. One of the big things it says out there is that to help attention span, people who have something to do with their hands tend to stay engaged longer.
Brian Kellerman: Right.
Gary McCreary: And it was amazing. I was looking around the room going, wow, this works. This is kind of a good idea here.
Brian Kellerman: Yeah.
Gary McCreary: So maybe, you know, go back to grade school and arts and crafts.
It's just another idea of looking at that and I think you need to look at the biggest thing is look at your audience, understand your audience, and understand what resonates with them.
Brian Kellerman: Right. Yeah, I absolutely agree. I think from my perspective, what's changed may be a little bit pre-pandemic. But certainly post-pandemic it has been also that desire to have more of a two-way communication. We talked about that in a small format, sort of on the networking side of things.
Of course, I want to have the ability to sit with you and have a coffee and discuss, you know, our history they're together, or the different things that you're doing, the different things that I'm doing and learn from a peer. But the other side of that is, how do we allow audiences, attendees, to feel like they're an active part of these programs, of these meetings?
How do you, how are they given a voice, either even pre-event, about what are the things that you want to hear about, or the things that are concerning you, depending on the type of event? If there's a, you know, a franchisor that’s coming together, you know, what are the franchisees out there saying? What are the challenges that they're dealing with?
Or if it's a sales meeting or what have you? Have you seen sort of a shift toward that, or what has been some of that two-way, sort of on a large-scale interaction?
Gary McCreary: Yeah, and on a large-scale interaction, kind of think, oh, well, how do I accomplish this? One of the most effective things that I've seen here lately is harnessing AI, that thing that's out there that a lot of people are very scared about, but to utilize its power.
So one client comes in, and everybody that walks into the room, there's a QR code, and they scan that, and it immediately goes into the AI piece, and it's asking questions. What are your top three words that mean the most that speak to you about what our brand is about, or whatever the question maybe?
And then from that, in this instance, AI went out and extrapolated and pulled together all these emotions and feelings and created art out of it.
Brian Kellerman: Oh, beautiful. Wow.
Gary McCreary: So literally, you have this work of art that's being created in real-time by the audience, then that's up on the screens, and it could be anything from art like that, or it could be like a Wordle type piece that then you can take that, and then that goes to the attendees afterward.
There are just so many different possibilities that you can do, but it's a way to engage the audience and a way to get participation on a mass scale that not only do you have the individual participate, but by the end of it, you have... I participated. You participated.
And it creates more of a sense of community amongst the individuals that were part of creating that piece of art.
Brian Kellerman: Yeah, I think that's amazing. And using those technologies, like you've said, to our advantage, allowing people to. Sort of do what they're accustomed to, which is interacting with that technology sort of constantly, but sort of leaning into that is a great one.