Have you used AI in the last week? Chances are, you have. ChatGPT, a leading artificial intelligence program, receives more than 1.7 billion page visits each month. Clearly, AI is popular. And its wide variety of uses makes it a remarkable tool for practically every industry. However, apprehension persists regarding the implications of this emerging technology.
But rather than being hesitant about utilizing the power of AI, event planners can leverage this technology to enhance their events. Many kinds of event tech, such as websites and event apps, already have AI capabilities built in. With AI’s ever-growing presence, it’s time to seize the opportunity and begin elevating events in other ways with AI technology.
What You Need to Know About Artificial Intelligence
In today’s world, it’s nearly impossible to ignore artificial intelligence. AI is seemingly everywhere, from website chatbots to the virtual assistants on our phones. While AI still has a long way to go (and you might even get a laugh out of its failed attempts to generate images), this technology can greatly impact the event planning industry.
Artificial intelligence simulates human intelligence and natural language to aid in real-world problem-solving. When using AI, it’s important to know that the algorithms and results are only as good as the data entered. In other words, the quality of the information put into these systems impacts the quality of the results you receive.
So it comes as no surprise that two common limitations to AI tools are accuracy and bias. Any type of artificial intelligence uses algorithms to learn, so the data input into the system must be current and objective. When it comes to event planning, it’s critical that all information entered into the program is as up-to-date and bias-free as possible in order to get the best results.
For example, imagine you ask an AI generator to create an itinerary for your event using a list of pre-approved activities and speakers. The program generates the information you need, but unfortunately, a speaker is no longer able to attend, making the AI-generated itinerary no longer accurate.
Another concern regarding AI is privacy. In fact, 80% of adults are concerned about their data privacy and would like to do more to keep their information secure. In order to protect both your privacy and the privacy of your attendees, it’s critical never to enter private information into an AI program. While AI can enhance events in various ways such as leveraging event data to boost efficiency, it still needs to be regulated and used appropriately.
All in all, this technology can revolutionize the way events are planned and executed. Likely, you are already using technology to help you plan events. Because of this, the integration or addition of AI into your tech stack will simply allow you to create more tailored, engaging, and data-driven experiences for attendees, ultimately improving the success of your event.
Seven Ways Artificial Intelligence Enhances Corporate Events
AI can significantly enhance corporate event planning by streamlining processes, improving efficiency, and providing valuable insights. However, successful events will use AI features while maintaining the necessary human touch that results in personalized experiences or activities.
The reality is that AI is a helpful resource, but it can’t replace the human component required for meaningful event experiences. Artificial intelligence might make us more efficient in our processes or help generate creative ideas, but event planners should find a balance between AI automation and human interaction.
Still, this technology can be a game changer in providing data-driven decisions, task automation, and creative idea generation. If you want to streamline the event planning process, below are a few ways you can enhance events with AI.
1. Meeting Agenda Development
Corporate events often have many moving parts and various details to consider when planning. But AI can assist in creating optimized schedules that avoid conflicts and ensure smooth transitions between activities. It can also analyze historical data to identify peak engagement times and plan key events accordingly. In fact, algorithms can predict optimal timing and duration for sessions you want to schedule based on factors such as attendee demographics, time zones, and historical attendance patterns (if available).
2. Personalized Experiences
Who doesn’t love a little bit of personalization? With the right touch, attendees can participate in events uniquely designed for their personal preferences. But how do you make sure these experiences resonate with each individual’s taste?
To create personalized itineraries, have attendees complete a survey before your event to learn more about their interests. Once collected, AI can analyze this data and suggest personalized agendas, recommend networking opportunities, and even advise attendees on which sessions they will enjoy most based on their interests.
3. Enhanced Marketing
Email campaigns, landing pages, and social media posts are all a vital part of event marketing. Fortunately, AI can streamline all of these by helping develop these assets. While it’s important for all marketing assets to go through a human review, using AI’s drafts as a starting point greatly accelerates the process and ensures high-quality content catered to your audience.
Better yet, AI-driven email campaigns can be used to engage attendees before, during, and after the event. In addition, these campaigns can be personalized based on attendee profiles, ensuring relevant information and pertinent updates are delivered.
4. Content Creation
On a similar note to marketing campaigns, AI can assist with content creation that’s uniquely designed for your event. For example, AI tools can create summaries of speaker presentations that will be shared with audience members, or you can ask AI to develop event slogans or phrasing for signage. These tools can generate content based on your message, your target audience, or your desired tone for the message. The more specific you are about exactly what kind of content you need; the better your end result will be. Further, if you’re in a creative slump, AI programs can assist you in idea generation that you can later develop for your event.
5. Venue Selection and Layout Optimization
One of the biggest reasons to use AI to help with location selection is because it can analyze huge datasets, including attendee demographics, preferences, and feedback, as well as some of the characteristics of the venue (such as location, capacity, amenities, and cost). Once this data is analyzed, you can make informed decisions regarding which location will truly serve you best. Another important consideration of event planning is attendee experience, which can be as simple as how guests move through a room. AI can also assess logistical considerations to recommend how to optimize the layout of your venue for better flow and engagement.
6. Budgeting and Resource Allocation
In addition, AI can analyze historical data and market trends to provide predictions for expenses and resource requirements for your event. This information will help planners anticipate budgetary challenges and make adjustments to plans as needed to stay within your budget. You will also be able to allocate resources more effectively and make informed decisions on staff assignments and resource distribution. This ensures efficient utilization of resources and minimizes waste, which in turn reduces unnecessary expenses.
7. Thorough Data Analysis and Insights
Perhaps the best way to enhance corporate events is by taking a look at your data. AI can assist in analyzing post-event data, including attendee feedback, social media sentiment, and performance metrics. This information can be invaluable for assessing the success of the event and identifying areas for improvement of future events. Data analysis can play a crucial role in planning by providing insights into attendee preferences, behavior, and satisfaction levels. Using the data you collect as your event progresses not only provides direction for the event taking place but also ensures successful future events.
Seven AI Tools for Corporate Event Planning
There are a multitude of different AI tools on the market, which is excellent for event planners as this gives them several options to help achieve event goals. Here are a few examples that can enhance corporate events and streamline planning processes.
ChatGPT
When you think of AI, ChatGPT is likely the first program that comes to mind. This AI engine is an excellent resource for event planners since it can assist in a wide variety of processes, such as content creation, itinerary planning, menu design, and more.
However, there are a few caveats that event planners should be aware of. The most important thing you should keep in mind if you are using the free version of this tool is that no information goes beyond September 2021. Paid users can access the internet (and its plethora of current information) by using the “Browse with Bing” feature. There are plans for this feature to be added for all users in the future. Another consideration that applies to this tool and all other AI tools is the more specific you can be with your request, the more detailed an outcome you can expect from your answer.
Gemini
Google’s AI engine (previously known as Bard) is excellent for research and has been able to access the internet from its inception, so there is no information cutoff. Much like ChatGPT, Gemini allows you to enter a prompt, and you get a response based on what it’s able to gather from other sources. Perhaps because Gemini has been able to access the internet from day one, it is a bit more proficient when surfing the web and using that information in a relevant way in the response.
In addition, Gemini has always been multi-modal (ChatGPT has added this feature recently, too). This means that this tool can respond to various inputs: text, images, the human voice, and code. This opens up options for event planners who can ask Gemini to shift through mountains of data or have it generate an image for a background for a speaker. The possibilities are endless. This tool is not going to build your program, but it can start conversations about what can and cannot work.
Project SPARK
While ChaptGPT and Gemini are great for most industries, Project SPARK was developed by PCMA specifically for the business events industry. This program helps event planners learn more about AI tools and how they can shape events.
Project SPARK is an excellent resource for developing agendas, creating content, building audience personas, and creating promotional materials In fact, it can build an agenda instantly. You then have the ability to export the agenda into another program, so you can tweak the proposed agenda to create the perfect schedule. By joining this program, users can use AI to assist with routine event planning tasks and help organizers improve the way they plan and execute events.
Adobe Firefly
To create stunning images and graphics using a generative AI engine, Adobe Firefly is the way to go. By using stock images or your own photos, you can instruct the program to remove unwanted elements, add new backgrounds, add text effects, and more.
For event planners, this tool can allow you to place any image on a background that matches the theme of your event, making it easier than ever to create a cohesive feel for your meeting. For example, if your theme is “Climbing Together,” you could add a speaker’s headshot to a mountain background instantly. This tool makes image generation and alteration a breeze. But keep in mind, Firefly is a public domain, so you don’t own rights to anything you create.
BuzzSumo
If you want to use AI to cut back time spent on content marketing, then BuzzSumo might be the tool for you. This program is excellent for content discovery, research, and creation. Plus, with this tool, event planners can analyze competitors and create benchmarks to help establish ROI goals for future events and campaigns.
One of the stand-out components of BuzzSumo is its ability to find keywords and hot topics that can add value to your business. Plus, this tool can help you research who the biggest influencers are in the event community. You can then co-write with these influencers to create more robust interactions for your business.
CLIPr
Looking to consolidate video content from your corporate event? CLIPr can take your content and using target keywords, it will pull all video surrounding your keyword and clip the content together. For example, let’s say you have 30 breakouts and 30 videos, you can search by any keyword across all that content, and this tool will clip together all content that contains your word.
This video intelligence tool can scan a video file and create transcripts that can be used to plan upcoming sessions or create presentations. We just used this tool to transcribe a 30-minute video of an executive’s speech, so the speech could be re-created for a presentation at an event.
Zenus
Zenus is another AI solution specifically made for event planners. This event tech uses small camera equipment to conduct facial analyses of everyone who enters the venue. You can track impressions, demographics, positive sentiment, and more - gathering behavioral insights with 95% accuracy without collecting personal data. Not only does this allow you to effectively track attendance, but it also helps you manage traffic and engagement throughout the venue.
With all of these tools available, it’s time for event planners to embrace everything that event tech and AI have to offer for the industry. Not only can these programs ease the planning process for corporate events, but they can also help organizers improve all aspects of their meetings, creating interactive and personalized experiences. To learn more about event technology and how AI can be incorporated into your next corporate event, reach out to the team at Bishop-McCann today!
