The Outlook for Events is Gloomy

If people don't want to come to the ballpark,

how are you going to stop them?

— Yogi Berra

This week marked the second anniversary of WHO's admission that Covid-19 was a problem.

Perhaps no other segment of the economy, except for the airlines industry, suffered worse from the pandemic than the face-to-face meetings industry.

I've been a Cassandra all this time, I'll readily admit. 

But four decades working in the industry told me the road would be rocky.

It will continue to be so for quite a while. 

As Covid-19 remains a threat to our wellbeing, organizers should expect no more than half the pre-pandemic audience to return to their live events in the coming three years.

That means organizers, if they honestly want to serve their paying customers, have a duty to reimagine their events with only half the customary audience.

Pollyannish thinking won't cut it.

Educating exhibitors in sales and lead-gen is the place to start.

Were I still an organizer, I'd devote an hour a day to learning from my smartest exhibitors precisely what they need to make my event pay off. 

Then I'd use my findings to create simple programs of benefit to every exhibitor—even those who in their unfounded arrogance believe they "know it all."

Yogi was right. 

You can't stop people who don't want to come to the ballpark.

But you can teach the players to up their game.

POSTSCRIPT: A bellwether event, SXSW opened Friday to a "noticeably smaller" audience.