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We’ve spotted a few recent news stories questioning attendance figures and it highlights a question many event professionals have. Football clubs have been under scrutiny for the way they report attendances and whether they accurately reflect the number of people actually at a match. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/45158878 Newham council said the average attendance at West Ham was 42,779 based on the 12 games it attended - which is 12,530 fans fewer than the club's season average figure of 55,309. The discrepancy comes because clubs tend to report the numbers of tickets sold, including all season ticket holders, rather than counting the actually people at a game. Similarly with events and exhibitions, there are variations in the way organisers report attendance figures and ticket sales. Sponsors and stall-holders assess the cost of their involvement based on likely returns, which is linked to the number of people who see and engage with their activity - so accurate attendance figures are important. However, we think that the real test is how many people had the chance to see your activity, what percentage of them stopped to find out more, and for how long. That’s where Exposure Analytics can help. Our sensors provide exhibition analytics data and can tell you visitor numbers, how many passers-by you converted to engaged visitors, dwell time and engaged dwell time. We also produce heat maps and flow routes. Our systems can give you detailed data on how many people you welcomed, how long they stayed, heat maps to show popular areas of your [...]

Budgets for experiential marketing are growing year on year with a diverse range of companies now working to build long-term relationships with customers and potential customers through experiences.  But which events and festivals are right for your brand? How do you know if your spend is generating results. The Goodwood Festival of Speed used to be very much somewhere for motor manufacturers to exhibit, but this recent Campaign article demonstrates the changing nature of the brands and exhibits and how companies are widening their thinking.  This is something the festival have actively promoted explaining: "It shifts the event into a different direction, so it’s not just a car show," Olaf Gueldner, chief marketing officer at Goodwood, explains. "We’ve tried to attract different brands with different propositions and that is most definitely working.” Goodwood FOS 2017 This reflects our experience of the event too, where we’ve helped brands to evaluate their attendance.  We’ve noticed new companies there including Hilton and Boeing, and this makes sense. People don’t go to Goodwood to buy a car, they go to be inspired, to enjoy the racing, and have fun. Brands that can seamlessly fit into this should achieve the best results. On a similar theme, the Detroit Motor Show have announced they are moving the event from January to June so that they can include “dynamic outdoor experiential brand activations”. Now that brands from Crayola and NARS to Amazon and SpecSavers are serious about experiential marketing there’s a growing need to evaluate the impact and objectively [...]

The news that House of Fraser is to close more than half of its UK stores was a surprise to some, and obviously very unwelcome for their staff. But it is just one more example of the changing face of retail.  There’s the well established trend towards online sales but we’re also seeing the rising importance of experience and experiential retail. John Lewis are changing their stores to improve customer experience.  Gucci have taken it to the next level with a paid-for experience in a 14th century palazzo in Florence. The House of Vans designed by skaters for skaters is a fantastic example of a brand building a long-term relationship with its customers. Buying decisions have always been complicated but behaviour has changed so that now people are looking for one of two things - either a quick and easy online purchase, or the chance to engage with a brand, browse products, and build a relationship with them. Activations are common and increasingly important to brands. Particularly drinks brands, food companies, sports wear retailers, car manufacturers but the list is growing, as is the range of opportunities. We’ve worked with a wide range of agencies and companies to help them to evaluate their activations at events, exhibitions, festivals, shopping centres and on the streets. Interestingly Amazon, an online-only retailer recognise the value of a physical presence and customer experience;  their Treasure Truck has been out and about across the UK. To be successful retailers need to change with the times. As always [...]

We all know that  the weather can have a huge impact on plans and the success of activities. That's why we've introduced weather information to our analytics platform.  This makes it much easier for clients to compare events year on year, or day by day. It make sense that an outdoor event will be quieter in torrential rain than on a warm summer's day, but capturing the weather information along side footfall and engagement rates will make it easier to analyse just what impact the weather has, and help explain fluctuations in visitor numbers. We already enable event and conference organisers, as well as brands and agencies who deliver experiential activity to measure accurate footfall, flow, dwell times and engagement rates, as well as sentiment of those looking at a stand or activation. Unfortunately we can't do anything to improve the weather, but we can make sure it doesn't affect the evaluation of activations. The weather data for the past three years has also been added to the platform so existing clients can compare this year's events with previous years.