5 emotions and ways for participants to participate in the event

To create a larger ROE (emotional reward), “think positive but influential”.

exist ConveneCMP series in April 2025, Convene The editor explores what exactly the meaning of emotional reward (ROE) means in definition and practice. According to two event professionals, they make ROE the main indicator of the toolkit – Community Factor Liz Lathan and Encore’s Senior Vice President of Communications and Industry Relations – really depends on your event goals.

“What you want to achieve is a point of view on your brand, your activities, your experience,” Armstrong said. “So… in general, you want to be positive, but you also want to be impactful.” She hints at the roller coaster – allowing viewers to “high and low” can create more meaningful experiences. Below are the ideas of size professors about how to hit these emotionally high profile big events.

1. Provide a “spontaneous think tank”

“We asked people to share the challenges they solved here, and then we asked them to look at that difficult wall if they saw the challenges they solved in their business to add their name to their business (and then) facilitated a meeting to promote how they can solve this problem,” Lathan said. “Often, this is enough to make you feel that uncomfortable adventure that is super interactive.”

Lathan’s event “Wall of Troubles” challenge attendees, proactively taking initiatives through dialogue on how they can be found through business challenges

2. Stimulate the senses

Here is the strategy for activation focus for IMEX America in 2024: “Break Free: Unlock Your Influence”, designed to illustrate how planners create emotional engagement in events. The 4,000-square-foot “stall” leads attendees through immersive, multi-sensory experiences that encourage active participation, for example, attendees can interact with the hologram guide in hands-on experiences. Encore also shows how to use LEDs to present content in a more memorable way by connecting content on three LED banners (see the photo at the top of the page). “In addition to the holograms, we did this to show lower cost options than the holograms,” Armstrong said.

3. Hold a welcome party

Fresh off completing their research project on Return on Emotion, Lathan and her then-colleagues at Haute hosted a group of event professionals at Atlantis Paradise Island in the Bahamas in 2022. Wanting to kick off the experience on a high note, they followed their HAAAM blueprint (on eliciting feelings of being hopeful, adventurous, active, accepted, and motivated), which the study determined as the most influential emotions in driving business at event. “The first thing we did was when attendees arrived at Nassau airport, we actually had a welcome party,” Lesen said, paired with Pompeii and the logo. She said, “That moment didn’t start” in the registration area. “It started at the airport.”

4. Choose expensive ones

For organizers with small or non-budgets, Lathan makes this advice: “Don’t overwhelm it. Just start with the simple part. Don’t feel like you have to pour $200 into it to evoke these things in order to evoke your child. When you’re a kid, you’ll be back to your fun, and how you play now. A perfect example is a puppy park where attendees can hug or even adopt shelter dogs at trade shows.

Attendees who convened leaders in 2025 get along with the cubs of Jenny Rescue Ranch in Houston at the George R. Brown Convention Center. What media group does the photos provide

5. Create an environment for acceptance

According to Lathan, this is not to be paid, and he recommends asking board members, committees or volunteers to serve as welcome committees during registration to “become the event ‘Wing People’ to help ensure people connect.” Another suggestion from Lathan is: At the start of the event, ask a leader to speak on the stage to encourage attendees to take the Pac-Man stance: “You never completely complete the circle,” she said. Standing in a part of the circle, “make others enter at any time” helps make the environment more popular.

Jennifer N. Dienst is Senior Editor Convened.