Why Corporate Events Need a Data-led Content Revolution

How the events industry can learn from the world of advertising and use audience insights to create more engaging, high-impact experiences. 

For advertisers, the Super Bowl isn’t just the Super Bowl — it’s their battleground, their Oscars, their high-stakes moment to justify mind-boggling budgets.

In 2024, brands collectively poured an eye-watering $650 million into in-game ads, with a single 30-second spot commanding $7 million. But here’s the real question: is all that money worth it? The answer lies in the data, and in how ruthlessly advertisers use it to shape what we see, feel, and remember.

The data companies derive from this is impressive, including insights into:

• Demographics: Over half of consumers prefer Super Bowl ads that are more inclusive and diverse. 
• Social impact: in 2023, 61% of viewers said brands should focus on making society better. 
• Viewer sentiment: Brands measure how ads affect their image and how much people enjoy them. 
• Celebrity and music engagement: They track if featuring a celebrity or popular song keeps viewers interested. 
• Generational preferences: They study how different age groups react to ads. 
• Interactive ads: They learn which interactive formats work best and for which audiences.

To turn insights like these into action, advertisers use tools to track audience behavior. One key source is Nielsen, a global data and measurement agency. ‘Nielsen ratings’ show how many people watch a program and their demographics. This helps advertisers decide how much to charge for ads, and the best times and places to run them for maximum impact.

This data can also show: 

• How long people watch 
• If they switch channels 
• What are the viewers emotional reactions

This deep dive into audience behavior doesn’t just help advertisers craft better ads. It also shapes their content in real-time. If a video or ad is not getting the expected engagement, advertisers refine it throughout the campaign. 

How can this apply to corporate events? 

How do you track your pre-event emails? If you’re tracking click-through rates, watch how long someone engages with a piece of content or what they’re clicking on. Use that data to plan your next email and shape your entire pre-event campaign. This can also help guide what happens at your event. 

If you’re promoting a new incentive destination but the video you’ve created isn’t getting the views you expected, it might be time to refocus. Maybe attendees care more about specific experiences than a broad concept. This is where we can learn from advertisers. 

Four tips from the advertising industry to improve your content: 

1. Advanced behavioral analytics: Track how people interact with your content — clicking, scrolling, watching. This shows what grabs their attention. 
2. A/B testing: Test different formats of content before the event to see what works best. Try out email subject lines, video formats, or calls to action. 
3. Attribution models: Follow the customer journey across platforms to measure what’s working. 
4. Emotional analytics: See how your content makes people feel. Advertisers use this to understand emotional reactions. 

What attendees expect from their event experiences 

We can also learn from the experiential side of advertising present at large events like Glastonbury Festival or Coachella. Where building excitement and engagement long before the event kicks off is critical to the success and buzz of the experience. For their marketing teams, immersive campaign-based content is key to connecting with the audience. They deliver short, sharp hits of content up to a year before the event.  

These might include: 

• Headliner announcements 
• Time-lapse videos of the main stage being built 
• Sneak peeks of lanyards and tickets 
• Competitions 

Everything is carefully crafted to engage the audience. Throughout the campaign, the organizers will gather lots of data about their attendees. This helps them tweak their campaigns, improve event content, and plan better for the next year. 

Compare that to a typical corporate event, like a sales kick-off. Attendees often get a bland email with the schedule, food options, and maybe a vague mention of what’s coming. Engagement is usually measured after the event by email clicks or social media shares. And never looked at again for future events. 

AI opportunities 

AI gives businesses help in developing content that creates a memorable impact — make the audience feel something! But in the corporate events industry, our thinking around AI is too small. We focus on using it for things like creating themes or improving menus.  

As an industry we must think bigger. How can we use AI to take all the data we collect and create better event content? With AI, we can analyze data from emails, website visits, and social media interactions. This helps design an event that feels personal. 

Emerging technologies aren’t going to replace good old-fashioned creativity, but they can certainly help. From training machine learning on to large sets of data to iterate content or event design year over year, to using AI diffusion models to help pitch concepts to stakeholders, this technology is evolving in leaps and bounds every day and cannot be dismissed or discounted. 

In closing

Corporate events have lagged behind for too long, relying on outdated methods while industries like advertising sprint ahead. Events are about connection, but connection doesn’t happen by accident. It takes strategy, insight, and creativity — the same principles that drive billion-dollar advertising campaigns. Let’s move beyond the status quo and create events and content that inspire, excite, and resonate long after the lights go down. The tools are in our hands; the rest is up to us. 

Want to learn more about creating impactful, personalized event experiences? Contact [email protected] and find out how we can help elevate your next event.

Originally published March 3, 2025 7:00:00 AM