vents collect a lot of data , and unless you ’ ve spent the past few years living under a rock you will know that data is king , that the more data we have the better and that events without data are worthless . Or so you ’ ve been led to believe .

Data can tell us lots of things , but collecting , managing , maintaining and storing data is expensive , so it can be a double-edged sword . Before collecting reams of data , you have to ask yourself ‘ what am I actually going to get out of it ?’

Consider what the actual tangible benefits are that the specific data will bring to you and your event . How will the data change what you do ? Data without context is pointless , and statistics and data without meaningful action points are no better than just stating random facts .

The ‘ so what ’ test

If you are running a B2B

“ Make sure you ’ re actually going to use that data in a meaningful way because your attendees have to invest their time in your event to fill that stuff in and you should make sure that information isn ’ t wasted .”

conference , then I can tell you that over 80 % of your registrations are going to come from a desktop or a laptop , rather than tablets or phones . Your delegates will be accessing your registration platform predominantly using Chrome , some Edge , some Firefox and they ’ ll be mostly using Windows . I ’ m not looking at any statistics for any of these predictions ; this is just what will happen because Windows is by far the most popular operating system and , currently , Chrome is the most popular browser . People registering for a business event tend to do so while they ’ re sitting at their desk .

I ’ m not saying these facts aren ’ t potentially interesting , what I ’ m saying is that they don ’ t pass the ‘ so what ?’ test because they don ’ t provide anything that could cause you to take action . With these facts in mind , you may ask if your registration forms need to be responsive so that they work on

mobile devices and tablets and , yes , they absolutely should be , simply because it gives people options and all forms should be responsive these days . But the fact that more than 80 % of your delegates are going to be registering on a computer at their desk is irrelevant , because there ’ s nothing you can do with that information . With stuff like this , you would be far better following tech trends to see if there are things looming on the horizon that you will need to cope with next year .

Something to remember is that web browser trends move relatively slowly . It takes many months , and even years , to see large swings . Your data only relates to a fairly small window for your event – perhaps three to four months . This means that you might be taken by surprise if , this