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EuBea Festival: Ferrabee (Cirque du Soleil): ‘Involve all the senses to create more engagement’.
Gillian Ferrabee, director Creative Lab Cirque du Soleil and exceptional speaker at EuBea – The International Festival of Events and Live Communication, which took place in Seville from November 5th to 7th, gave an interesting speech entitled ‘The’ Xperience factor’: engaging with audiences through disruptive innovation ‘.
As Ferrabee explained while interviewed by ADVexpressTV, the purpose of the speech was to illustrate some of the features that can make an event exciting, engaging and therefore memorable for the audience that experiences it.
For example, it is often better to move the centre of attention, just like in the Cirque du Soleil shows, which always offer several points of attraction for the audience, thus ensuring that it is not distracted. For the same reason, it is more effective to allow people the freedom to move about rather than forcing them to be seated for a long time to watch what happens in front of them, since this can lead to a loss of interest and a wandering mind. It is instead much more effective to create an event that develops in the whole physical space, at 360 degrees, without the need of a single focal point.
WATCH THE VIDEO INTERVIEW WITH GILLIAN Ferrabee
We must also consider that the more senses are involved, the greater the likelihood that the event will be remembered: an event that can be seen, heard and touched is certainly more impactful than one that stimulates sight alone.
As Farrabee stated to our microphones, thanks to new technologies now available to professionals in the event industry, there are additional ways to create engagement, to interact with the audience and stimulate participation, not to mention the fact that with digital media it is also possible to extend the event’s experience beyond the live moment.
As Ferrabee also pointed out to ADVexpressTV, the important thing is to effectively use the digital tools available, yet without forgetting that an event is first and foremost a ‘human’ experience.
Augmented reality is among the innovations Cirque du Soleil is developing the most, which will provide further inventive opportunities for interaction.