The Cost of Loneliness at Events

Isolation diminishes the whole experience

You can put on a beautiful event and still have someone leave feeling alone.

They heard excellent speakers. Ate well. Admired the venue.

But at lunch, they ended up eating alone. They stared at their phone while everyone else was eating with buddies. During the networking session, they had a few okay conversations but never fully felt connected. Exhausted by their day and the awkwardness, they decided to head back to their hotel early.

It’s especially when we’re surrounded by others who are all interacting that isolation hurts. It makes us feel unimportant, excluded, and even judged.

Eating by ourselves at home or even in an airport, where many other travelers are also alone, isn’t as big of a deal.

But when it feels like everyone else is connected, chatting, and having a good time, being alone makes us, I’ll just say it plainly, feel like we didn’t make it into the cool club. It makes us feel like losers.

If you’ve had a normal high school experience, this might bring back harsh memories.

We all know that feeling.

This is why, especially at events, engagement matters hugely.

Because as much as everything else at an event could be stellar, feeling alone can tint our whole experience negatively. As humans, we can’t help but compare how we’re doing socially.

For event organizers, it might be hard to put a price tag on the benefit of good peer engagement.

So I’d propose the opposite exercise: think of how much being disconnected is costing you. Think of the percentage it is shaving off from your attendee satisfaction, retention, and sponsorship.

Conservatively, I’d estimate that at least 10% of the value of everything you’ve worked so hard on gets lost when people struggle to connect.

So yes, when your attendees don’t engage well with one another, it has an important cost. And that feeling can linger: remembering how alone we felt can bring back the same pit in our stomach.

Is that how you want your event to be remembered?

Good company elevates the whole experience

But now, let’s look at the flip side: as much as we might remember the pain of high school, hopefully you can also relate to my memories of being 20. The fun of having a great group of friends and hanging out in basements and bad apartments, dumpy bars and cheap restaurants.

The company was so good that it made the worst things shine and left us with good memories.

Good relationships matter.

Imagine hearing a speaker describe a challenge you’ve been facing for months. You glance at the person in the next row, who you just talked to about this exact situation. They’re already looking at you. You gesture at each other, happily surprised, smiling and nodding. They DM you: “I can’t believe she’s talking about this! Love how she frames it.”

You respond, “I know - it’s awesome!” As soon as the talk ends, you rush toward each other, excited to talk about it more.

What’s different about this interaction is that it’s not what I expect from someone I just added on LinkedIn. It’s what happens with someone who knows you.

But see, it’s possible to craft that level of connection at events. This exact situation happened at the last event I planned. Two strangers had gotten to know each other well enough that, when the speaker coincidentally mentioned their topic, they didn’t hesitate to look at each other, start messaging, and laugh together: they had “gelled” and were beaming.

I saw them spend so much time together at the event, alongside other people they’d newly met there.

Their joy of being together completely changed how they experienced the speakers, the places, and all the activities - they became fond (social) memories.

Not only did this become something worth talking about, but it also made them vocal about it on LinkedIn and buy their ticket for next year before the event was over. In business talk, I’d label this organic word-of-mouth and retention.

What’s the price tag on that incredible feeling of connection?

What does that mean for organizers?

Getting people into the same room is important, but it’s only the beginning.

Most importantly, I’d love for every organizer to think about how their attendees feel when they are together.

Do they spend their breaks feeling a bit awkward, some making small talk and many silently staring at their phones, or are they eagerly chatting as they’re waiting for the next speaker to come up?

Do they leave with a lot of not very memorable LinkedIn introductions? Or with people with whom they had a magnetic connection and can’t wait to message again?

If quality connection changes how people experience everything else, it deserves a central place in event strategy.

When I work on an event, I want us to be clear about what we’re helping people do together. For instance, a few questions I find useful are:

Those questions help us decide where interaction belongs and what form it should take.

Because an attendee can participate in every activity yet still feel isolated or poorly connected. We need to look beyond whether people joined in and ask how they felt together and what takeaways they had from their connections.

We put tremendous care into what attendees will see, hear, and eat.

What they socially experience during that time deserves the same attention.

A year later, the details of the menu may have faded. But they might still be exchanging messages with someone they met. They might have acted on an idea they explored together. They might remember the relief of finding people who understood them uniquely well. Or they might now be working with someone they clicked with there.

And when registration opens again, they have another reason to come back:

“I can’t wait to see those people again!”