FIFA's Fan Festival Proves Live Experiences Matter

More than 425,000 people attended Philadelphia’s FIFA Fan Festival™ in 2026. While the matches drew the crowds, the event itself became the attraction. Visitors enjoyed live music, local food, cultural programming, giant viewing screens, family activities, and countless moments designed to create memories.

That reflects a broader shift happening across every industry. Whether you're organizing a customer conference, a museum exhibit, a product launch, or an employee meeting, your audience expects more than the ordinary. They expect the extraordinary.

Creating an experience is easy. Creating an extraordinary experience can be extraordinarily difficult.

Most event design companies measure attendance or Net Promoter Scores. These poorly predict what an event is supposed to do: create raving fans who spend money and tell the world about their experience.  

Extraordinary experiences are built from thoughtfully engineered moments that are measured and incrementally improved.

Create a Story Arc

One mistake many event designers make is trying to keep the energy high every minute. That approach overwhelms the brain, leading to exhaustion. The most memorable experiences are built around a handful of peak moments surrounded by opportunities to reflect, connect, and anticipate what's coming next.

Long-form storytelling does exactly that: tension rises and falls so that audiences sustain the energy to enjoy every part of the experience.  Tension troughs are necessary to allow neurons to rest and recover the energy needed for the next high tension element.  

One difference between traditional storytelling and event design is that events do not need to resolve all the parts of the narrative.  In fact, the data show that the most effective events end on a high-note, something so amazing that people want to return and do it all again.  This is known as the peak-end rule: people remember the emotional peaks of an experience  and what happened at the end.  There is a powerful desire to repeat the experience when an emotional peak occurs at the end.

Those are events designed with intention.

Instead of asking, "How do we keep people entertained all day?" ask, "What are the two or three moments people will still be talking about next week?"

Know Your Audience

When event designers create the right experience for the right audience, magic happens.  But, even using a story arc, there is not one ultimate design that will be valued by every audience.  A core finding from psychology (due to Nobel prize winner Danny Kahneman, RIP), is that people have poorly defined preferences over things they have not personally experienced.  This is the Steve Jobs problem: asking an audience what they want is a fool's errand.

Best practice is to create a mock-up and measure.  Mock-ups include drawings, animatics, VR films, and small-scale builds. Then, test your design by recruiting humans and measuring their neurologic Immersion while they go through the experience.  Rather than ask people what they "like", measure what their brains value second by second to turn an idea into something extraordinary.   

Measurement is Your Competitive Advantage

Clients demand extraordinary because IRL experiences are increasingly central to doing business. Design, then measure Immersion.  Repeat until the audience responds exactly where you want it to—during the product reveal, the call to action, or the final goodbye.  Put the "OMG" emotional response exactly where you want it to be by measuring before execution.  IRL experiences will not get "AI'd away" anytime soon.  But, an ordinary experience does not move the needle.  Only the extraordinary does.

This is where ImmersionLive comes in.  ImmersionLive is a kit you own that has everything you need to optimize your experience.  ImmersionLive's ROX calculator will convince the skeptical CFO paying for the experience that your expertise and execution were well worth the investment.  You cannot optimize without measuring, and with a simple pay-as-you-go model, ImmersionLive makes it is easier than ever to ensure every experience you design is the best ever. While you may never reach the fever-pitch of the FIFA FanFest, you can get close when you intentionally design for peak Immersion moments that your audience will love.

To get a demo of ImmersionLive from a live human, use the link here.

FAQs

What makes a live experience memorable?

Memorable experiences are built around a few emotionally powerful moments, balanced with opportunities to reflect, connect, and anticipate what comes next.

Why should event designers use a story arc?

A story arc creates natural rises and falls in energy, helping audiences stay engaged without becoming overwhelmed and making peak moments more impactful.

How can event teams improve the audience experience?

Teams can prototype key moments and measure neurologic Immersion to understand what audiences value, optimize the experience, and demonstrate its business impact.