5 Networking Mistakes Event Organisers Make

5 Networking Mistakes Event Organisers Make (And How to Fix Them)

You can have a great venue, standout speakers, and smooth logistics, but if the networking falls flat, your event probably will too.

According a report from Bizzabo, 76% of attendees say networking is their primary reason for attending events. But most events still treat networking as an afterthought, or worse, leave it entirely to chance.

That gap? It’s a missed opportunity, but an easy one to fix.

Here are five common mistakes organisers make when it comes to networking, and how to avoid them without overcomplicating your event.

1. Leaving Networking to Chance

We’ve all seen it: the room fills, name badges go on, and everyone is left to figure things out from there.

When networking is left unstructured it rewards confidence and familiarity, not relevance. Conversations happen based on proximity, not purpose. And for many attendees, that means walking away feeling like they missed someone important.

The Fix:

Add just a little structure. A tool like WITR gives attendees a way to signal what they’re looking for and see who else is open to connecting. It’s not prescriptive, it simply makes it easier for the right people to find each other.

2. Networking Starts Cold on the Day

If attendees don’t know who’s coming or what kind of people they’ll meet until they walk into the room, you’re asking them to wing it.

That first 30 minutes is often spent figuring out the vibe rather than starting meaningful conversations.

The Fix:

Give people a head start. Sharing a WITR link before the event lets attendees opt in, set their intention and arrive knowing who they might want to talk to. You’ll find more conversations happen and they happen earlier.

3. Manual Contact Lists

Paper sign-in sheets, clipboards at the door, Excel exports from your inbox. Sadly, these are all still far too common.

Not only is it inefficient, it’s risky from a privacy standpoint. And most of the time, that data goes nowhere useful anyway.

The Fix:

Use something that handles sign-ins, consent, and GDPR/data compliance in one move. WITR lets attendees opt in, share what they’re there for, and appear on a live list, no spreadsheets, no post-event scrambling, and no guesswork. You have enough on your plate when running an event, WITR helps ease the burden.

4. Overbuilt Tech That Gets in the Way

Many event platforms try to do everything: ticketing, scheduling, chat, content and community. It’s asking a lot of attendees to download an app, create a login and figure out where to click.

That complexity often turns people off before they even try to use it. Your event technology should add to your experience, not demand your attention.

The Fix:

We made WITR intentionally lightweight. It’s a QR code or a link. No downloads, no bloat. It fits into how events already run instead of trying to reshape them. You can share the link as part of your regular event housekeeping and the rest runs itself.

5. No Easy Way to Follow Up

Even when people have a great conversation, follow up is usually left to memory, LinkedIn searches, or the old “I’ll find you later.” And often, they don’t.

If someone makes a great connection but has no easy way to revisit it, that connection fades and the real value of your event goes with it.

The Fix:

With WITR, the attendee list stays live for 48 hours after the event. That gives people time to reconnect, while it’s still fresh, but without leaving them on a permanent contact list. It’s time-bound, respectful, and easy to act on.

The result? More meaningful follow-ups, with less friction and a better return on attention for everyone.

Final Thought

Better networking doesn’t mean reinventing your event.

It just means giving people the context they need to find the right conversations.

And when that happens, events stop being “something people attended” and become something they got real value from.

Keep reading

See how WITR works in practice on the event networking app page, how organisers measure outcomes with Impact Analytics, or read how to measure event ROI.