Posts Tagged ‘trivia questions’
Trivia Themes Which Nobody Likes: A List of Failed Trivia Rounds
Following up on yesterday’s post highlighting 5 trivia themes proven to bring smiles to people’s faces, I thought today we would explore the flipside: live trivia party themes which are surefire flops. As discussed yesterday, I’ve been writing & hosting live trivia events for 5 years, and in that time have experimented an awful lot…
Read More5 Fun Themes for Live Trivia Parties, and Why They Work
Perhaps one of the first things I’m asked when holding an initial conversation with clients is, “what kind of trivia do you guys do?” The answer brings both good news and bad: the good news is, you can have a trivia event about any topic you like! The bad news, of course: where on earth…
Read MoreFinding Trivia Gold in Pop Culture Garbage: Great Questions from 6 Terrible Movies
I read a very interesting article this weekend in the New York Times movie section, entitled “Catch That Reference? There’ll Be a Quiz.” The gist here was that many movies contain veiled references to other works, directors and eras, and that viewers who catch these subtle hat tips will enjoy the films better. This got…
Read MoreUsing Twitter for Trivia: A User’s Guide
Since launching our official TrivWorks Twitter feed in 2009, we’ve utilized it for a variety of purposes: marketing upcoming free trivia nights, highlighting news items & achievements of fellow event professionals and live trivia hosts in New York City and beyond, as well as to promote the daily blog you are reading now. However, as…
Read MoreUsing Live Trivia for Audience Engagement & Brand Awareness: The Economist Case Study
This week, I had the honor of producing and hosting another very special trivia event with The Economist, the distinguished weekly news magazine known for broad and insightful coverage of current events, politics, economics and world history. Readers of The Economist are equally bright, intellectually curious consumers of global affairs, and in an impressive effort…
Read MoreExperience Trumps Content Any Day
It’s the mantra of the entertainment industry: “Content is King.” Whether talking about movies, television shows, Broadway musicals, video games or books, the guiding principle has always been that compelling content is what will drive interest and, ultimately, sales. You could have the slickest marketing campaign, the coolest packaging or the most credible spokesperson, but…
Read MoreNobody Likes Hard Trivia Questions
Most trivia enthusiasts pride themselves on their ability to tackle challenging questions. If you or someone you know is a diehard buff, than you know that the buzz received from puzzling, pondering and ultimately retrieving the correct answer to a query is highly rewarding and satisfying. Perhaps, though, what is even more fulfilling when correctly…
Read MoreMaking Trivia Questions Bulletproof
As a trivia theme party planner and team building event producer, I am responsible for researching and writing trivia questions which are appropriate for a wide variety of audiences: bankers, lawyers, teachers, IT professionals, nonprofits, government workers- you name it, it’s up to me to customize it. One aspect of my job, however, which remains…
Read MoreTrivia Questions Which Will Get You Fired
One of the most useful books I’ve read in recent years is Send: Why People Email so Badly and How to Do It Better by David Shipley & Will Schwalbe, which I referenced in a previous post on recommended reading. Within these pages, the authors have devoted an entire chapter to cautionary tales of Email…
Read MoreThe Art of Trivia Event Sequencing, Part 2: Questions
In yesterday’s post, I highlighted the important role of round sequencing in live trivia events. Now, let’s turn our attention to the equally important – yet also overlooked – significance of the order of trivia questions within rounds. Questions As with the order of the rounds, the progression of questions in a trivia event can…
Read MoreThe Art of Trivia Event Sequencing, Part 1: Rounds
It’s perhaps one of the most overlooked aspects of the live trivia event, yet one of the most important. What order should the questions be asked in? If you think that it doesn’t matter, think again- the sequencing of trivia is a crucial element to ensuring a fun, well-paced event. Rounds First off, we have…
Read MoreWhy Social Media Is Great for Trivia
Today’s attention-shy world is so vastly different from the one we inhabited 15, 10 or even 5 years ago. Constant interruptions, rings, pings and buzzes from devices, desktops and even subway platforms make this planet – especially New York City – an incredibly difficult place to focus on any one activity for an extended period…
Read MoreWhy Pop Culture is Great for Trivia Events
When people find out that I own a trivia company, they immediately assume I am a trivia guru, and pepper me with all sorts of arcane queries. This may come as a surprise, but I am absolutely terrible at trivia- ESPECIALLY pop culture trivia; I may be good at writing trivia questions and hosting trivia…
Read MoreAnatomy of a Trivia Team Building Event
In an earlier post, I explained general terms how trivia may be used as a corporate team building activity. Now I would like to describe the live trivia event in further detail, in order to illustrate its value for this unique purpose. The first step is customizing the trivia questions themselves, to tailor them specifically…
Read MoreMaking a Trivia Event Humorous Without Overdoing It
Having hosted over 300 trivia events over the last 5 years, I can say with relative certainty that the most important ingredient for a successful event is humor. How does humor play a role in trivia? Well for one, it allows people to enjoy themselves- who doesn’t love a good laugh- or two, or ten?…
Read More