Know your quiz night crowd

Organizing a quiz for groups is a bit of an art. There is no fixed recipe, and it all comes down to the quizmaster’s creativity. But this creativity should have a solid base of preparation.

What kind of questions should be asked? On what topic? For how long? In which format? 

Like in all public speaking events, a lot of it depends on the audience. And that’s why knowing what kind of crowd will participate is key.

For a quiz participant, there is nothing worse than feeling out of place in terms of cultural references. If you’re an Asian millennial and you’re faced with questions about British TV series from the 70s, you won’t have much fun. And the same goes if you are a European in your 60s and you’re asked about Korean pop.

In most of the quiz nights that I’ve hosted since 2018, the crowd was mostly international and in their 30s or 40s. Which made it easier for me, as we shared a lot of cultural references. In any case, every time I prepare my rounds I need to make a conscious effort to prepare questions that can involve everyone in a team.

The audience will quickly notice if a quizmaster’s sets of questions can relate to them or not. They will mentally check out if they feel they don’t know anything about a topic - even worse, that it is totally justifiable for them not to know anything about it. You can’t blame them for it. And if you want your quiz night to be successful, you’d better do your “study the audience” homework first.