The hundreds of festivals staged in Australia every year generate significant revenue, not just for organisers and performers, but for the wider economy. They also play an important cultural role in bringing communities together. Discovering how successful festivals work and ways the experience can be improved - and with that profits - has become an exercise for academic minds. Australian School of Business lecturer Jenny (Jiyeon) Lee has been researching crowd loyalty and says that building social and emotional ties through shared experiences is a key factor. Festivals are applying modern event-design techniques to positively influence an audience’s motivation, participation and satisfaction. It's all about keeping the crowds coming back for more.