You could make the default value as the placeholder value as follows.
Copy wp-content/plugins/events-manager/templates/forms/event/attributes-public.php to wp-content/plugin-templates/events-manager/forms/event and then add a placeholder to the input field. Change line 26 to this:
<input type="text" name="em_attributes[<?php echo esc_attr($name) ?>]" <?php if (!empty($attributes['values'][$name])) echo 'placeholder="' . esc_attr($attributes['values'][$name][0]) . '"'; ?> value="<?php echo array_key_exists($name, $EM_Event->event_attributes) ? esc_attr($EM_Event->event_attributes[$name]):'' ?>" />