TIPS ON SCALING UP YOUR VIRTUAL EVENT EXPERIENCE

There are countless perks to pivoting an event into the digital world: expanding your brand’s reach and influence, ease of accessibility for attendees all over the country and world, improved ROI, and the added bonus of the potential to go 100% green. But as event planners move away from small team meetings and webinars to large-scale networking meetups, corporate town halls, and online music festivals, tasteful and intelligent planning measures need to be taken.  

So, what are the best ways to scale up your virtual experience for both your presenters and attendees? Luckily, Wizard Studios has worked on virtual and hybrid events of all sizes and can offer you the information you need to ensure your next event is an enormous virtual success! 

Choose Your Technology Platform Wisely

Virtual meeting platforms have grown exponentially over the past year, offering everything from built-in marketing strategies to digital experiences that feel like virtual reality video games. As an event planner, you know better than anyone how many moving parts you need to keep track of. That being said, take the time to do some research and demo as many virtual meeting platforms as you can. Have specifics in mind, and analyze how competing platforms market themselves differently. 

Look for platforms that offer top-notch engagement, interactive sessions, and are user-friendly and accessible, especially for your target audience. Nowadays, many of these platforms are “all-in-one” and can manage everything from registration to analyzing post-even data. The choice is yours, but ensure you’re choosing wisely to offer engagement, ease of use, and a unique positive audience experience. 

Consider Exciting Sponsorships and Partners

Finding and nurturing high-quality sponsorships is vital for virtual events, especially if you’re hoping to scale up. To begin, ask yourself 2 things: 1. What type of sponsorship would spark interest in my target audience? And 2. What would that sponsor get out of funding my online event? In a typical (non-COVID) world, this might include offering the sponsor a booth or exhibitor. But virtual events offer a similar perk: place a sponsor’s logo on event promotional banners and flyers, embed them throughout the virtual event platform, and make sure they are a part of the overall experience. 

Remember to keep in mind that sponsors want as much bang for their buck as possible, so when you’re scaling up your virtual event, think about all the ways you can nurture that relationship with your sponsor or partner to make sure it’s a win-win for both of you: mention their company on your blog posts or email newsletters, provide incentives or discounts for customers that purchase the sponsor’s product or sign up for their service, and encourage your social media followers to “like” and share the sponsor’s content. These small ways not only help nurture the relationship you have with your sponsor, but offer your virtual attendee experience a change of pace, style, and energy with a sponsor or brand they enjoy and love. 

Mix in Some Mid-Session Activities

The experts in virtual event technology know one thing for sure: staring at a computer screen with little change in scenergy is absolutely exhausting for audiences. Regardless of event size, encourage your speakers, panelists, and performers to engage with attendees through mid-session activities like online polls, interactive breakout rooms, session ratings, and gamified content. These quirky icebreaker activities will encourage participants to connect and share responses, which is particularly valuable when sessions are large and breakout groups run the risk of being inefficient. Through this tactic, speakers will have the opportunity to engage attendees in meaningful conversation and keep attendees leaning in, hungry for more. 

Get Your Audience Sharing on Social Media

One of the many benefits of creating a virtual event is that, unlike in-person events, you and your participants can keep the momentum of the event alive by utilizing social media. Create opportunities for attendees to share their event experience by giving them the tools to do so before, during, and after the event. You might create specific social media hashtags (make sure others aren’t already using the ones you come up with!), utilize contribution walls before, during, or after the event, and at-home or home office photo opportunities. If you’re able to incentivize social media participation from your speakers to your audience, attendees are more likely to engage with each other during the event and to encourage further online interactions sparked by more follows, likes, shares, and reposts, all centered around your virtual event. This allows event goers to familiarize themselves with fellow attendees while increasing your online event presence. Brand awareness? We’d say brand explosion! 

We can’t say what the future of events will look like moving forward, but we know that virtual events are here to stay. You never have to worry about pivoting an event into the digital world if you have the right event professionals in your corner. If you’re ready to scale up your virtual experience for your next event, be sure to contact the virtual and hybrid event experts at Wizard Studios today!