Why Virtual Events? Marketing has changed a lot recently. Today, virtual events are the number one radar event for marketers, according to a new report from the Association of Event Marketing Professionals.
Virtual events are breaking attendance records, and people are only getting better at what they do. This past spring, more than 120,000 people visited the virtual summit of Fashinnovation, 60 times as many as the physical event. In the first 24 hours of that online virtual event alone, visitors watched over 80 thousand hours of live content.
Companies are achieving great results in multiple industries, and even when personal events return, most marketers plan to maintain virtual events. This post describes the reasons why marketers love virtual events and the technologies needed to make them possible.
Virtual events cost less than if you plan and implement them yourself, so it costs less to produce them. Travel, catering, and event costs are not required and do not require any travel, catering, or event costs.
As a result, the ROI can be significantly higher than for an event itself and the extra funds that can be used to cook a meal together. The money you save can be invested in planning even more virtual events or used for other things such as travel, catering, and event costs.
On average, it takes three to four weeks to plan a virtual event instead of two to three weeks for a physical event such as a press conference. Virtual events can be implemented quickly and easily and move people, products, and physical displays. The less time you plan and promote, the fewer employees you need, and the better the ROI for your company.
For those responsible for their homes and families, traveling can be a logistical challenge and fits into the participant’s schedules.
With so many events taking place virtually, more people are participating in online events than ever before, broadening their virtual horizons. This means that most people attend fewer events than they want, but people from all over the world can network and connect.
Geography has always been a limiting factor for personal events, but virtual events can attract participants worldwide. This is a massive advantage if you are a global company or think about becoming a global company.
Attendees attending narrowly focused events are also more likely to take your product or service seriously. They are characterized by highly concentrated discussions and impress potential customers with their in-depth knowledge. Even if the event is superficial, focusing on a niche topic can be much more profitable because virtual events are cheaper and allow you to draw from a geographically diverse pool of participants.
Due to the high participation and engagement, a lot of data and knowledge can be generated in a short time, especially at virtual events.
Getting people to fill out questionnaires after an event can be a problem, but virtual events give you much information about how participants interact with the event. How participants experience the events is worth knowing, and it gives insights into how they deal with attendees.
Most event platforms record sessions and interactions, but not always in real-time, especially in a virtual event. This data is invaluable for sellers who can develop new event and campaign strategies for potential buyers and marketers. It can be challenging to find the best speakers for an event because people are always in demand. C – Executives and VP’s to move around the company on their travels to events, but it appeals to a broader range of people, not just executives and executives.
Taking away the travel requirement opens up many opportunities for marketers and sellers and vendors’ partners in the event industry.
For example, it is much easier to book a 90-minute virtual keynote than a visit lasting several days. You can also record virtual presentations for your event, giving you access to the same level of detail as a real-time presentation at a physical event.
Most events in person can only be as large as the place where they occur, and in fact, many events end up with long waiting lists. Virtual events are much easier to scale and can be scaled as big and fast as you need with various tools such as a virtual event management system (VMS) and virtual hosting.
You can develop your marketing strategy, marketing materials, customer service, and loyalty strategy just as quickly as with your product.
Instead of waiting for new product line information to be shared in a single, big launch, experiment with more frequent, focused launches. Virtual events are a great solution for sharing essential products, services, or news in an interactive environment with customers and prospects.
This means that leads can be qualified and qualified faster, and their path through the sales funnel can be accelerated. This can help you build a pipeline of events faster, and it means you’re more focused on your business and the path of your leads into the sales funnel. The following conversation will prepare the ground for a discussion on calendar technology combined with virtual events and the benefits of ongoing events.
Virtual events are both art and science, and you need creativity to develop a fantastic theme and format that will captivate your attendees. This technology is essential when you work with multiple teams around the world. It would help if you had them plan, promote and run your events efficiently, whether you want to host multiple events throughout the year or have a small marketing team.
The online virtual events technology helps companies work together, break down silos and stay on track. It takes a village to produce a summit, and organizing online requires more villagers, so there will always be more.
We have found that a good way to guarantee a great event is to hire an event producer that can help plan, organize, market and advise your teams on how to deliver the best user experience. Dozens of our client companies at Kolektive have delivered and learned from us during these years, here are some of them: Waste Management, UN, WWF, and more here.
