The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a rapid, and necessary, pause on live events. Some organizers have canceled events completely while others have shifted to digital events that are attended online. Certainly there is some skepticism over the effectiveness of moving an event online, but it has been done, with great success.
A great example is Salesforce. The company had an event planned in Sydney, Australia but was forced to change to an all digital event. With 80,000 attending and 12,000 participating in product demonstrations, the event was a success. That’s a good number of engaged attendees.
Thanks to technology, a digital event can be purely digital without losing the human element of participating in an event. The best way to transition an event into a purely digital experience is to make the event an experience.
Immersion
Shifting to digital events might give the impression that someone on their computer can’t be fully immersed in your event or brand. That’s not true. Going digital means you’ll have many opportunities to place branding. Also, as you won’t be spending money on printed and other physical materials, that frees up your budget to really drive digital immersion.
The Nuances of Being There
You can still bring the feel of booths and seminars online. Web seminars have been going on for years, so there’s no challenge there. Today’s telecommunications technology allows for effective roundtables with global attendees. Product launches can still be amazing. You don’t need to sacrifice what the physical nuances of attending events when switching to digital events, but you do need to adapt.
Engagement
An engaged audience has always been essential for a great event experiences, and the same holds true for digital events. Attendees of digital events need to feel like they are in the room. Digital events allow the audience to engage more fully with the presenters and with each other. The second way to create a high engagement event is through the use of social media connects or gamification.
Sponsorships
By shifting to online events, you won’t be decreasing sponsorship opportunities or losing sponsor revenue. You can actually use the transition to digital events to increase sponsorship opportunities and provide more value to sponsors. In addition to new and different branding placements, you’ll also be able to provide sponsors with valuable data following the event’s conclusion.
Which, speaking of data, this is perhaps the greatest benefit in the shift to digital events.
Physical events are used for lead generation, but it’s difficult to gather real detailed and actionable data. With the shift to online, we can measure everything and use that data to provide an improved future event. When hosting an online event, you’ll know how many people attended each session and how long each individual attended. You’ll have every question documented and the presentations will be archived for later use or to make available for attendees after the event. You can measure everything!
Digital Events, The New Normal for the Time Being
For the time being events will be purely digital as we tackle the COVID-19 virus, but expect a future of hybrid events with split digital and physical elements.
As things stand now, focus on digital and create events that are engaging and provide the best experience for attendees. Don’t allow digitization to intimidate you. Do as you would normally would with a physical event, and focus on the attendee experience.
Let’s Talk About Your Brand
shane@3catslabs.com | Call +65-3159-4231
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