Virtual Conference Best Practices 2021
The year 2020 was indeed a dark year for all the businesses out of which the Event management business was one of the worst-hit sectors.
Just like all bad times come to an end, Event professionals too navigated the crisis successfully and rose back significantly.
As the year passed by, more tools and approaches made their place in the market. The emergence of these tools allowed organizers to convert their real events into virtual events.
2020 can be referred to as the year of Virtual Conferences. Even though normalcy is still en route, the concept of Virtual Conferences has garnered a lot of attention and will continue to exist for a long time.
In this blog, we shall be covering the best Virtual Conference ideas to make your virtual conference successful in the year 2021.
However, we need to understand the prerequisites associated with Virtual Conferencing first.
So Let’s get started!
What Are Virtual Conferences?
Virtual conferences can be referred to as a sub-category of Virtual events. In comparison to other forms of virtual events known as Webinars, Virtual conferences are longer in duration and have a larger audience. Virtual conferences can last for days and in a few cases, they can end up in weeks depending on the organizer and the content.
Commonly referred to as the largest form of Virtual events, these conferences often have a much larger crowd.
Benefits of Virtual Conferences
Many benefits have come to light ever since the emergence of Virtual Conferences. We have listed below a few major advantages of Virtual Conferences.
More Reach
Surveys suggest that more than 80% of event professionals were able to reach a wider audience with virtual events. Virtual conferences significantly break down a few barriers like traveling and time-consuming entries. The conference capacity becomes unlimited. Virtual conferences can be made international and people all across the globe can join you. Hence, it significantly increases reach.
Environment Friendly
Regular events leave quite a negative impact on the environment. In-place events result in increased air travel, food, and water wastage, and more. Virtual conferences are a much more sustainable option in comparison to regular conferences.
A Safe Choice
We must remember that we are still amidst a global pandemic and not completely safe yet. Looking at the increased Covid-19 cases, it is not safe to be a part of a conference. It is imperative for the organizers to keep the attendees and staff members safe. Virtual conferences make for the perfect choice for people to meet and interact from the comfort of their homes and staying safe too.
Best Practices For Planning A Virtual Conference In 2021
Go As Per The Budget
Irrespective of the type of conference, it is always crucial to set and abide by the budget. Planning a detailed event budget will help you keep a track of where and how the money is flowing.
The more detailed the budget would be, the smoother would be the planning of the event.
Understand The Goal Of Your Event
Planning a successful Virtual Conference is mandatory and in order to plan, you need to first understand the reason behind conducting the event. You need to understand the objective of the event. Why are you conducting the event? What are you trying to accomplish?
Curate Powerful Content
Event professionals need to give extra attention while curating the content. Your intention and purpose must be crystal clear. Now since the attendees are tuning in from home, to grab their attention you really need to up your content game. Remember, they have many distractions at home. They may have simultaneously opened many different browsers to jump into it if they get bored. Don’t let that happen. Build content so impactful and engaging that your attendees don’t feel the need to make a switch to other platforms.
Social Walls To The Rescue
Social Walls are a perfect way to increase user engagement, display your social proof, increase and build faith and loyalty in your audience, grow your conversion rate and maximize your profits too! Displaying social walls during your virtual conference can instill excitement and your attendees will want to be a part of your event. You can showcase images, videos, gifs, reviews, etc. to build curiosity amongst the attendees. You can create a hashtag for the event and encourage attendees to post on their social media using the hashtag. You can display the live tweets on the social wall too to create more buzz and excitement.
Practice Will Make You Perfect
Rehearse as much as you can. Just as the quote says ‘Practice makes a man perfect, you too need to rehearse with the guest speakers. This will give the production team the ideal opportunity to check the back support and the internet connection. Moreover, it will make the presenters more comfortable during the event.
Wrapping It Up
Hosting a Virtual Conference is not an easy task and involves a lot of brainstorming and proper planning. These conferences are however the need of the hour and marketers are making full efforts to make them successful.
Using the above-mentioned ideas, you will surely be able to plan and conduct a brilliant virtual conference.
