Introduction
This year surely had us all scrambling to cancel all our plans at the last minute. The
novel coronavirus forced people to sit back at home and rethink their ways of attending
that most-awaited conference or visit that crucial trade show through different digital
mediums. 2020 has redefined what is deemed to be normal and one of the trends seen on
the rise are virtual events.
Virtual
events is any event that takes place on an online platform with people engaging
and interacting with a virtual environment. The experiences that can be explored in
Virtual Events are vast, ranging from multi-session online events to webinars, webcasts
and exhibitions and online workshops. Brands
have been using Virtual Events as an important tool of their digital marketing
plan and are exploring the digital landscape now more than ever. The results that are
yielded from these are great because the events are highly interactive and have a
novelty factor for the masses.
While both on-ground events and virtual events have their own lists of pros and cons, we
must take a step back from the physical events until the pandemic is over and evaluate
why Virtual Events are the better bet to go ahead with.
Here Are Five Reasons Why Virtual Event Are Better
Than In-person Events
- Cost-effective
It is no secret that physical events can burn holes in your pocket. While taking
your attendees to new destinations can be emotionally gratifying, chances are that the
objective of doing so is rarely met. The troubles do not end there. Along with travel
costs, there’s hotel booking that needs to be taken care of, live entertainment options
that have to be factored in, speaker hospitality to be given importance to. Virtual
Events make these costs non-existent as you only have to pay for the platform, it’s
promotion and the speakers. Through Virtual Events, you are more likely to afford a
top-notch speaker for your event as logistics aren’t involved in the process.
- Flexibility
Virtual Event Platforms have the advantage of
being extremely flexible and be tailor made to suit custom requirements. With physical
barriers out of the way, you can carve out the exact experience you want to provide to
your attendees. Unlike traditional events, virtual events do not suffer from uncertainty
such as weather hazards or technical glitches. The experience that the end users get is
a much smoother one. A lot of organizations have a global workforce who work remotely
from their locations. Getting the entire team to be aligned for a physical event seems
to be a mammoth task. Virtual Events take care of the different time zones and churn out
a memorable experience with the whole team involved. Similarly, a brand is likely to
have bigger audience reach with a Virtual Event than a physical one because Virtual
Events are accessible from any smart device with internet bandwidth.
- Scalability
Most physical venues will have a definitive capacity for the audience. With
Virtual Events, the number of participants depends on how many people you as a brand or
an organization want to reach out to. During physical events, there are hundreds of
people gathered at a venue and chances are they are missing out on important segments of
the experience and information that the event aims at providing. Virtual Events tend to
focus on providing unique user experience to all the participants and make all the
necessary information accessible to them. This scales up the chances of ROI and lead
conversion which is an uncertain factor during physical events.
- Data Collection
The key agenda of any event is to provide data and information to the participants
and also to collect data from the participants. During on-ground events, the information
that you are trying to provide to the attendees may not be retained and can be lost. If
your event is being hosted for three days and is packed with data and information,
chances are that the user will not be able to grasp all of it at one go. The perk of
hosting a Virtual Event is that the information that you wish to provide to the
participants can be downloaded and the information is available online for as long you
want to keep the event page live. Virtual Events are data mines as you can monitor
consumer behavior, the type of content that they are viewing, the products that they are
interacting with and the networking sessions. You can collect data through feedback and
rating and get an understanding of what worked with the attendees and what didn’t.
- Fixed ROI
The basic question that you need to ask yourself before hosting any type of event
is “What is in it for me?”. You need to understand the ROI before you invest in any
event. Traditional events cannot determine ROI as they cannot study every attendee
minutely and gauge their pulse. However, Virtual
Events can surely indicate the ROI that can be expected as they have data of
every attendee. The level of engagement, the content consumption and the interactive
networking sessions will help the hosts understand their audience better and turn these
potential leads into confirmed ones.
Virtual Events are more convenient and efficient than their traditional counterparts.With
the health issue that is dominating the world today, it’s safer to host a virtual event
and keep the audience engaged.
