Published on October 14th, 2022
Taking your event online might be challenging if you don’t have a solid plan for translating the most vital aspects of your in-person participation into a thriving online presence.
The competition for your audience’s attention is fierce in the age of virtual reality, and it may be difficult to overcome viewer weariness.
We’re lucky to live at a time when technological advancements such as virtual event engagement ideas can be repurposed to address pressing issues. First, go back to fundamentals and address participation in all of your virtual program’s primary components:
In addition, there is a multitude of flexibility beyond the traditional polling, question and answer, and socialising formats. To further increase participation in your virtual event, we’d like to share some of our favourite methods with you.
1. An Electronic Trade Show
Build an online interactive exhibition hall. Branded “booths” may be set up on these sites, where visitors can watch a video made by the exhibitor, ask questions in real-time, or arrange a time for a video conference to learn more.
If you’re interested in learning more about how to design an exciting exhibit hall, including the features of the platform, how to attract visitors to the online venue, and how to encourage participation from both attendees and exhibitors, go here.
2. Online Sponsorships
Sponsorships in cyberspace may be addressed in several ways, each best suited to the intended audience.
Advertising for your sponsors on the landing page for the exhibit hall, the registration page, and other high-traffic areas is one approach.
You can either force your sponsors and attendees to passively listen to your presentations or you can make them active participants by providing them with chances to communicate with each other and with the information you’ve created.
Discover the many online methods for interacting with sponsors before, during, and after an event.
3. Online Connections
One of the primary reasons people attend events is to make new connections, thus this is a crucial aspect to consider when designing a virtual event. However, it’s also one of the trickiest.
Even if your distant participants won’t be bumping into one other at the breakfast or the evening reception, you may still arrange for them to meet via the power of technology. And it might help to foster even more natural and sturdy bonds.
The article has discovered that your online audience is more likely to work together and branch out of their comfort zones when they’re in a more laid-back, shared atmosphere like the one you’ve created.
By fusing the features of your distribution platform with the information gleaned from a virtual event, you may generate novel and fruitful methods to build professional connections.
4. Display Visuals!
Graphics not only improve a show but may now also be used to interact with viewers.
In this way, you may single out a few of your most engaged audience members by name, as seen in the example, by using a ticker scroll at the bottom of the screen.
For example, you might sprinkle the show with pop-up images that provide interesting tidbits of information or entertainment. In this case, if the audience turns away, they could miss something important.
Utilize Pay-to-Play at your next gala or fundraising event. Make a list of add-ons that may be purchased by users and used to unlock features in the software.
Non-passive components, such as picking the closing song or getting an on-air shout-out from the host, might have a higher price tag, while passive elements, such as an animation that runs across the screen or a visual indication about a sponsored dollar number, can be on the lower end.
5. Employ Social Media
You may have your emcee show off some of the best social media postings during programme transitions or use a social media duration application to showcase the feed during the “walk-in” loop.
An alternative is to have speakers at your breakout sessions issue a challenge to the audience and encourage social media responses using a designated hashtag.
6. Take Control of Your Second Monitor
Also known as competing browser windows, mobile devices, tablets, and other screen-based interruptions. Consider how you can keep your audience from checking their email, working on a project, reading the news, etc.
Incorporate some of the aforementioned ideas into the programme first (using smartphones to bid on products, share social media postings, etc.). Post social media links to relevant papers or articles; this will encourage readers to check out your work on their second device and learn more.
Conclusion:
Solicit their participation in a note-taking competition based on the presentations they attend. In this example, they would have your event platform open in full-screen mode while using Word as their second screen.
Ask the speaker relevant questions in the chat to spark discussion; this again needs attendees to have the event platform open in full-screen mode.
Image Source: pixabay.com
