When planning a virtual event, don’t forget everything that you learned about putting together a physical event. Even though the scope and dynamics vary greatly between a physical and a virtual event, the process essentially remains the same, and with a few minor modifications, your experience should continue to serve you well. Here are some of the key success factors:

1. Clearly define event goals and objectives: Thinking through the goals and objectives of the event gives you a baseline for objective measurement of the outcome. Some of the questions to ask during the planning stage: Is this a new event or one we are migrating from the physical to the virtual world? If migrating, what will we gain and what will we lose? What are we trying to achieve with our guests? How will we define and measure success?

2. Build a detailed profile of the target audience for your event: You want to maximize event registrations, attendance, interactivity and longevity with the right audience. So thoroughly define the attendee profiles you are seeking for the event and create a communications and promotional program around their needs, desires and expectations.

3. Develop and articulate a compelling value proposition: What’s your event’s unique selling proposition (USP)? You need to communicate this USP to prospective registrants and sponsors. You need to give them a set of tangible reasons for attending or sponsoring the event. Ensure that your promotional team can articulate and disseminate the USP in a way that grabs the target audience’s attention and compels them to action.

4. Create relevant and timely content for your audience and deliver it in a memorable way: Your virtual event audience has many distractions competing for their attention. Make sure you engage them by providing the highest caliber of relevant content and deliver it in the most compelling way. “Content is king,” as the old saying goes, but virtual platforms create unique opportunities for delivering that content in ways that are not possible with a physical event. In the end, the quality of your content and it’s unique delivery will be the critical drivers of success for your event.

To find out more, please visit us at www.virtualevents365.com and come back to this blog for part 2 of the best practices discussion.

Last week, I had highlighted some of the key capabilities of our VirtualEvents365℠ Version 3 solution. This week, I would like to delve further into this topic and talk specifically about how we’ve tried to increase the ‘stickiness’ of the virtual booth.

What is stickiness? Stickiness is trying to hold the attention of the visitor in order to engage them in a productive exchange of information.

In the context of the virtual booth, it’s ideal to make it “sticky” so that visitors stay longer, absorb the sponsor’s message and interact with a booth representative. With most virtual event platforms, this is accomplished by providing a collection of content to review and a representative with whom you can chat. Video/flash content is usually the most engaging for visitors, however most of the times it is buried in a pick list where it is not easy to find, and only one video message plays in the booth. In Version 3 we gave sponsors the option to place front and center in the booth easily accessible video clips (taken from longer videos). Since visitors can view several different video/flash clips, they are more likely stay longer.

Another way to make the booth sticky is to deliver an engaging and exciting environment. We know from our e-learning business that games can be a great tool for engaging learners and delivering/ reinforcing a message. In Version 3 we gave sponsors the option to create and offer games, including crosswords, jeopardy-style contests, word matches, and more, which can be displayed directly in their booth. Furthermore, offering prizes is another way to make the games—and the overall experience—more engaging, so visitors now have additional reasons to stay longer.

Taking chat to the next level: using text chat as the primary medium of communication in a virtual booth can be very challenging for both the booth representative and the visitors. Booth representatives can only type so fast and there is a natural tendency to respond with full sentences, proper grammar and no typos. The lengthy answers at times make this process even more cumbersome and frustrating for both parties. VirtualEvents365 Version 3 has taken chat capabilities to the next level by providing the booth representative with the option to answer visitor questions with a voice response. The representative can address their voice to either one visitor or to all visitors at the booth. This capability gives booth representatives a way to engage more effectively with visitors. Stay tuned to learn more ways in which we are making the virtual event experience more compelling and productive for event hosts, sponsors and attendees.

To find out more, please visit us at www.virtualevents365.com and come back to this blog for more interesting discussions on virtual solutions.

We recently announced Version 3 of our VirtualEvents365 platform, which includes many new capabilities. Enhancements to the virtual booths, which event organizers create or offer to sponsors as part of the virtual exhibit hall, meaningfully improve lead capture and qualification.

Every marketer wants to generate booth traffic… but what happens when you have too much concurrent traffic? This can be a major roadblock, especially when a speaker does a good job encouraging participants to drop by their company’s booth after the presentation ends. In the physical world, booth attendees can easily see whether a booth representative is available to speak and can decide whether to wait or leave. However, in most virtual event platforms, the attendee who asks a question at a booth has no idea how long they will have to wait for an answer if the booth representative does not reply immediately. So, instead of it being a blessing – lots of booth traffic – it can quickly turn into a curse –frustrated attendees with unfulfilled expectations.

Version 3 of VirtualEvents365 addresses this by providing a queuing system that informs booth visitors if there is a wait and how long the wait will be. Furthermore, booth visitors are given the option to leave a message, which would be answered as soon as the booth representative became available.

Another way Version 3 helps drive the effectiveness of marketers is by providing multiple booth representatives with tools to manage and direct booth traffic. The booth representatives’ “cockpit” allows them to see a profile of visitors at the booth and then assign the most appropriate representative to engage with each unique visitor. Think about the impact you can have by pairing up the right subject matter expert with a booth visitor… consistently exceed expectations by surprising and delighting your guests!

These are just a few of the ways we have improved Version 3. With VirtualEvents365 for Demand Generation, we are committed to helping our clients turn passive booth visitors into engaged prospects. To find out more please visit us at www.virtualevents365.com and come back to this blog for an ongoing discussion on all the new capabilities available on Version 3.

As we begin wrapping up 2009 and prepare for a promising 2010, let’s take a minute and see how the ‘Virtual Events’ category has performed in this year. The economic woes, coupled with the accelerating decline in the demand for physical events, made 2009 the breakthrough year for Virtual Events – with the growth rate soaring to over 300%. According to research conducted by Marketing Sherpa, the budget allocated by companies of various sizes to virtual events increased by 37% during the first half of 2009, while face-to-face events declined by 30% during the same period.

Lead generation capabilities, actionable intelligence and integration with social media platforms are some of the capabilities that have made Virtual Events a ‘must have’ and ‘highly desirable’ solution for marketers. More and more industries and verticals are beginning to see the potential in Virtual Events and are starting to adopt them for both internal and external use, including Employee Training, User Conferences, Trade Shows, Job Fairs, Sales Conferences, HR Meetings, Demand Generation, and more. Clearly, the breadth of applications makes this platform a truly disruptive technology.

In line with the growing demand for Virtual Events as a whole, and our increasing brand recognition and deep market penetration, we have taken several steps to ratchet up our marketing presence online. I am very pleased to announce the launch of our new and dynamic VirtualEvents365 website (www.virtualevents365.com). The website provides valuable information about our capabilities, dimensions of distinction, client projects and partner community, so be sure to visit us for up-to-date information. We will soon be announcing expanded capabilities and offerings…until next time!

Best,
Tom Wieser

VirtualEvents365 sponsored the BtoB Netmarketing Breakfast in San Francisco on October 15th, and virtual events was one of the most sought after topics of discussion.

Marketing on a shoestring budget–and getting more out of limited marketing dollars–seemed like the universal theme of this BtoB breakfast. With speakers from Intel, McAfee, Sage and Sybase on the panel, it seemed that on-line video, earned media and virtual events were some of the technologies that have become very much mainstream within the marketing toolkit of these high profile marketers. Intel is for the first time substituting its 2010 Sales and Marketing Conference with a virtual event for many thousands of its employees. Many of the Intel’s new product launches are rolled out to press and analysts with virtual events (executed by CGS VirtualEvents365). Sybase started to experiment with virtual events and has seen some good traction around audience participation. What has made the offering even more attractive to these organizations is the capability to host the content for an extended period of time, driving additional opportunities for engagement. Sybase even went so far as to quote that ‘physical events are on their way out and are being replaced more and more by virtual events.’

Other reactions from the room indicated that many of the marketers are experimenting with the virtual platform technology, including a good discussion on how to generate appropriate traffic and audience generation for virtual events. As we often advice our clients, the same amount of effort and planning that goes into a physical event should be applied to a virtual event. Long term planning, integration with other marketing efforts and aggressive promotion of the event–showcasing the value attendees should expect to receive–will set the stage for a successful virtual event.

This is our first blog for Virtual Events 365.

Happy Blogging!

VirtualEvents365 Team