Businesses struggle to capture audience engagement as corporate adopt a hybrid work schedule. With consumers stuck within the confines of their homes, brands and marketers rely on virtual corporate events to maintain engagement.
Corporate events and trade shows are an excellent way to build a competitive industry standing and engage clients and investors.
Virtual corporate events allow businesses to impress potential clients and investors with an innovative, digitally literate mindset. However, planning virtual corporate events are just as hectic as a traditional event. Numerous event management platforms are available to ensure proper time management and seamless operation of any size event.
Besides, virtual corporate events are easier to leave as the audience simply has to tune out. Therefore, creativity and engagement are crucial aspects to consider. Keep reading to explore tips to help you plan a stellar virtual corporate event.
Planning Virtual Corporate Events 101!
No matter how many employees work on-site and remotely, you can host several successful virtual corporate events with the following hacks!
Setting Clear Goals
What goals do you want to achieve with a corporate event? Are you trying to promote your services or launch a new product? Or perhaps, you’d like to celebrate ten years of running a successful business and honor your clients and associates?
Setting clear and realistic goals will help you manage time and schedule effectively. It will also help you prevent setbacks and align your efforts with your core objectives.
Out of the Box Creativity
As explained earlier, virtual corporate events are easier to leave because the audience simply has to exit the live session. In formal events, attendees linger around for the food and refreshments or wait for the event to end.
However, virtual corporate events do not demand such social etiquette. Therefore, getting creative and coming up with out-of-the-box ideas is crucial to keep your audience hooked.
For instance, how about hiring a trollkarl to fascinate your audience with mind-boggling magic tricks? Magic shows are endlessly intriguing and captivate people of all age groups. Magic shows are a timeless trend to add a fun punch to otherwise dull and formal corporate events.
Once the corporate formalities are over, you can entice your audience with an interactive virtual magic show. That would undoubtedly make your virtual corporate events a viral trend across the industry!
You can also cook up other strategies to keep your audience hooked. For instance, you can create a panel of influencers and the core executive team to humanize your brand.
Many brands host panel discussions to focus on social issues concerning their target audiences.
Choosing the Right Platforms
Choosing the right platforms is paramount to ensuring your corporate event is a success. We advise you to go live on multiple platforms instead of restricting yourself to one medium.
For instance, broadcasting your event on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube will help you secure maximum engagement.
Typically, Facebook leads the trend bandwagon when hosting successful virtual corporate events and panel discussions.
However, this may prove tricky if you don’t enjoy popularity on multiple platforms. In that case, it’s wise to hook your audience on the platform where you enjoy maximum popularity.
Actively Promote your Event
It would help if you organized multiple campaigns to raise awareness around your virtual corporate event. Getting started weeks ahead is wise to pull a large crowd of eager attendees.
The goal is to build the hype around your event and hook in the audience by luring them with interactive media. You can use multiple platforms and mediums for your promotional campaigns.
Naturally, this endeavor requires you to curate content through imagery, interactive videos, informative blogs, and attention-grabbing calls to action.
We advise using your Facebook and Instagram stories to capture attention and give daily reminders. For instance, you can use your stories to create a countdown leading up to the day of the event.
Your website and blog should promote your event using keywords, banners, and informative excerpts. Social media marketing is vital to secure engagement, as the event will go live on social media.
It all boils down to a game of savvy and immersive aesthetics and offering value to pull an enthusiastic crowd.
A Skillful Moderator
Moderators and hosts engage the audience with their enigmatic and engaging conversation styles. They pour life into the script, bringing out the best in the event schedule and entertainment.
Hiring an effective and experienced moderator who can keep the audience hooked and engaged is crucial.
Moderators with an interactive style will encourage attendees to make comments by engaging them with fun questions. It’s crucial to bring out the audience and encourage attendees to comment and interact with the moderator.
Virtual tools allow engagement through comments and sharing; the audience isn’t passive spectators.
However, if the event lacks a savvy and interactive moderator, the audience will likely lose interest and tune out.
Effective Time Management
Scheduling and time management are crucial when hosting a corporate event online. You cannot expect your audience to tune in as soon as you decide to go live.
It is important to research and examine your target audience’s digital activity to find the right time.
You must pick a time when your target audience is free and actively looking for entertainment online. Don’t expect people to wait around or rearrange their schedules unless you offer a special giveaway or discounted products.
You must also maintain adequate time management during the event by scheduling each segment efficiently.
Conclusion
Planning virtual corporate events demands the same amount of scrutiny and planning as formal events. The pressure to secure engagement may seem more intense as the medium is relatively new and requires extensive adjustments.
It all boils down to offering value and hooking the audience with fun activities they wouldn’t want to miss. Naturally, this endeavor requires you to conduct market research and tap into audience preferences. Be sure to hire an enigmatic moderator, or perhaps someone from the executive team can perform this role.
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