Driving Audience Engagement with Virtual Events

One of the biggest issues facing virtual or hybrid event planners is the level of audience engagement in external or marketing events. This is why a solid engagement strategy is critical to include in your planning framework to drive meaningful engagement.

Make sure you include a strategy that covers pre-event, during & post event activities; I tend to advocate for a year round event strategy to build community (small ‘c’) and loyalty amongst your target audience. This is critical, but it takes time and repeat, consistent value delivery through omnichannel marketing, webinars & micro events.

From a content perspective, and in order to drive engagement, you need to remain authentic and storytelling should be a theme throughout your event because stories;

· Evoke emotion and empathy with your audience

· Aid knowledge retention by persuading us at a deeper level

· Bring context, allowing us to deliver complex information or highlight challenging situations

· Provide interaction opportunities with the audience

Some of the things you can include in your strategy are listed below but first and foremost you must know your target audience intimately as this should drive your engagement strategy and design. Are you able to answer these questions?

1. Why would they attend your event, what are they trying to achieve by attending? (could be personal, professional or direct business / role related)

2. How do you answer their question of “What’s in it for me (WIIFM)”?

3. How do they measure success of the event?

4. How do your sponsors measure success?

5. How do your senior stakeholders measure success?

6. How does this translate into Goals & Objectives with measured KPI’s to track progress toward these objectives?

Knowing these answers are critical in building a solid engagement strategy and delivering a successful event.

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Strategy activities to drive engagement with a long term or annual strategy
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Pre-Event

· Talk to your target audience in communities, forums & social media they frequent, carry out interviews, surveys and polls – this can be as far out as 6-9 months before your main event

· Build audience loyalty by creating a regular ‘slot’ or day/time to hold regular webinars / podcasts – think about TV style scheduling that suits your target audience. These can also be micro or smaller regional style events throughout the year in many different formats

     · Use both of the above to understand more about their specific preferences, interests and expectations

     · Tailor content, interactive elements and networking features based on this information

· Create behind the scenes content and interviews, humanise your team and experts

· Create a community or event venue where your target audience can start to connect & exchange ideas

      · Create dedicated event-based X and other social media hashtags

· For your larger (and regional) quarterly and annual events create sneak peek and teaser content

· Create pre-event on-demand content in the event environment to get attendees familiar with the attendee journey & experience and up to speed on the agenda, speakers and content. This will also allow them to plan & build personal schedules, book meetings, plan networking and view educational content to maximise live event attendance.
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During Events

· Start strong by delivering value from the outset as well as using ice breakers

· Utilise the CEO, senior leadership team, hosts & speakers to humanise them, capture audience attention and set the desired tone for the event

· Think about the goal of every session and what action it wants the audience to take, mix up the content format to achieve that goal

· Keep the audience entertained as well as engaged with multi-way dialogue, video, live demo’s, virtual tours and gamification where appropriate

· Make presentations / sessions no longer than they need to be but ensure you include audience participation – don’t forget authenticity and storytelling!

· Ensure there is no ‘pitching’ during sessions, instead focus on delivering value and engaging with attendees

· Feedback to the audience during sessions so they know their input is heard and important to you

      · Use audience input in real time to shape and direct the session content and conversation

· Make sessions available on-demand as soon as they have finished (if appropriate) so people can catch up on sessions they missed as soon as possible

      · Continue the conversation post session, show people they have been heard

· Gamify your events with relevant & meaningful polls, quizzes & activities that drive educational or intent-driven engagement

· Use CTAs wisely throughout the event, as well as throughout the pre and post event periods to drive opt-in as well as setup meetings and secondary activities

      · Good use of CTAs at moments of ‘value’ throughout the event can really help to bypass MQL’s and deliver true SQL’s by understanding intent and opportunities for ‘self-selection’ by buyers

      · Optimise your opportunities to capture opt-in, by waiting until you have delivered value before requesting any opt-in other than event essentials, and make sure there are multiple opportunities on longer events

· Use breakout rooms & networking circles with pre-determined themes or create them in real-time based on audience feedback for both structured and unstructured networking with time allocated on the agenda

· Provide event-wide, session-based, booth-based text and video chat sessions, as well as 1-1 between attendees and / or with speakers

· Allow attendees to schedule meetings between attendees, speakers and staff to facilitate serendipitous networking and potential deals

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After the Event

· Don’t stop engaging just because your event is over!

· Make sure you send out personalised emails for those attending and sorry you missed the event emails that include a relevant call to action for your post-event content and follow-up micro events
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Make strong use of post-event content:

· Highlights & key takeaways

· Deep dive, lessons learned follow-up sessions, brainstorms and working groups

· Repurpose content into podcasts, short form video & social media posts for learning points

· Forward looking promo’s

· Testimonials, case studies and attendee stories
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Analyse your data, particularly engagement metrics:

· Understand which were the successful sessions and speakers

· Engaging trends and subjects

· Shape future events, session formats and follow up activities

· Refine customer / attendee journeys

· Establish areas of improvement

· Continue the networking and follow-up through value based community activity
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Remember, your virtual event is just a moment in time, albeit a very important one but it is only one part of the journey. Make it a must attend part of the journey by demonstrating your value again and again in a strategic, well planned and crafted way that builds community and loyalty.

Stay authentic, tell your story, and the engagement will flow.