Virtual Event Strategy & Execution

A Practitioner's Guide! If you’re like most organizations, your current event program is almost unrecognizable from the one you ushered in at the start of 2020. The global pandemic has - temporarily at least - shuttered most in-person events, forcing planners and marketers to scramble for new ways to connect with prospects and customers. Faced with an urgent need and few choices, many organizations reflexively “pivoted to virtual.” And, while virtual events have been around a long time, the rush to repackage in-person events into virtual events has been an experiment for most. This experimentation, while messy, should be applauded. The past several months has seen great innovation and learning as organizations of all kinds feel their way into the possibilities, and limitations, of virtual events. But the reality is that merely cramming all elements of an in-person event into a virtual wrapper will likely fail. Often, this failure starts at the strategy level, as the rush to go virtual short-circuits essential questions about the goals of the event and how those goals are achieved virtually. Even if the strategy is clear, executing the logistical and technical elements of virtual events often requires skills and inter-team discipline that may not have been needed for an in-person event. Finally, while many execution elements of virtual events are the same as in-person (think promotion and registration), creating and capturing attendee engagement in a virtual setting often requires rethinking your programming and your technology.