Whether you’re hosting an in-person event, going completely virtual, or using a hybrid approach, there are several ways to help maximize the audience’s experience – and keep your attendees engaged. Read on for some trusted tips to do this … 

Plan with your audience in mind 

When planning a conference, you should always keep your audience at the forefront because understanding your audience from the get-go will help you in the long run.  

For example, it’s essential to consider attendees’ attention spans while you’re still designing the event and scheduling the itinerary. If you host an online or hybrid event, it’s worth noting that many people have shorter attention spans in those capacities. How can you break up the event content into shorter segments? Or how can you incorporate more interactive portions into your event? 

To plan with your audience, you must also thoroughly understand your target demographics and which people will be attending your event.  Are they working professionals? Stay-at-home parents? Donors? Consider their drive, focus, personalities, behavior, and other vital factors. Each element is critical in shaping how you will best engage conference attendees. 

Keep the schedule interactive 

Do people want to listen to presentations, or do they prefer to participate? Sometimes, a lecture-style conference might serve a purpose, but most prefer some form of interaction. 

The interaction could occur in several ways, whether it’s an in-person or virtual event. Ask your audience questions. If the event is virtual, ask where they are tuning in from. Can you get them to answer questions, fill out a form, or take a poll? You could also consider incorporating wellness checks, even if your event has nothing to do with wellness. Something nice and specific like everybody could use a stretching break or something.  

For example, people at both in-person and virtual events often sit for an extended period and look at screens, which strains the eyes. Could you host an interactive break where you give them a few minutes to look away? Maybe there is a quick screen-free option that facilitates the connection between the attendees? 

If your event introduces something new, give your audience hands-on experience with it. Whether it’s an app, video, virtual reality, or a demo, how can you let them experience it first-hand? Can you simulate it, even if it would traditionally occur online or in an app? 

Ensure you find a proactive way to host a Q&A session, too. Audiences are often expected to keep their questions to themselves until the end of the session.  Instead of asking your audience to do that, risking forgotten questions or even confusion, you could hold multiple Q&As throughout the event. Or, even better, use technology to your advantage. If you have access to an app, you can often set up a feature that allows your audience to submit questions, which you can then prioritize as you see fit. 

Consider hybrid events to increase engagement  

A hybrid event can offer the best of both in-person and virtual events because people can choose which part of the conference appeals to them or fits their schedule. 

They can choose if watching from home is more conducive to their lifestyle or budget. If the individual prefers to be in-person for face-to-face networking, there’s also an option. Some hybrid models work by having people do both: If you host a live session, do follow-up Q&As or optional secondary sessions online. 

A hybrid event can make it easier to ensure you engage everyone in a way that suits their personality type better way that better suits their personality type. too. For example, many dislike speaking to unfamiliar people in a new environment, making an in-person event more nerve-wracking. It might be easier for individuals to ask questions or talk to other attendees online. 

Keep engagement up after your event 

Since hybrid events involve live streaming your content, you can rest assured that your audience is fully engaged in the room and at home. The live stream will let you record your entire event, which you can send to everyone who attended. 

People can rewatch to go over speakers’ presentations, remember your contact information, anything else you could do during a rewatch – take notes? Clarify insights? and more. Your engagement can continue long after your event is over. 

Use mobile apps for events and conferences to communicate with attendees 

One surefire way to encourage engagement and communication is by using an event app or mobile platform. Whether you’re hosting an in-person, virtual, or hybrid event, an app is what you need to enhance communication. 

An event app can remind your audience of your conference’s logistics, like time and location, and provide access to live streams and virtual trade shows. In the mobile app, you could send attendees pre-recorded videos of your sessions and entertainment. Many apps offer features like: 

• Private messaging 
• Live chat 
• Emails and notifications 
• 1:1 meetings 
• Breakout rooms 
• Group meetings 
• Webinars  

Finding a reliable event app can help ensure you keep your audience engaged before, during, and after the session. 

ConsiderPathable as your event app for conferences

Enhance communication and engagement with the Pathable event app. Our virtual, in-person, and hybrid event platform makes speaking with your attendees easy. We offer multiscreen capabilities, live and on-demand videos and real-time chat features. 

Please schedule a demo of Pathable today to find out how our app can increase event engagement! 

Hybrid events can be challenging to manage, especially when it comes to monetizing them. Virtual and hybrid event platforms make it possible to monetize your next event and make doing so easy for all involved.

So much of monetizing a hybrid event really comes down to what our team at Pathable considers hybrid event best practices. When your team implements a strategic monetization plan for your next hybrid event, and follows up with part paints in meaningful ways, you should see a significant increase in your overall return on investments (ROI).  

What follows is a quick breakdown of what event managers can do before, during, and after hosting a hybrid event to help monetize their efforts and realize hybrid event success. 

Turn a profit before, during, and after your hybrid event 

Perhaps the trickiest part of hosting a successful hybrid event comes from the challenge of catering to two distinct audiences: in-person and virtual. Both audiences require unique and specific platforms and must be carefully managed during every step of the participant’s journey.   

Before your event…  

As you plant, consider all the typical logistics of hosting in-person: the right venue, a well-designed and accessible floor plan, seamless registration, convenient ID retrieval (hint: on-demand badge printing is a gamechanger), plus ample refreshments and appropriate signage and support for sponsors. Those are just the basics required for successful in-person events.   

For the attendees who prefer or need virtual, your team must ensure that these participants are empowered to use your online platform to access important pre-event information. From registration to session sign-ups, virtual attendees must have the same level of control over their event experience as those attending on the ground.  

Both audiences benefit from pre-recorded content and promotions that excite your event. Monetize this content in the form of downloads for purchase.   

Pro-tip:  

Collaborate with your event’s sponsors to create content that benefits all parties. By creating helpful, entertaining, and compelling content that attendees are willing to pay for, the event host, supporting sponsor, and attendees all benefit.  

Before you even think about monetizing your content, check out our tips on How to Seek Sponsorships to Monetize Your Next Hybrid Event (And How to Avoid Sourcing Sponsors that Miss the Mark).  

Strategic sponsorships present real potential to monetize your event significantly ahead of time. 

You can make this task easier on yourself by working with what you know — event management, your audience, and your sponsors. In other words, train your team to create the counterpart to whatever in-person features you offer at your event. 

Everyone likes swag bags 

It’s easy enough to present in-person participants with swag bags full of sponsored goodies, but did you know you can do the same for your virtual attendees?   

In many ways, virtual event gift bags have an advantage over those handed out during in-person opportunities. Consumers are increasingly concerned about the environment and how to reduce their carbon footprint; virtual gift bags are certainly more environmentally-friendly when presented as digital-only via gift cards and vouchers.   

Any gifts you plan to present to your in-person attendees should also be shipped to remote participants. By doing this, you model inclusion for everyone at your event, which speaks volumes about how much you value both audiences.   

Circling back to our sponsors, ensure you leave enough time before the event to discuss what branded items they would like to contribute for both formats.   

If you partner with the right sponsors early, you’ll significantly impact your attendees immediately, putting you in a more advantageous position to nurture those relationships throughout and after the event. 

During your event…  

When monetizing a hybrid event, you must pay close attention to the virtual component. Avoid the temptation to load up your event with pre-recorded content (no matter how creative or compelling it might be). Doing so means you miss the opportunity to create interactions between participants, speakers, and sponsors. And interaction during a virtual event is where you will make your money.   

What are some engaging ways to inspire interaction during a virtual event?  

There is no shortage of fun ways to inspire engagement among virtual event attendees. In addition to polling, contests, games, and giveaways, you can also consider some unique (but proven) ideas that will delight your participants.   

Event managers must take this step seriously to avoid leaving money on the table. Current research shows that 49% of marketers attribute audience engagement to virtual event success as the number one factor.  

And some of the most popular — and fun! — ways to include and interact with your virtual audience require thinking ahead to allow critical processes like shipping.   

Tasting sessions are currently trending in the virtual event space. Depending on your sponsors, you might host chocolate, cheese, beer, or wine tasting, which means you need to allow ample lead time to ship the components so that your attendee is ready to participate when the time comes.  

You might also consider hiring a sommelier to run a virtual wine tasting. This is a great way to pair an industry pro with an enthusiastic audience while simultaneously representing the importance of communication and education. It’s proof that your event truly supports professional goals!   

Using a tool like Pathable’s virtual and hybrid event platform, you can track attendee engagement in both formats throughout the event.   

After the event 

The post-event realm is where too many event managers miss the mark. Without driving your attendees crazy, you need to remain top-of-mind after the event is over to help turn a more significant profit from your hybrid event. An excellent way to do this is to introduce new content created during the event and make it available as a paid download after the event.   

Rely on tools like Pathable’s metrics and analytics to help determine what kinds of content your audience engages with and values from your schedule. From there, create additional content that can be accessed for a small fee long after the event has officially wrapped.   

Pro-tip:

 It helps to think of your event as never over but an ongoing resource. That way, your audience can continue to pull information while you continue to pull a profit.   

To Sum, it up — Show me the money strategies 

Who doesn’t love a checklist? (Especially a short one.)  

These key takeaways you should be prioritized if you’re serious about monetizing your next hybrid event.  

• Secure the right sponsorships based on your audience’s wants and whom they want to interact with.  

• Inspire that interaction for all attendees by creating engaging opportunities that increase involvement and communication.  

• Create content your audience will find valuable enough to pay for before, during, and after the event. 

• Become a reliable resource for your attendees to return to when they need information from thought leaders and colleagues about their industry.  

Discover our easy-to-use engagement platform and mobile app 

Again, hybrid events aren’t easy to host. There are many moving parts and components to keep up with when planning an event.   

By teaming up with Pathable, you’ll have a pro-level partner passionate about supporting hybrid event managers eager to deliver remarkable and memorable experiences for their attendees. 

All event planners know the high-stakes stress associated with event management details. It can be fun, but event management is demanding — even unforgiving at times — from planning and hosting to making strategic follow-ups with sponsors and attendees.  

No wonder an unexpected historic challenge like the COVID-19 pandemic complicated and challenged event planning even further. This resulted in 96% of event professionals dealing with cancellations and record-high loss of business.  

Fortunately, this forced professionals in every sector to reimagine how they could do business. As author Roy T. Bennett advised, “When things do not go your way, remember that every challenge — every adversity — contains within it the seeds of opportunity and growth.”   

In this case, those seeds planted the growth of hybrid events, which we believe represent the best that in-person and virtual have to offer.   

While hybrid events present unique challenges, an increasing number of event planners rely on them to get back to business and make things happen as we move forward. In fact, 34% of event professionals plan to invest in hybrid, with 21% of marketers pursuing a hybrid event platform. 

In order to appreciate what hybrid has to offer your next event, let’s review the benefits of both in-person and virtual. We’ll also take a hard look at the challenges posed by hybrid so that we can empower any event professionals planning to host hybrid for the first time.   

In appreciation of in-person events 

Despite the collective anxiety leveled upon us by the COVID-19 pandemic, people are fans of in-person events. In fact, 89% prefer in-person, citing these events as irreplaceable.   

According to research by The National Press Club, “The human factor and relationship building experience is the #1 reason people attend events.” Open communication and in-person engagement are still very important.  

Enter the virtual world.   

Virtual-Specific Virtues 

Like it or not, the pandemic forced most interactions online in the name of safety. Since we couldn’t meet in person, weekly social events occurred through Zoom, and we all did our best to achieve some semblance of everyday interaction. The virtual environment allowed more access to certain groups who otherwise would have not attended due to coast or location. 

Concerning event management, virtual has more virtues than vices. While many of us might be feeling Zoom fatigue, virtual events are kinder to budgets and take far less time to plan and execute.   

However, being kind to budgets doesn’t always translate as being fun for the audience. When asked to rate virtual events, attendees are twice as likely to designate them “not fun at all,” compared to attending in person. That’s a challenge that event professionals must consider to inspire attendee engagement and deliver quality content that makes an impression.   

Overcoming the no-fun factor is a worthy goal when you consider virtual events’ reach compared to in-person opportunities.   

Event planners can’t overlook that virtual event attendance is often easier for a larger number of potential attendees to manage than in-person attendance. Rather than shell out money to travel to an in-person event, a virtual attendee must only log on from the comfort of their living room, kitchen, office, or car. They can also be wherever you need them to be, relative to your event.   

Hybrid: The Middle Ground that Matters Right Now 

Although some people would argue that we have more or less returned to normal, there are still those among us who are hesitant to gather in person and prefer the virtual format, whether for meetings, classes, or events. When planning an event, you’ll likely want to go hybrid to reach a wider audience and do so in a way that supports everyone’s need to feel safe and in control.   

Simply put, hybrid offers the best of both worlds by allowing those who register to attend in person or virtually. They have the choice, which means your job is to ensure that both options are equally compelling and accessible. In other words, you can’t prioritize one format over the other.  

Trust us when we say your attendees will notice and the response could undercut your overall event management efforts.   

Enlisting the help of a virtual and hybrid event platform will help you manage all aspects of planning and promoting your event in ways that will resonate with both specific audiences. 

Heads Up: Hybrid Presents Unique Challenges 

While hybrid seems like the obvious answer, it comes with its own unique challenges.   

Perhaps the biggest challenge is introducing both virtual and in-person audiences to each other and inspiring meaningful interactions between them. Approximately 71% of event managers report that connecting in-person and virtual audiences represents their toughest hurdle.   

It is not surprising then that a reported 39% of hybrid event attendees who engaged virtually felt excluded from the action… and the interaction.   

Remember what Roy Bennett said about challenges and seeds of opportunity?   

Overcoming Hurdles to Hybrid Event Success 

A hybrid event brings together the best of in-person events when done well which makes a personal connection through face-to-face interaction and networking more accessible. For example, you can offer virtual chat and appointment schedulers to your online platform.   

Similarly, virtual is budget-friendly and time-saving for those unable or unwilling to travel and/or return to in-person opportunities. With a virtual event, you can connect with remote attendees in an increasingly familiar format.   

As for those above and authentic challenges inherent in hybrid events, the opportunity here is to master two critical components. Communication and content can help overcome these disparities in a hybrid event… but these need to be supported by cutting-edge technology that makes everyone feel like they are in the same room, regardless of their location.   

The connection between these two groups is infinitely more accessible with a virtual and hybrid event platform. These events facilitate communication between in-person and virtual attendees via intuitive software.   

By investing the time to educate yourself on best practices and strategies to help you plan your next hybrid event, you will strike the right balance between in-person and virtual. Thus you’ll deliver the best of both worlds to your attendees.  

Discover Pathable’s Virtual Platform  

When you’re ready to plan, promote, and power your hybrid event, book a demo and access our outstanding customer service team to get you up and running!