Before 2020, most events required your physical presence. Whether it was a work conference, convention or continuing education event, it required you to be there in-person. Things have been reimagined for the most part due to COVID-19. Events now require your virtual presence. Virtual events have been on the rise since early 2020 and all sorts of industries are creating amazing content. In 2019, Google Trends reported the rise in Virtual Events between December 2019 and November 2020.
What Are Virtual Events?
Virtual events are live stream virtual events that are remote productions using a computer or mobile device and in many cases, a centralized control room at a remote production studio. If you have attended a meeting, conference, concert, workout or class via a video conferencing tool such as Google Meets, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, or Skype, then you have attended a live virtual event. Live virtual events can also be facilitated on social media platforms such as YouTube, Instagram and Facebook.
Virtual Event and Remote Production Considerations
The fact that an event is online does not mean there is less effort required to stage the event. In fact there is more that is required in planning and executing an event online. An online event consists of more moving parts.
Two very important things that you have to bear in mind are video quality and sound quality. Poor video quality and poor sound quality for an event will impact the image of the organization. More emphasis is needed to design the experience because it is more difficult to keep an audience interested and logged in to the event. The experience has to be curated in such a way that attendees want to stay logged in. It is on you, the organizer to keep the audience interested.
Some very important questions to ask when planning your virtual event:
- What kind of experiencing are you aiming to deliver?
- Will your event be live, on-demand or both? (On-demand events are pre-recorded)
- What platform do you want to employ? Where do you want the content to be seen?
- Is it a paid event or is the admission free?
- Is the event a private event? Do you need to create a registration form?
- What is the best time to host the event? (The purpose of your event will inform this)
- Will you need to work with an advertiser?
- Do you need to circulate the event after it has aired? Where will people access it?
- Do you plan on tracking data, if so, what are your Key Performance Indices?
Your event still needs to be promoted. If you are having a private event, you still need to promote it to the people you wish to target. Promotion involves informing people about your event in whatever way you choose to. We no longer operate in the era of the Production Concept of marketing which translates to “If you produce it, they will buy it”. We operate in an era where the Marketing Concept is alive and well. The Marketing Concept translates to “If you promote it, they will buy it.”
Virtual Events and Remote Production Opportunities
You can create an email list by requiring registration for events: As a business, an email list is a very valuable asset. It allows you to have constant interaction with your customers. You can use this to communicate new offerings to customers. It is also a very cost effective way of marketing your goods and services.
You can reach a wider audience online: Virtual events allow you to reach a wider audience that you would not have been able to meet with a physical event alone. Hybrid events are starting to become popular. As the world learns to coexist with COVID-19, hybrid events will become the norm. Hybrid events are events that allow for a physical audience but are also live streamed virtual events online to facilitate an online audience. Hybrid events will become the new norm as a result of the fact that businesses have come to a realization. A realization that they have an untapped market that is available to them using online means such as virtual events.
It would be difficult for a business to resume business only in the physical space. Hybrid events increase revenues. Through registration companies get access to valuable information that can significantly cut marketing costs.
Hire a Remote Production Studio for Live Stream Virtual Events
The answer to this is simply put in two words – quality and reliability. Those words can be the difference between increased revenues, engagement and audience and loss in revenue, and poor engagement with limited audiences. It is simple but also the single most important factor to your success in business. It has become even more important with the way businesses have had to reimagine how their audiences can access their businesses as well as their offerings.
Having high-quality video gives you the opportunity to use the video multiple times for marketing purposes. You can build an audience through education. So regardless of the service you offer or goods you sell, you can use educational and informative videos to create an audience. You can tap into this audience to close sales and increase revenue. Sales will directly result in more profit while marketing and advertising is used to create awareness for the most part. With that being said, informative videos are one way of marketing your business and offerings. So, YES, you absolutely need to produce these videos and have them in circulation. Your marketing strategies work when they are not readily perceived as marketing but rather as a means of helping in some way, shape or form.
The importance of having quality videos can not be thoroughly put into words, especially given the climate the world is now in with COVID-19. You no longer have the luxury of making an impression face-to-face. This now has to be done online. The higher the quality of your content, the more engagement you can garner. Engagement that can translate to revenue.
Higher quality material equals higher perceived value of offerings.
