Faced with an increase in the number of digital events due to the pandemic, new digital interaction solutions are emerging. But by focusing on the success of digital events, the human and relational aspects of the event can be neglected. Yet, it is essential - even more so during this difficult time - to place the participant, the human, back at the heart of the event, regardless of the type of event.
The importance of humanizing digital events
Maintaining the link between partners, customers and employees is more essential than ever. Indeed, by being physically away from one another, we tend to experience loneliness, struggle with commitment, feel less valued and less productive. Furthermore, when companies choose to do online events, they often limit themselves to a simple online meeting without any magic.
The attendee, at the heart of the virtual event
Once you have mastered the organization of your event (we explain all the best practices to organize a good virtual event), you can think about the process of humanizing your event.
Thus, several aspects can keep guests engaged, entertained, interested throughout a digital event:
1. Taking care of each step of the user experience
2. Create little touches that will differentiate your event
3. Customize every aspect of your event for an optimal experience
Take care of each step of the user's journey
We recommend that you check that the whole process is smooth, user friendly, that the time of the event is appropriate, that everyone has access to the same information, and that the registration process is flawless.
Remember to test your platform with a few browsers and at least once on your phone, the event website, and the invitation email, to make sure that everything meets your expectations.
Ask a colleague to register and attend your event (in the demo) in real-time and note all his remarks including elements of incomprehension. This will allow you to reduce the bounce rate, i.e. the number of visitors who arrive on your page but leave immediately because of a bad experience. Put yourself in the shoes of a webmaster or a digital agency and design your end-to-end user experience as such.
Another important point: make sure that the webcams are of good quality and that the internet stream is fast: this way, participants and speakers can broadcast in HD and make the experience more pleasant.
Create little touches that will differentiate your event
The goal is to make every guest feel truly taken care of by customizing every aspect of your event Your guests need to have an exceptionally friendly and memorable time that will make them want to attend your future digital events. You need to enrich their experience however you can when doing a virtual event, as they may be tempted to disengage easier.
It is, therefore, necessary to think as much as possible about "non-digital" elements. There are plenty of elements in this area:
- Gift boxes to send
- Meals sent home
- QR codes to be scanned to have access to other content
- Personalized content
The more punctual, sincere, and authentic it is, the more certain you are to gain interest and to please attendees!
This search for authenticity must also be present in your presentation: the virtual format allows you to put less distance between you and your audience. You compensate for the physical distance by creating a more intimate approach: you see the apartment of the people you are talking to, you see the guitar in the background, and have a brief window to better understand their daily life and their personality.
A picture is worth a thousand words:
Customize every aspect of your event for an optimal experience.
Every detail of your digital event needs to be customized, starting with the platform you use. You can ask your digital event expert to customize the look and feel, integrate conversation modules, surveys, documents, quizzes, and even event replays based on the specific interest of your guest.
To take it one step further, you should also segment your event into sub-theme-specific mini-hubs so attendees can directly choose the virtual rooms that interest them. Add to this idea by creating 1-to-1 meetings so that your attendees can network and create connections.
This way your participants can interact in the workshops that interest them and build their own agendas, which makes the experience more pleasant than "having to" attend hours of presentations in front of a screen.
Your attendees need to spend less time receiving top-down information and more time in action, much like the Clubhouse social network.
Another way to personalize the experience is to remember to use variable tags in your invitation emails. This allows you to customize them based on your attendees' information (example: Hello {first name}, we invite you to {event} this {date}).
Conclusion
Bringing the human back into digital events can be difficult.
It clearly requires expertise in both events and user experience. Feel free to browse our blog to find tips on how to boost your events in physical, virtual, or hybrid.
We also hope that thanks to our tips you will now know what elements to keep in mind to humanize and really succeed in your digital events.
Need more best practices? You can download our 17-page EBook on virtual events.
