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The advantages of hybrid events over virtual events make them highly popular among companies. You must have already heard about hybrid events. In this article, we will dive deeper into the meaning, benefits and best practices of hybrid event management. This blog will act as a hybrid events guide for you.
Understanding Hybrid Events
Hybrid events bring the best of both worlds together by combining both virtual and physical elements into the event. It combines the superior engagement of physical events with the accessibility and reach of virtual events to provide a more immersive experience. it consists of both physical as well as virtual audiences. Therefore, the strategies need to include both online and offline events. Events like conferences, AGM, exhibitions, expos, trade shows, and product launches can be hosted using the hybrid model.
Benefits of Hybrid Events
Below are the most prominent benefits of hosting hybrid events –
Increased Audience Reach
Hybrid events include the virtual element that allows the attendees to widen their reach and attract people from remote locations. It helps you promote your products to a new set of customers, further leading to a global brand impact.
Better Engagement
Hybrid events combine the engagement of a physical event and bridge the gap between a physical and a virtual event. It promotes interaction between in-person and physical events. Hybrid events can keep both the in-person and virtual attendees engaged.
Reduces Environmental Costs
The presence of virtual elements reduces the requirement to travel across far distances. This further leads to a reduction in the carbon footprint thereby, resulting in reduced environmental costs. Hosting hybrid events can result in a cleaner environment. Furthermore, the reduced need for paper and plastics leads to a reduction in environmental waste.
Reduces Costs
The hybrid model has a virtual component in itself. Virtual component reduces the need for a larger venue, catering arrangements, travelling and lodging requirements. Therefore, it leads to significant savings in cost for attendees as well as organizers. The attendees can join the event from anywhere without having to incur a huge amount on travelling to the event venue.
Helps In Data Collection
While it is not possible to track the details about attendee engagement during a physical event, a virtual event allows you to gather deeper insights into the event. This data can act as a great source of information to facilitate improvements in the future.
Better Accessibility and Flexibility
When it comes to flexibility and accessibility, hybrid events fare much better than physical events. Hybrid events provide the attendees with the choice to the attendees. They can either attend the event physically or virtually through their mobiles and laptops. Moreover, the virtual event platforms that help you host a hybrid event also allow the integration of third-party apps. This further improves the accessibility of the hybrid events.
Better Sponsorship Opportunities
It is easier to attract more sponsors for hybrid events when compared to physical or virtual events. Hybrid events have a greater potential to create a brand impact and increase brand visibility. This makes hybrid events a better way to attract sponsors for your event.
Hybrid Events – Best Practices
Choose the Right Hybrid Event Solution
Choosing the correct and most appropriate hybrid events solution is the most important step in your planning process. Make sure that the online platform you select has all the necessary features for making your hybrid event successful.
Cater to Both Online and Offline Audiences Hybrid Event
While hosting a hybrid event, you might end up paying more attention to the in-person attendees. This could make your virtual attendees feel neglected. Therefore, you must create content in a manner that caters to the needs of both online and offline audiences. In addition to this, train your speakers to address both virtual and in-person audiences. This will help create an inclusive environment and the virtual attendees will not feel neglected, thereby resulting in an immersive and engaging experience.
Plan Content According to Both Types of Audiences
Make sure you plan and create your content before the event. The content should be information-rich and provide value to the attendee. Furthermore, create content keeping in mind the online as well as the offline audience.
Conduct a Trial Run
Conduct rehearsal sessions to ensure that all the technical equipment is working well. It will help make sure that the event runs without any hassles. Moreover, you must also check all the content including videos, presentations, images to avoid any embarrassment. Conducting a technical check will help ensure a smooth event and avoid any last-minute technical trouble.
Conduct Technical Check Hybrid Event
Every event is prone to technical errors, whether a physical event or a virtual event. Technical errors can take hours to fix leading to embarrassment. Moreover, it might result in frustration among the attendees. Conducting a technical check before the event can help avoid this situation.
Provide 24×7 Support
Another best practice while managing a hybrid event is to have a support team ready at all times. Live event support is a crucial feature that can help you avoid any difficulties and ensure a smooth attendee onboarding process. Having live event support will make it easier for you to manage the attendees and troubleshoot their problems.
Focus on Pre-event Promotion
You must indulge in pre-event promotion as it helps attract more people to the event. Social media is the most effective method of the pre-event promotion of your hybrid event. Another great idea is to create a creative and unique event landing page. Moreover, you must be consistent in posting content on these pages. This pre-event promotion can further improve your event attendance.
Take Feedback
Taking feedback is an amazing method to gather data about the experiences of the attendees and identify the areas that can be improved. While constructive feedback helps you identify the strategies that fared well with the attendees, negative feedback helps you determine what went wrong and how can it be improved.
Final Words
Hybrid event management is the future of the events industry. Hope this article helped you get to know more about hybrid event management.
