Virtual events don’t have to be difficult when planning for one, especially when the best event planning books are available to guide you. Many event organizers refer to such books to define the roadmap for their event and measure its success.
No matter how much you prepare for the event, there’s always something missing in event planning. Thankfully, with the proper guidance, you can easily plan a spectacular event. To help you do that, here are six mistakes that you need to avoid while planning a virtual event.
- Hosting Irrelevant Content
The content of the events determines whether your audience will find it helpful or not. Hosting inappropriate content in the events like webinars and conferences can confuse the audience, and they may lose interest.
Maintaining the relevance of the content should be your highest priority. The audience needs to find the content helpful, and it should help them solve their problems or at least guide them toward the right solution. For example, an SEO conference should discuss different SEO techniques, industry trends, and SEO’s future. That way, it will be relevant to the audience of digital marketers and SEO professionals.
- Not Managing the Attendees Expectations
The attendees of your event have certain expectations when it comes to the roadmap of the event. The attendees should be comfortable with the duration and flow of the session. They may or may not get a say in planning the event, but a little brainstorming will help you have a somewhat clear idea about what they want.
The events may be attended by freshers who have started their careers recently and top executives with massive corporate experience. In such a case, it’s essential to manage the attendees expectations and plan the event roadmap accordingly.
- Setting Wrong Objectives
Setting the right objectives will help you determine the success of the event. The correct objectives will ensure whether the outcome of your event is in line with your goals. Setting wrong objectives can disrupt the whole flow of the event while not providing any quantifiable insights to determine whether the event was a success. The best event planning books have strategies to define practical goals for your event. They also have the relevant metrics to quantify the success rate of those objectives.
- Not Prioritizing User Engagement
User engagement plays a vital role in the interactivity of your event. The attendees need to engage with the content of the events and interact with the speaker. As they are not physically present at the venue of the event, it can be challenging to manage all the interactions from the attendees. It can create confusion and conflicts among the attendees.
The virtual event hosting platforms have the necessary tools and features like polls, Q&As, and AMAs to improve the audience’s engagement. You can also gamify the sessions to add fun and interaction to your event. Not prioritizing the user engagement will make the event unidirectional, and the attendees will soon lose interest in the content.
- Taking Too Much Time
Time is always of essence while conducting virtual events. If it is an external hybrid event, time management should be paramount. As the whole event would be broadcast across the different locations, it’s essential to follow the schedules and start and end the event on time. Consider the event as a production of a TV episode; it has to be managed in a specific time frame and should have higher production quality as numerous attendees will view it from local and international locations.
- Not Having a Virtual Host
A virtual host directs the flow of the event and maintains the consistency of the content. The virtual host acts as a conduit between the attendees, speakers, and the production team. Without them, it would be challenging to manage all the stakeholders of the event.
The event’s success lies in smooth transitions between the sessions and highly interactive sessions on time. Avoiding the above mistakes can help event organizers to stay clear of problems and successfully host a virtual event.