August 24, 2021
Going to business events is so much fun, there is no doubt about that. Meeting interesting people in the sector, feeling people’s energy in-person, sharing experiences over an evening drink, sightseeing in a nice city at the end of the session, and building friendships. Business conferences are great platforms to develop your working methods by learning from others, sharing knowledge and expertise, and expanding your network. With the emergence of COVID-19, many events producers carried their work to virtual platforms as well, but do you get the same value on an online conference? Do the sessions get lesson-like, or is there still some space for real networking? Do people really participate in online events, or is the turnout low?
We asked these questions to some of our conference producers at GlobalBSG, who are in direct contact with the speakers and field professionals from the initial idea-creation phase of a conference to the very end to make a business conference worthwhile. One of the producers told us about the turnout level at the conferences, underlining “In a business event, speakers can strongly influence the quality of the event as a whole, and their presence is key to us. Now, there is a tendency in speakers to opt for virtual conferences rather than in-person events. Their point is, especially on a busy period of time, ‘If I don’t have to travel, I won’t’, and I think it makes sense in many ways,”.
“All of our speakers are senior-level people – CXOs, vice presidents, managers, directors and those are some of the busiest people we have met. It is hard for them to spare extra time for traveling, being in a different country or city, fully participate in the event and travel the way back home. When we offer the flexibility of joining one of our events virtually, from the comfort of their home, we actually get a much higher turnout from those sector leaders who are always hard to be reached. At the same time, now we are able to make our conferences even more international, as we can invite speakers from Canada, the USA, Middle East, Asia, and many other locations around the world. This brings more value and diversity to our business, as we get to meet professionals not only from the European continent but from all around the world. Achieving this gets much harder at an in-person-only event, in which cross-continental business partners would get into the difficulties of travel. Especially in these times after the COVID-19 pandemic, travel is much more complicated. Speakers and delegates do appreciate being able to network with sector colleagues while they also exchange knowledge and experiences,”.
Later on, when we ask another conference producer whether the quality of the content of the program is negatively affected by the virtual transition of conferences, she responds “I don’t think so. Be it an online conference or in-person, or hybrid, the speakers and companies attending the conference are still people. It is in our nature to connect and communicate, and so far they have been doing it in fun ways. Our speakers are carefully selected, and they know how to speak to their audience. I definitely think that we get the same or even higher value out of each event. Now our events can include more delegates and more prominent field professionals who had not had time for business meetings before the pandemic. We offer the option of participating in hybrid events for those who strictly go for in-person events only, where they also listen to speakers joining virtually. This is a new trend we have in our business, and so far it works excellently for all sides and all minds. Flexibility and digitalization are two key business elements we cannot ignore. As event producers, we need to offer flexibility to people whose lives are so much different than before since the outbreak of the pandemic, and digitalization for those who enjoy virtual meetings. As long as we stay centered in human beings in our business, we never fail to produce great events that are valuable in content and networking,”.
This interview gives us a valuable insight into the business conferences taking place for the last one and a half years and shows us that there are many advantages to participating in virtual conferences. We see that online conferences are indeed worth the hype, and our conference producers add some more points that you may have not considered about the pros of online conferences:
- Lower costs for delegates to join – Travel and accommodation expenses are simply gone!
- Note-taking made easy – Most virtual events are now recorded and delegates can easily get back to a point that they missed. You don’t need to worry about catching everything up at a time!
- Easier to ask questions to the speaker using breakout rooms and direct messages.
- Need to join a quick call with your team but you are at the virtual conference? No worries, you can swoop back in, or take a short break without feeling guilty!
New parent, cannot travel? Virtual conferences are still there for you to stay connected to your job while fulfilling your family responsibilities!
