It is no secret that with the widespread adoption of event technology over the past several years, some norms and best practices have been persistent and new trends started to emerge. So, you might be asking yourself:
What is the best day and time to run a virtual event?
What is the average attendance rate?
How can you offer experiences that engage?
What are other event planners doing and where are they finding success?
The 2022 Benchmark Report for Webinars and Virtual Events has the answers! Notified, a leading provider of event technology, recently analyzed the data from a subset of customers’ webinars and virtual events conducted between June 2021 and June 2022. The report provides data-driven insights, top trends, best practices, and action items to help you craft a winning event strategy in 2023.
Here are our favorite key takeaways from the report related to virtual events:
Build Anticipation for Your Audience Leading up to the Live Event
Over 68% of all viewers register for your event over a week in advance and additionally, the average promotion time of an event has increased to 56 days, compared to 50 days in 2019.
So, what does this mean? Timing plays an important part in your communication strategy. There is so much time to engage with your attendees leading up to the live event. Offer your registrants opportunities for engagement ahead of the live event: conduct surveys and polls, strategically revealing the agenda, publishing teasers and talks, and promote your event on social media.
Pre-event engagement leads to higher attendance rate.
Increased Live Attendance
According to our benchmark data, 50% of registrants attend the live virtual event (compared to 45% in 2019). Viewers are embracing the nature of LIVE events in greater numbers and are getting more comfortable with attending virtually.
Our benchmark data has also shown us that when people attend the live event, the levels of engagement are higher:
20 Speakers on average per event (Up from 6 per event in 2019)
228 Questions asked on average
Over 1 million unique booth visits
112 million total minutes spent playing in-event games
The live engagement allows for speakers to connect with the attendees on a more personal level and allows them to get to know the participants and shape content that the viewers want to see and react to in real time.
Event Content & Programming
When looking at the data, virtual events typically include 1-2 live days, followed by the on-demand period. Events that are scheduled for multiple days tend to start earlier in the week, with Tuesday being the most popular.
Your attendee’s time is valuable – they won’t attend your event if they can’t make it fit into their busy schedule. While every audience is different, understanding the people that will be attending will allow you to design your content and programming based on their specific needs and interest.
When we design an event based on our attendees’ needs, it leads to higher engagement and a better experience with your audience. Strong events have a singular goal and provide unique content suited to the needs of your audience.
Engage Your Audience Long After the Live Event
So much has changed in the events industry over the last few years, a big one being the extended shelf life of your content. Your virtual event lives on long after the live session concludes and can continue to be a powerful asset to continue to refer to.
6% of live attendees return for on demand content, give registrants and attendees a reason to come back by:
Keeping the content fresh
Hosting small-group panel discussions
Planning a series of thought leadership sessions
Scheduling networking activities
If you are an event planner and you are not hungry for data, this is the time to be!
Data should be used at every step of your event planning process. Leveraging data is critical in helping you design and deliver experiences that attendees crave.
The data collected in Notified’s 2022 Benchmark Report: The Latest and Greatest in Webinars and Virtual Events can be used to help you build a virtual event that stands out and leaves a lasting impression with your audience.
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