Over the last few months, Hybrid events have gained a lot of popularity in the industry. It has offered the best advantages and innovative practices to organisations that they can’t forget. But are they going to be the next big thing for your organisation? The answer to this question is yet to be discovered. To ensure that, you must weigh the pros with the cons before pivoting to Hybrid events.
What are hybrid events?
Hybrid events have got their place for being the ideal combination of virtual as well as in-person elements. This sort of event takes place with the guidance of a virtual meeting platform. Assorted individuals are usually present at the event location, and the rest are connected through a virtual platform. In layman’s words, a hybrid event is the optimal combination of real and simulated events. These events are streamed via hybrid event platforms. The feasibility of this technologically advanced invention is the primary reason for its popularity. They are not only goal-oriented, but they also have a significant influence. It is critical to choose the best hybrid & virtual event platform if you want to produce efficient hybrid events.
Let’s take a look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of hybrid events.
Pros of Organising a Hybrid Event
1- Great Flexibility
Attendees have more flexibility for hybrid events. They have the leverage of attending the event either in person or as a virtual delegate. They are not obligated to travel halfway around the world if they do not want to. And They can undoubtedly participate virtually. However, if they’re going to travel and personally visit other people, they are free to do so.
Some individuals do not have the time, resources, or assistance to attend an event as an in-person participant. However, since a virtual dimension is an integral part of a hybrid event, there is no need for them to miss out.
Hybrid events are much more flexible and adaptive for virtual speakers, who can attend meetings from all around the world and interact at your event.
2- Cost-Friendly
Hybrid events may help you with your significant expenses such as venue rent, catering, etc.
Hosting a hybrid event requires a smaller space than usual as most of the attendees will be attending your event from their home. And if you’re planning to invite speakers from different parts of the world to your event, guess what? You can deduct the overall cost of travelling and venue, benefiting both parties.
When you pick your preferred location, you can boost your profits by selling sponsorship packages customised for simulated attendees, in-person attendees, or a mix of the two, based on the supporters’ needs.
3- Generate Feedback and Data in just a click
In a traditional event, gathering feedback was always time-consuming, and the results were not so effective.
But after the emergence of hybrid events, generating a feedback survey became much easier than expected. Now you can get instant feedback post your event by sending an email to your participants. Not just that, you can curate essential details about your event by conducting a live poll or Q&A session during the event via a simple push notification. Isn’t that fascinating?
This valuable information can be accumulated in real-time thus allowing you to adapt as per the information in the future events.
4- Diverse networking opportunities
Whether participants connect in person or virtually, hybrid events allow people to join regardless of where they are in the world. We suggest setting up virtual chat rooms and scheduling brief breakout sessions to encourage remote delegates to communicate with each other between speakers. At the same time, in-person attendees may join in via pc / laptop or mobile devices.
5- Reusable material
When you host a hybrid event, you can choose to record the event. Recording the event will allow you to upload it on any platform you desire to revisit the event as many times as you want.
It would be best if you also considered conducting your events as video on demand (VOD), encouraging users to watch at a time convenient for them in their time zone on any device. Finally, you may also leverage the footage from your event for advertising purposes.
Cons of Organising a Hybrid Event
Quite as much as we enjoy hybrid activities, they too carry some flaws. To better comprehend whether they’re the best fit, you must understand both the positive and the negative aspects.
1- You must think out-of-the-box for engaging your virtual attendees
No doubt, attending an event from the comfort of our home sounds perfect and convenient. But it’s not that easy! While attending a meeting virtually, there can be particular challenges that you might face, such as poor internet connectivity, disturbance in the background like your kids are screaming, or the neighbor’s dog is barking. Such a situation can draw your attention elsewhere, which we certainly can’t afford.
Now to avoid that, use similar kind of tactics like the one you decided for in-person attendees. Make sure you have arranged means to achieve feedbacks from your attendees, regarding participation and opinion.
2- Managing both sponsors and attendees can be challenging
When you host or schedule a live show, you expect promoters to offer their services to visitors in pamphlets, brochures, handbooks, and so on.
With hybrid events, you must make sure that this information reaches your attendees via uploading it to your hosting platform or giving your sponsors the ability to share it. It can be time-consuming to ensure these resources are adequately formatted to share and speakers have them ready to go.
You must also ensure that the venue you choose can host your event, with ample room and seats available for your in-person attendees. Event must have enough capacity to accommodate all the attendees without any loss of content.
3- Cannot hold long events
attendees will be compelled to stare at their computer screens, whereas the speakers and participants of the event may come and leave at their leisure. While many employees spend so much time on their work machines each day, they aren’t generally overwhelmed with helpful information.
Most events do not last longer than two hours, and information should be given in 20–30-minute intervals so that participants can better process the details being delivered to them.
4- Speakers need to adjust to speaking to two separate audiences
Speakers are not only presenting in-person participants but also viewers at home. The speakers have a traditional habit of facing the audience on front of them rather than the camera that captures their event.
Although it is up to the speaker’s ability, you can assist in resolving the topic by drawing their attention to something and enabling them to address doubts for the virtual audience.
To have someone committed to deliver queries of the audience is recommended. This keeps the attendees engaged and provides them a feeling of inclusion.
Over to you
Hybrid, digital, and on-ground all have advantages and disadvantages, but only the viewer and business can determine which are deal-breakers or game-changers. However, engaging in an event platform that can respond to the event’s lifecycle can make your life a lot easier.
Your goal must be to create and rethink your ideas that could add more value to your sponsorship package.
