Organising successful conferences and events is hard enough at the best of times, but now it’s a lot tougher.
Volcanic ash clouds (Iceland has 130 active volcanoes) as well as intermittent strikes by airline and airport staff are making it increasingly difficult to plan and coordinate international events. If you’ve got speakers, participants and delegates coming from Europe and beyond, the success of this hugely expensive exercise boils down to just pot-luck – with all your hard graft accounting for nothing.
You need a contingency plan. You need a webinar back-up plan!
Webinars are the low-cost, convenient way to hold conferences, meetings, seminars and product demonstrations – there are no travel expenses, hotel bills or any of the other costs and problems associated with getting any number of people to the same place at the same time. In these days of aggrieved airport workers and belligerent volcanoes, as well as tightening budgetary controls, webinars offer a great way to get your messages across while still closely interacting with customers, vendors, partners and prospects.
Webinars provide nearly all the functionality of a live conference – you just have to forgo the gala dinner and the close-up magician and some of the bigger benefits of face-to-face networking – although you do get everyone to the event.
You still have your panel of speakers, your chairperson or moderator, a choice of presentation methods (slides, video, interactive white board etc.) handouts, Q & As (audio or typed), polls/surveys and even virtual breakout rooms.
All attendees need is an internet linked computer (home or office) and a headphone set (preferably with a microphone attachment for those sessions with audio Q & A). You can hold a meeting for just a few to a few thousand.
Even the presenters can be at their own computers to do their presentations, they just need a webcam/microphone; they then share their desktop with the audience for displaying their visual material.
Full A/V recording functions for these events usually come as standard - which might be useful for updating non-attendees, as well as for wider marketing purposes.
If you would like to discuss the webinar option, get in contact. You’ll be surprised how cost-efficient webinars can be – normally just a fraction of the cost of a ‘live’ event, and with no worrying about Eyjafjallajökull, Fimmvörðuháls, Hekla or any of the others.