With the change in times, virtual events are getting increasingly popular. Today, virtual event technology has become a necessary part of any business around the world. Organizations that never thought of adding a digital component to their physical events are now transitioning their most crucial events into the virtual world to keep the business running. The global pandemic has left people around the world with no other option rather than to leverage digital mediums of hosting events.
At first, exhibitors are quite nervous about transforming their live physical exhibitions into a virtual format. The technology involved and the newness of the event format made them skeptical at first. However, the benefits offered by virtual exhibitions made them leverage the same to boost sales and generate ample business revenues.
The benefits of virtual exhibitions and expos significantly outweigh the advantages offered by on-ground exhibitions. Today, Industry exhibitors around the globe are willing to be part of virtual exhibitions. It allows them to showcase their products and reach a wide segment of global audiences. Thus, resulting in enhancing the reach of brand messages and boosting brand awareness. To ensure a successful virtual exhibition, selecting the right virtual exhibition platform with the extensive set of most amazing features becomes necessary. Additionally, create an effective strategy, and promote the virtual exhibition long before the actual date to ensure a successful virtual exhibition.
If you are new to the virtual world and planning to host a virtual exhibition for the first time, you have landed at the right place. In this blog, we will uncover a few effective tips to host a successful virtual exhibition and achieve optimal results. Time to get started!
What is a Virtual Exhibition, and how does it work?
A virtual exhibition is an online event hosted on a comprehensive virtual exhibition platform that offers the most interactive and engaging features with the help of internet connectivity. It gives exhibitors the opportunity to show off their unique new product offers to a global audience seamlessly. The virtual exhibition facilitates attendees to communicate in real-time just like physical exhibitions. Attendees can connect and network with speakers, exhibitors, booth representatives, and other attendees by using various networking features offered by the platform such as live audio, video, and text chats, networking lounges, business cards exchange, and more. Additionally, exhibitors can even display their products on a screen just like physical exhibitions that can be accessed by attendees.
With virtual exhibitions, exhibitors get an opportunity to connect, network, and engage visitors from all around the world. Exhibitors can personalise virtual booths as per the company’s branding to engage attendees effortlessly. We have listed some of the effective tips to host successful virtual exhibitions below, have a look:
Tips to host a successful virtual exhibition
We have enlisted a few steps below to ensure a successful virtual exhibition.
1. Identify your event goals
Before anything else, determining the objective and goals for organising a virtual exhibition is a must. One must be clear whether they are planning to organise a virtual exhibition to boost business revenues by upscaling the sales? Or want to extend brand reach by tapping global attendees? The purpose of organising virtual exhibitions should be clear in mind to create an effective strategy.
2. Know your target attendees
Next comes identifying your potential target audience. If you know your audience, you will get help in creating an effective strategy that appeals to them. Satisfying your potential audience is the prime objective of exhibitors and planners to achieve maximum out of the event. Determine your audience before creating a strategy for your virtual exhibitions. Take the likes, dislikes, and preferences of your potential attendees into consideration while curating a strategy for virtual exhibitions to ensure a successful event.
3. Brainstorm for an effective strategy
Create an effective virtual event strategy as per your target attendee’s preferences to achieve optimal results. Decide on a few important questions beforehand to ensure a successful event.
- How will attendees register for your virtual exhibition?
- What networking options do you wish to offer to your attendees?
- What networking options do you wish to introduce in your virtual exhibition?
- What options will be available at virtual booths?
- Can attendees access the product brochures at the event or not? And so on.
Think about the most relevant things you would like to include in your virtual exhibition. Once you are sorted from it, create an effective plan.
4. Select the right virtual exhibition platform
Now, it’s time to pick the right virtual exhibition platform to host your virtual exhibition. Leverage the platform that offers endless possibilities for networking and engagement. A platform that offers a wide array of networking, engagement, and data analytics features is the right pick to host a successful virtual exhibition. Go with a platform that enables you to customise the look and feel of your virtual exhibition as per the company’s branding. It helps in delivering breathtaking event experiences while keeping attendees immersed in the event.
5. Promote and market your virtual exhibition
Utilise social media channels to promote your upcoming virtual exhibition to ensure maximum attendance at the event. Promoting and marketing your virtual exhibitions are a must to make sure your event reaches the right set of audience. If your potential attendees are likely to be part of the exhibition, it is most likely to be a hit. However, if your attendees are not aware of your upcoming virtual exhibition, it will not deliver optimal results. Creating excitement about your upcoming virtual exhibition and make it the talk of the town even before it goes Live.
6. Offer engagement & networking opportunities during virtual exhibition
Virtual exhibitions offer engagement and networking opportunities for attendees. Allow them to interact freely with booth representatives as well as with other attendees and speakers via live chats, video calls, networking tables, and more. Additionally, introduce photo booths in the exhibition to replicate live physical event experiences. Allow attendees to get clicked at the virtual exhibitions in a virtual environment. Apart from it, you can even introduce virtual games, Live polls, leaderboard challenges, and more during virtual exhibitions to boost engagements.
7. Do not skip on follow-up
One of the most significant steps you should never miss is follow-up. Send a push notification to attendees before they leave the event to fill in the follow-up survey. It will help you in gaining an understanding of what the audience enjoyed the most and what not. You can even take their valuable feedback into consideration to create more enriching event experiences.
Conclusion
Virtual exhibitions offer many benefits for all attendees as well as for event organisers and exhibitors. All you need to do is, select the right virtual exhibition platform, curate an effective strategy and you are all set to host an impressive virtual exhibition that delivers outstanding results and taps global audiences effortlessly.
