As the business of meetings continues to exist in the virtual and hybrid worlds for the foreseeable future, the role of an experienced and technologically savvy meeting planner/tech team is more important than ever to the success of your program.
Just as you wouldn’t dive headfirst into an important traditional live hotel room meeting without the proper logistical and audio-visual support, it would be a mistake to organize a vital online conference without the same.
We have seen that the ubiquity of internal company Zoom meetings has lulled some stakeholders into a false sense of security that all online meetings are the same. This couldn’t be further from the reality of the situation. Inviting an external audience raises the stakes in terms of presentation, time management, and troubleshooting. If anything, holding a virtual event allows for even less margin for error than a typical live one.
Below are some of the reasons why a meeting planner/tech team are essential for your next virtual or hybrid event:
Before The Event
Selecting a Virtual Platform: We’ll use the app your team already uses to communicate internally (Zoom, Teams, WebEx, etc.) as the backbone of our virtual solution; paired with the best virtual broadcast platform for your needs.
Designing the Meeting: Keeping “Zoom fatigue” in mind, we help your team craft the most efficient and engaging program to keep your attendees involved and paying attention to your material. All attendees’ interactions are tracked for post-meeting reporting. Flash polls, in-meeting surveys, note-taking, and question asking are all tools we employ to maximize attendee engagement and attention.
Inviting The Attendees: We ensure that your invitation message stands out in your target audience’s inbox with attractive and colorful templates and videos.
Registering The Attendees: We make the registration process as quick and simple as possible while still extracting the demographic information you need. Via a branded standalone website for your specific meeting, we are able to convey all pertinent program information to your attendees during registration.
Training The Presenters: Our planning and tech team takes the necessary time to ensure your virtual presenters have a uniform look including background, lighting, and audio levels for the most professional-looking presentation. We review the process until they are comfortable if not proficient. Also, we’re there every step of the way as a safety net should anything go wrong in the virtual process.
During the Event
Controlling The Traffic: A virtual event can be like wrangling cats without a proper “traffic cop” to organize and maintain the meeting flow. A good virtual meeting planner will create a run of show document to track meeting events down to the minute and make sure it stays on time.
Ensuring Production Value: Even the most organized virtual meeting will not come across well if it is visually unappealing. Our platforms incorporate your branded colors with HD quality audio and video to make sure your presentation pops off the screen and remains stable throughout.
Staffing The Help Desk: There’s no more frustrating feeling than being lost in the virtual wilderness of an online event with no one to turn to if something is not working. We staff our help desk in relation to your number of attendees so anyone with issues has a live person to walk them through a solution over the phone.
Moderating The Meeting: The meeting planner can also serve as your virtual MC to introduce speakers and segue from one section to another. This can help anxious presenters by providing an audio cue for them to be stage ready.
COVID-Certifying Hybrid Events: When you are ready to take your meetings hybrid, a pandemic-certified planner can add an extra layer of scrutiny and security to ensure your live attendees’ health and safety with extensive CDC-recommended checklists and constant real-time monitoring.
After The Event
Reporting The Meeting: Our virtual platforms produce robust reports on all attendees’ virtual interactions including questions asked, time logged on, poll and survey responses, slide notes, slides saved, and slides rated. Our reporting can also be used in lieu of sign in sheets for compliance purposes.
Recording The Meeting: We can turn around your program as downloadable video files to share with those not able to attend the virtual meeting or as a refresher for those that did.
Reconciling The Meeting: As with a traditional live meeting, our planners provide a complete post-event accounting to ensure budgetary and regulatory compliance.
Summit Management has already reformatted numerous live events to virtual and hybrid meetings for our clients over the past year. We have done our homework on best practices and cultivated our own systems to ensure your program’s success from start to finish. We anticipate that 2021 will see more of the same as travel is still restricted and inconvenient for many. With that in mind, we encourage you to reach out for solutions to your virtual and hybrid event needs as only an experienced meeting planner can provide.
Email info@summitmgt.com or call (973) 239-4005 today.
