Virtual Summits have achieved a lot of recognition in recent times, mainly because of the pandemic making it practically next to unimaginable to host physical summits. Quite evidently, it’s essential to comprehend the approach and flow of planning an Online Summit to pull together a triumphant event implementation. Planning is the most substantial part of organizing any online summit if you are expecting profitable outcomes for your organization as a result. But before starting to understand the planning procedure of taking a Summit event virtual, let’s explore what a Virtual Summit represents in the online sphere of business and events.
What is a Virtual Summit?
A Virtual Summit is similar to an in-person summit, except that it is organized virtually in an immersive 3D environment! An online Summit event brings together a gathering of experts to speak on industry-related topics. These virtual events are mostly 3-5 days long and all the event sessions & discussions support the general theme of the event.
Online Summits have been a game-changer in the world of conferences as apart from the price and period benefits, it offers you the opportunity to have a better impact on the target audience than physical summits.
Some Reasons to Host a Virtual Summit Event
If you’ve already reconsidered the thought of hosting the online summit with a little confusion in mind, here are a few prominent reasons to give you the much-needed assurance. Hosting an online or virtual summit provides you with several benefits that can be advantageous for you in the long run.
Benefits of Virtual Summit-
1) It will enable you to create and promote your organization’s presence & reputation in the industry. With the right branding, people will remember the organization, adding up to your goodwill.
2) The online summit will allow you to elongate your list of prospective customers or clients by generating maximum marketing leads.
3) You get the option to build connections with the industry’s finest participants and potential associates.
4) Hosting a Virtual Summit can be a great way to create some sales leads.
Let’s move further and explore how you can plan a successful Virtual Summit!
The planning process of an online webinar or virtual event starts with making the most consequential judgments & decisions that are actually going to decide what and how your summit event is going to look.
Decide on A Suitable Event Agenda & Timeline
The most significant element of planning an Online Summit is to start preparing for it at the correct time! There are different arrangements to be made, and decisions to be taken and all of this should happen at the right time.
Here are some elements in a series that you need to plan-
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Choose the appropriate schedule of the event while remembering the availability of your target audience or participants.
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Understand your event purpose and determine if your Virtual Summit will be free, paid, or freemium.
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Bring engaging and skilled speakers on board.
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Create promotional plans for both the Online Summit as well as individual event sessions.
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Setup the landing & registration page.
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Start promoting the virtual event.
Determine the Event Format
Your Online Summit event can have different formats based on your event needs & requirements.
A virtual summit usually has numerous sessions with different speakers. So how should you plan your virtual summit?
You’ve got three different ways- pre-recorded session content, live or real-time session, or a combination of both.
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The first alternative is pre-recording the sessions ahead of time!
Once the recording of the event sessions is completed, the recordings can be broadcast at their scheduled time without requiring any extra management. This format of a virtual summit will help you ensure the quality of the session as you get the time to check and ensure that nothing goes wrong. However, the disadvantage of pre-recording a session is that it eliminates the possibility of real-time interactivity and requires a prior investment of it.
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The second choice is to go live and organize real-time sessions.
You can broadcast live summit sessions based on a well-thought or strategized schedule. The real-time sessions also have their plus & minus. You will have to guarantee that all your live attendees & speakers are having a seamless experience. Your virtual summit can end up becoming tedious & dull if the live sessions are not engaging and productive.
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The third option is to choose the combination!
You can also mix things up and create a combination of the above two options, bringing the advantages together & eliminating the possibility of your audiences getting bored.
Moving ahead, decide if your Online Summit will be Free or Paid.
There are advantages & disadvantages of this too. If the virtual event is paid for, the participants are more likely to attend it as they have paid for it. However, the overall number of participants might be less. The online summit can be free but then you don’t get the chance to make monetary profits. However, if your goal has nothing to do with a monetary profit, you can go ahead to pick the specified format.
In addition, there’s also another option of freemium.
In this case, the virtual event is free but if individuals want to view the sessions after the Summit is over, they can be charged a minor fee to get lifetime access to the event content.
Decide the Content
Apart from the content of your virtual summit, there’s also the content that you need to determine and keep ready to ensure the efficiency of your Virtual Summit. Such event content includes blog posts on your website, press releases, e-mailers, advertisements, social media content & posts, etc. Also, promotional content has to be determined with a sharp understanding of what draws the audiences by stating what’s helpful & valuable to them.
Organizing a Virtual Summit means you need to use some essential virtual tools. These tools will not only help you maximize your organization’s reach, contacts, and leads but also enhance the performance of your Online Summit. Therefore, it is significant to choose the right virtual summit platform that provides you with all the suitable features & functionalities.
Once you follow the mentioned and elaborated steps, you are good to go!
