The new trend of virtual meetings

Virtual meetings and virtual teams have become more and more popular over the last decade.

According to Julia Young, from Facilitate.com, a virtual meeting is an event joined by attendees from multiple locations and which is technology-based. Attendees run the meeting through video platforms from their desk without travelling. It can be held in real-time or run by several times due to jet lags of attendees or lack of coordination of their schedules.

This new kind of corporate meeting is often considered as time saving and more effective as a virtual meeting tends to be short - it lasts in general around 90 minutes. When the meeting is planned, it is useful to determine the level needed for interaction; it will then determine the technological tools needed for this conference as technology must match objectives. Technology needs to be easy to use and accessible for all participants. Over the last decade, it has known some improvements: better connection speed, high-definition monitors etc. The result: while it remains very expensive (some video conference rooms cost until £300,000), technology enables savings in travel budgets, boosts productivity by letting people collaborate with one another from the comfort of their home offices.

According to CIO.com, several formats of virtual meetings exist and each of them has its ‘event specialty’:

· Live Meeting: best format for a presentation where one person will speak to a group with occasional participant questions using SLi.Do for example, i.e. live chats functionalities.

·  Group Support System (GSS): best format for problem solving or decision making where a team of people will work on a difficulty and come to resolution.

· Collaborative Document-Building Tools: tools such as Google Docs are best for a work product execution meeting where a team will work at developing a deliverable.

Rules of virtual meetings

Some rules for virtual and face-to-face meetings remain the same. Some key questions have to be answered by the event planner far ahead: What are the objectives of the meeting (communication, data gathering, idea brainstorming, problem solving, networking, decision-making etc.) and how is the event going to reach them? What are the technological tools needed for that meeting? What are the obstacles likely to occur? How much time do the IT team and the event planner need to prepare this meeting? Etc.

The audience needs to be kept interested and occupied all along the event for face-to-face events as well as for virtual ones. Thus, the event planner needs to vary the possibilities for the audience to participate and has also to evaluate his event and Return On Investment.

In addition, the event planner still needs to have a backup plan in case the technology fails.

According to CIO.com, the ground rules for a virtual meeting might include: to log in at least 15 minutes before the beginning of the meeting due to downloading time, to avoid disturbance and attend the meeting in a quiet place, to avoid multitasking while attending the meeting, and to turn off cell phones, emails and PDAs during the meeting.

The VirtualFinFair

The VirtualFinFair is, for example, made to create a unique customer experience thanks to the avatars, the virtual booths and even the scenery of the platform. Its objective was to animate a network of asset managers and finance experts by launching a professional fair where they can meet during a special day.

Virtual Finfair 2013 poster (source : http://e-merging.hyperfair.com ) 

During this event, the company staff has its avatars and appears on the booths to help visitors. Concerning the communication of the event, the usual strategy is used with social media posts, website news and invitations were sent along with a user manual to help future participants.

The fair is opened from 9AM to 10PM to allow visitors from all over the world to participate to the event. Exhibitors and visitors can wander in the alleys and exchange virtual business cards, interact with other participants and attend live conferences just like a traditional fair. In a few clicks, participants can download the documentation they are interested in, talk business in live without leaving their desk. Thanks to special hashtags, they can also express their feelings about the event on social media and share the experience with their community.

Advantages and disadvantages of virtual meetings

According to us, there are many advantages for companies to organize or attend virtual events:

• It is money saving: less HR and investments in venue, transportation & accommodation.
• Time-saving; it reduces travel and time out of the office for participants.
•  Boost of productivity.
•  It is an innovative product which makes the event more memorable and fun for participants.
•  It is more environmental-friendly as only a computer is needed for the event.
• It allows a broader geographical audience as the hours of the event are more flexible than a traditional one.
• There are also more detailed statistics in live time useful for event planners.

-       Concerning the disadvantages, we consider: 

•      Face-to-face meetings preference remains as well as the human dimension.
•      Participants tend to be less concentrated in front of their screens in the comfort of their offices.
•      There is less control possibilities over participation and success of the event (passive participation).
•    This type of meeting does not fit all industries. For example, for the agriculture/food sectors, touching, trying in live and smelling products is essential for purchase.

Finally, technology guru, Corbin Ball declared to Succesful meetings webmagazine: "Webinars and other virtual meetings are great for short information exchange," but "30 to 45 minutes is usually the maximum you can expect someone to pay attention to a webinar while sitting in front of a monitor. Meetings, on the other hand, take people to a more focused environment with fewer distractions. As long as attendees are informed, entertained, and fed, event hosts can keep them engaged for days. The opportunities for networking, brainstorming, and relationship building are usually far greater at face-to-face events than online."

To conclude this article, we can affirm that real face-to-face meetings are far from over. Hybrid meetings might be the best alternative to them. Indeed, more and more companies choose hybrid meetings, that is to say they create a virtual fair in addition to a traditional one. The Paris Art Fair is an example of hybridation allowing the visit of the exhibition online while the real one is taking place (source: leads-france.com).

References:

https://www.facilitate.com/support/facilitator-toolkit/docs/Six-Critical-Success-Factors-for-Successful-Virtual-Meetings.pdf

http://www.cio.com/article/2437139/collaboration/running-an-effective-teleconference-or-virtual-meeting.html

http://www.cio.com/article/2437735/infrastructure/for-those-who-can-afford-to-pay--the-video-conference-grows-up.html

http://www.my-marketing-manager.com/non-classe/marketing-evenementiel-le-test-du-salon-virtuel/

http://www.leads-france.com/salons-virtuels-la-nouvelle-tendance/

Hybrid events as a trend

Hybrid event is one of the most popular trends in event industry for recent years. What is hybrid event? A hybrid event is a conference, meeting, trade show, seminar or workshop, which combines both live event and virtual event via Internet. It provides the methods for attendees, who are not able to be physically present, to participate in the event. The huge convenience and benefits help hybrid event gain popularity in the industry.

Source: http://www.internationalmeetingsreview.com

PCMA (Professional Convention Management Association) held this year’s Convening Leaders conference, an international conference focusing on future trends in meeting design, strategy and event tech, during January 11th to 14th, 2015 in Chicago. Hybrid sessions are scheduled for 3 days, including general sessions with Andrew Zolli, Diana Nyad, and Dan Pallotta; Thought Leadership sessions with Scott Stratten, Helen Marriage, Simone Ahuja and Erin Meyer; and some main speeches such as "Boom! 5 Education Disruptors and their Implications for Conference Learning Design". Hybrid attendees can watch the lectures and download the materials, as well as participating in the sessions by live chatting and live poll. And hybrid attendees can also build networking through "virtual happy hour" at the end of each day.

The technology of hybrid meeting keeps contributing to the success of Convening Leaders conference. "Every year, we have seen an increase in both our remote and face-to-face audiences since first streaming in 2010," said Jennifer Kingen Kush, director of experience marketing for PCMA. Last year, she added, the conference saw nearly 1,000 remote attendees. This year's event has already seen hybrid registration from 17 countries.

Hybrid meeting is an effective way for event organizers to recruit and organize remote attendees. Due to time schedule or limited budget, some attendees are not able to attend meetings which take place in long distance. And in some occasions, event organizers cannot provide venue with enough capacity. Hybrid meetings provide the solution for these problems. Through technology, remote attendees can get access to live audio/video of the conference, presentations, slides and other materials.

Source: http://www.freedigitalphotos.net

Hybrid meetings provide and promote the communication between attendees. Remote attendees can ask questions to the live speakers through online forum. And they can interactive with any attendees and exchange opinions through online chat rooms, live blogs, social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. It is an online community for both live and virtual attendees to create and share values during the event. And long-lasting communication can still be held after the event.

As a cost-effective event solution for both event organizers and attendees, hybrid event is adopted more and more frequently throughout the whole world. The interactive experience provided by this type of event meets the trend of meeting industry development. With the development of tailored event apps, the demands of remote attendees can be satisfied more easily. What’s more, hybrid event eliminates large quantity of long distance travels. By reducing carbon footprint, it favors the sustainability of the environment. And also it is an ideal back-up plan for large-scale events and conferences. With all the benefits and added values, it can be predicted that we will welcome a high-speed development of hybrid events in the coming years.

In the meantime, what leaves event organizers to think more about is how to create authenticity for hybrid event attendees, comparing to face-to-face meetings.

Authors:

Hongyin ZHANG & Bao WANG

Source:

http://www.internationalmeetingsreview.com/meetings-events/pcma-promotes-hybrid-sessions-convening-leaders-100813