DepositPhotos.com

Out of all the trends that rose from the pandemic, hybrid meetings and events is one that could continue for years to come. As 2023 is coming to a close, many financial and insurance meeting planners are glad to see that most of their event attendees appreciated being in person more than ever before. But just as the energy of the on-site attendees at events invigorated the industry, the flexibility of the hybrid option animated the virtual crowd.  The question is, what happens next?

Developing the Culture

While the benefits of hybrid meetings and events include not only the cost savings on travel, but also inclusivity for those who don’t have the financial means or ability for health or personal reasons to attend an in-person event, planners’ focus is on bringing people together, not just for content, but as part of team building and networking. They are aware of the attendees’ needs — a good balance of time between work and home. Building a culture that caters to both is vital to their event’s success.

For those planners looking at planning a more sustainable event that reduces a meeting’s carbon footprint, hybrid is good option. Along with the conveniences of the hybrid events model, there are also unique challenges, such as maintaining engagement and overcoming technological hurdles.

Though audiovisual companies like Encore have seen a decrease in demand for hybrid post-pandemic, there is still interest, according to Rob Wilcox, director of sales engineering at Encore. Headquartered in Schiller Park, IL, the company is on the cusp of what’s next and the forefront of innovation, with an extensive range of event technology solutions from core audiovisual to specialty equipment, technology installation, and presenter support to engage participants in surprising and inventive ways.

“It [hybrid] is still something that we see a fair amount of interest even still today, but the way that hybrid events have changed is most interesting,” Wilcox said. “They are no longer trying to do a full-fledged production for the remote participant. Basically, they are still putting all their eggs into the in-person experience because that’s where people want people to be, but they do realize the value that hybrid brings from widening their audience.

“Typically, they might do a livestream of the general session and then they may provide video on demand, whether that’s prerecorded or rerecorded live during the event of things like breakout sessions. So, they’re no longer trying to make a similar experience.”

Wilcox notes that a successful hybrid meeting or event is not as simple as trying to figure out how to incorporate the remote audience.

“You have to almost assume that you’re designing two separate events that will eventually make a connection,” Wilcox said. “They meet at some point and figuring out where those points in time are and where they intersect with each other; where your remote participants and your on-site participants are in the same group and where they diverge back out to their separate groups — that can be a challenge for a lot of meeting planners, seasoned or new.”

Sarah Soliman, president and CEO of Soliman Productions in Orlando, FL, concurs that the nature of hybrid requests is transforming from the basic request of streaming to a remote audience. She does, however, still accommodate the traditional streaming option when producing events.

“We just did an event with a group that wanted an old-school hybrid event,” Soliman said. “They had an in-person audience and they hired us to livestream their annual meeting to people online through their platform. So, more so an old-school, traditional hybrid, if you will.”

Hybrid Strategy

The hybrid strategy is changing due to some of the limitations of the hybrid model. According to a recent study by B2B marketing firm Markletic, 46% of event organizers say that speakers had difficulties engaging a virtual and in-person audience simultaneously and 71.1% of event organizers say that connecting the in-person and virtual audience is their biggest challenge.

One of the new trends Soliman is seeing is livestreaming the general sessions, keynotes and also creating a different digital experience. Instead of the virtual audience going away for a break of several hours before the next livestream, planners can arrange for the production team to fill in the blanks with more dynamic content.

“They are having us come in and create quick turnaround content, where we’re interviewing their speakers after their sessions,” Soliman said. “Or we’re interviewing attendees and capturing footage of the event overall and piecing it together in longer chunks. Those being 15-to-20-minute chunks that we’re inserting into the digital experience. That is in addition to some live interviews that are more in-depth with a presenter that just got off stage, for example. That’s one aspect of hybrid I would say is the most popular that we’re doing right now.”

The content in that capacity is for the digital audience rather than the in-person attendees. Sometimes, the client may want their company to distribute what is being placed online in the in-person venue as well attendees to also see, which can be done on video walls or other strategies.

“Some of the challenges are having to work with many different groups of people to accomplish this. It’s not just my team that’s there, and we’re producing it. Unless they’re using our platform, we have to share the digital content with an on-site AV team, if that’s who they’re using to further online distribution,” explained Soliman.

The challenge becomes whether the next party distributes the content in a timely manner and measures proper analytics from that content if someone else steps in and takes over control of it.

Driving engagement for both in-person and virtual attendees during a hybrid event is not easy. In an in-person event, personal interaction and networking are keys to keeping attendees engaged. For hybrid events, the virtual attendees lack of personal interaction can hinder the overall experience.

Event planners need to design interactive elements and leverage technology to foster meaningful engagement. Utilizing real-time polling, interactive chat features and breakout sessions can help encourage active participation. Incorporating networking opportunities, both in-person and virtual, can also help maintain attendee engagement.

“In any hybrid session, we leverage tools like Q&A or live polling,” Wilcox said. “Those tools are the largest that work seemingly within real time for anybody, no matter if you’re in person or far away. Rarely do we bring a remote audience participant on screen just because it does take a lot more production to pull that off. We don’t rule it out. It just depends on what the scope is and what the objective requires. If we are looking at bringing remote presenters in, that’s a different animal.”

His company did bring on a presenter from the U.K. for a conference in San Francisco. For them, it was more affordable to have Encore do that than have the presenter fly across the globe for a few days.

Confronting Technology

Technology is a great thing, but it can also has its challenges. And the hybrid presentation is not necessarily easy or straightforward. The Markletic survey showed that 67% of event organizers said that to ensure a smooth experience, you must secure stable internet connections, reliable video conferencing platforms and intuitive user interfaces.

For those reasons and more, event organizers need to test the technology in advance and to ensure that participants can easily access and navigate the virtual components. It’s key to double-check that there will be adequate technical support and backup plans to mitigate potential disruptions. Wilcox suggests planners ask the audiovisual company in advance for advice on how to best accommodate a hybrid event.

“Ask for their advice,” he said, explaining how he asked the client: “Here’s what we want to do. How do you think you could make this happen?”

There are new technologies including a variety of specialized meeting apps for both in-person and hybrid events.

For in-person participants, there’s an app with a map of the venue, with places to go for  food and beverage, or how to go from point A to point B. A lot of that is turned off for the remote participant because it’s not valuable to them.

For remote participants, their view is mostly just dialing into where they can watch content and connect with people via networking modules.

The applications that are most successful are the ones that are not bound to any specific platform and designed to work both on a mobile tablet or traditional computer.

According to Wilcox, insurance and financial planners pose a different challenge.

“Encore has found they particularly like closed systems that are secure and access to the content very restricted, as to limit the risk of content leaking,” Wilcox said. “For our in-person events, we do leverage our own technology with a product called Chime Live. More specifically for these groups, we see a lot of apps and demand for timelines and second screens. Essentially what that is, is when they’re in person, we are providing each one of those participants with their own iPad.”

The reason for that is two things, he explained. The content on that device can augment the content that is on the main screen; whether it’s the same image or different; or it’s supplemented where they’ve got some high-level bullets on the screen, but they’ve got a lot more detail on the iPad in front of them. If Encore is providing that device, it significantly reduces the level of distractions that the attendees could have than if they’re using their own device. They can’t go and find Facebook or LinkedIn or message their significant other.

For the remote attendee, there are ways to deliver the content to make sure it cannot be moved outside of a specific platform.

“It lives inside the platform and we’re displaying content that is relevant in the moment,” Wilcox said. “Whether it’s exact same content of the presenters speaking on the main screen, which we are also livestreaming to them, or it’s secondary content that is supplementing what’s on screen. Or we’re pushing other things like a full report on your screen, saying, ‘Here’s the report that we got all this from, feel free to bookmark it and take a look at it later.’”

There are also ways to track attendees on virtual platforms for purposes of accreditation, according to Wilcox.

“Sometimes, we see ‘asks for attendee tracking’ to see whether they were in the application, how long they were in a certain video or a particular module. That correlates to earning a credit.”

Advantages of Hybrid for Branding

Soliman notes that the advantage of using hybrid is also an opportunity for branding. For instance, an insurance company is putting an event and using a space at their booth where people can sit to conduct interviews. Tapping in and taking advantage of those branding opportunities that can happen on-site through hybrid is huge.

Another benefit of hybrid is having the ability to post content both live and on demand. This can serve both the remote attendees and in-person audience that may miss a session or want to review it later. There are also ways to monetize that content, according to Soliman. Rather than having the content fizzle out after it airs, there are ways to repurpose the content that was produced.

“Let’s find snippets of content through smaller sound bites that we can repurpose and share,” Soliman suggested. “One thing we also do to try to help is to find sponsors to take on a portion of the cost. Let’s say it’s $10,000 for us to be on-site and producing this content. Well, why don’t we help you find your sponsor for $20,000, so now it pays for our production, and then it helps you generate revenue as well. There are still a lot of companies that are very much buying into sponsorship that way, because as you know, it’s no longer just the logo placement. They want in on the actual content and sharing their message in a more robust way.”

Another advantage is the opportunity for analytics to help with lead generation. In Soliman’s opinion, that’s probably where planners tend to miss the point.

“We really want to think about how you’re adding value to your partners investing in your event. How can you expand their presence outside of just a booth at your event or a logo on a banner? How can you really help them tell their story, and then also provide them that lead generation that they’re looking for? That’s one aspect of hybrid that I think is tremendous.”

Though the need for hybrid is no longer as glaring as it was during the pandemic, there are still enough benefits that give it staying power.

“I can’t imagine hybrid being phased out,” Wilcox said. “This was something that we were doing well before the pandemic, and it was obviously heightened during the pandemic. As we’ve come back to in-person, what we learned during the pandemic was the way to do virtual and hybrid meetings and offer as much opportunity for the remote participant as the one in person.”

According to the data gathered as part of the 2023 FICP Industry and Perception Study, 47.1% of meeting professionals are planning 26 or more in-person events and 34.3% of hospitality partners are expecting that many events.

For 2024, the data shows that the majority of events planners are aiming to host 6-25 in-person events. But ultimately, it depends on where they want to put their money.   I&FMM