Hybrid Events – An Industry in Transition
The entire event industry is talking about hybrid. But what does that mean and how do I successfully implement hybrid events? These are exactly the questions we will be examining in our blog post.
Prepare yourself for the future of the event industry and incorporate the approach of hybrid events into your planning. With their high degree of flexibility, reach, and impressive design styles, hybrid events are becoming more and more entrenched in the foundation of the event industry.
What does hybrid mean?
Before we discuss the benefits of hybrid approaches, let’s clarify the terminology. What are hybrid events? Basically, it is the merging of several types of events. In our context, we are specifically talking about merging digital and live events.
Due to the effects of the pandemic, travel behavior has changed significantly, especially with regard to business travel. Whether getting on a plane, train or car to leave the office or home office will be considered carefully. The reasons for staying away from events are manifold, lack of time for multi-day events, lack of travel approval, potential savings, or even learning that digital events work too. This development will influence the future implementation of live events.
As an event organizer, you will therefore have to play attendees on-site and off-site with your content. A hybrid event allows you to serve both parties of participants. On-site, you have an app in use that supports the live event. Online, users simultaneously follow the event virtually via the same web-based platform.
Of course, the hybrid approach presents a challenge. After all, you have to plan two events – live and virtual. But with centralized platforms, like the Mobile Event App, linking these two worlds is easy. Via web and native solutions (apps for smartphones), both types of attendees are provided with the best possible user experience. As an organizer, you operate only one centralized system, and thus have complete control.
Complete control over a centralized system.
How do I create real connection between digital and analog attendees?
A two-tier audience, live and virtual attendees, naturally poses further challenges for event organizers. However, as already mentioned, centralized platforms such as the Mobile Event App help to merge the real and virtual worlds.
Via a central and at the same time flexible platform, both participant parties move in the same space. Messages, likes, polls and other forms of communication and interaction take place on a shared level. This approach helps to remove contact barriers that often exist on other virtual platforms and seem insurmountable.
What are the advantages for me as an organizer?
As already mentioned several times, one of the biggest advantages is the central platform. Every piece of content and information is managed and distributed through it. You have complete control and at the same time keep track of your event.
The hybrid approach also gives you maximum flexibility. Should unscheduled changes or other circumstances occur. Since you keep the event live and virtual, it is possible to switch to the virtual component at any time. This means you don’t have to cancel your event, for example, just relocate it.
If you finance your events via sponsors, the hybrid approach offers the advantage of versatile advertising space and significantly more reach. Promote exchange and networking among your participants and inspire them with live interactions, such as polls in real time, for example during keynotes.
Cross device interactions make it irrelevant whether participants have an iPhone, are surfing on their Android tablet or are sitting in their living room with a laptop. Every user becomes part of your digital event community.
With the help of the virtual component of the hybrid approach, your reach is increased enormously. Not only do you reach a new number of potential attendees, but at the same time you enable every person to participate in your event.
Thanks to the digitalization of your event, it is also easy to integrate additional systems. For example, the mobile event app offers a check-in on site, for documentation purposes. In our case, this also takes place via the same platform.
With hybrid events, organizers have maximum flexibility.
What are the advantages for me as a user?
One of the biggest advantages for your participants, is the flexibility. Because you are not always able to actually participate in the event. Using the hybrid approach, a change is possible at any time without any problems. At the same time, virtual users are fully involved in your event despite their physical absence.
Even in the case that a user could not attend live and also had no time virtually to participate in your event, the hybrid approach has again a solution ready. By recording your livestream or creating highlight videos, you can share information and impressions that were created during the event afterwards via video on-demand. Thus, you can digitally catch up on what was missed live.
Via the central platform, participants only need to download a single app or call up the link for it. There, only one account is necessary to have full access to all content and interaction possibilities of the event.
Users have complete access to all content and interactions through a single app.
Are you planning an event? Then our Mobile Event App could be just what you need! Due to the extremely high degree of individualization, every event can be branded in an appealing way. Content and features can be distributed and controlled via user groups. As an event platform, several events can be realized simultaneously over a few days or even long-term as a community solution.
More information about plazz AG can be found on our corporate homepage or our product pages mobile-event-app.com and mobile-employee-app.com.
Please contact our sales team, if you have any questions regarding an offer or personal consultation.
