Our event industry has been riding a roller coaster since COVID’s impact began in March 2020. We’ve gone from having no face-to-face events – with almost total dependency on digital or virtual events – to the recent return to face-to-face events with little to no digital participation.
Given that recent history, it’s fair to ask what’s the future for delivering digital products to customers. We’ve got technology suppliers telling us that digital/virtual is here to stay, though many of their businesses are struggling. Some event pundits claim that digital/hybrid/virtual delivery is in the past – and permanently so, never to return. At the same time, your biggest sponsors/exhibitors are demanding more and more stats from past and future attendees (of both face-to-face and digital events) to help them to make fact-based decisions as to whether to add/stay with your event. The metrics matter when marketing spending is involved, and according to many exhibitors, we as event organizers just aren’t cutting it.
What’s going to happen next?
Experience has diminished the luster of the concept of ‘hybrid’ events that combine both in-person and digital participation. The simultaneous execution of what essentially were two events with two different audiences didn’t work. Attendees of one format didn’t really care about the ‘other’ audience. However, digital events have proven a valuable opportunity for event companies to learn how to engage an online audience. That’s valuable experience for building an omnichannel reach that includes those who can’t always attend a face-to-face event or would digitally attend something for which there was no face-to-face version. The key is to deliver value for each audience using the advantages of that appropriate channel. These advantages will often differ from those to be found with an in-person event.
As an active salesperson working with exhibitors, I am observing a huge dip in demand for digital offerings now that face-to-face events are back. Potential exhibitors/sponsors still ask for deeper analytics (which may not be available or, when available, compelling) to support their decisions to participate. And there may be fewer events from which to choose. But we are in a gold rush for in-person events that is similar to what we experienced for digital events between March 2020 and August 2021, when face-to-face options were not available.
I’d imagine that none of the above is a surprise to you, given our common experience working in the same events market. But what does it mean for the future? The future might be more surprising. My projection is that demand for pure digital (not hybrid) offerings will increase after September, once exhibitors have had a chance to look at and be disappointed in many of the of leads they’ve gotten from face-to-face events as far as quality and possibly volume is concerned. It’s always smart to have omni-channel offerings for your customers at any one time, as COVID proved.
What does that mean for show organizers? Dust off your digital offerings, refresh them, and have them ready for sale by budget season……