Hotel Group Meetings: One Event, Two Experiences
The COVID-19 pandemic has created an unprecedented disruption to the events industry on a global scale.
Business events are gatherings, hosted for a variety of reasons: networking, education, sharing information, and conducting business.
Traditionally, those objectives have been best achieved at events that are live and in person. The pandemic changed the landscape of how people meet, largely due to economic shutdowns and social distancing efforts. Large group settings were discouraged and even banned for a period. Many smaller event companies and industry suppliers, had to close their businesses, many companies and associations conducted layoffs in the event department, and planners in the industry faced event postponement and/or cancelation.
These factors had a long-lasting impact on economic recovery worldwide. As a result, the events industry quickly united, adapted, and transformed. The Events Industry Council (EIC) formed the APEX COVID-19 Business Recovery Task Force that aggregated and organized accepted practices across the events industry and presented a framework for recovery and resilience. Event planners and organizers were forced to rethink the way they hosted events.
Venues, from small venues to convention centers and hotels, adapted and learned how to safely host live events by implementing practices that would mitigate the spread of the virus. Things like mandatory masking, hand sanitizer stations, health checks at registration, staggered arrivals, specific and separate egress points, wider aisles with directional signage and floor stickers, enhanced cleaning, and moving groups of attendees in "pods" from session to session to avoid cross-pollination of people, became commonplace at live events.
Moreover, planners had to think strategically to attract/retain attendance rates they say pre-pandemic. This included drafting "duty of care" statements to make cautious attendees feel comfortable and outlining rules for behavior in "know before you go" communication for skeptical attendees. The balance between these two attendee groups was perhaps one of the greatest challenges for planners. On the one hand, there were groups of people who were ready to get back to meeting live and were "skeptical" about the seriousness of the virus.
For those attendees, planners would need to do a lot of work pre-event to communicate the rules for safe behavior at events, and the consequences of not adhering to the rules. Attracting these types of attendees to come to the event was not the issue; getting them to adhere to the rules, however, became paramount. Conversely, to attract the "cautious" attendee, planners had to demonstrate that they conducted a thorough risk assessment of the landscape surrounding meeting live.
In other words, what are they doing to keep everyone safe at an event? Therefore, communicating the host organization's duty of care statement, which included key metrics about the destination, the facility, and efforts to maintain contactless touch points became paramount.
The number of live events hosted in the US dropped significantly over the first year or two of the pandemic. In turn, planners had to innovate new ways to conduct business events. This propelled the industry forward in the technological realm of events. Pre-pandemic, the industry shied away from virtual events due to a lack of "humanity" in how participants engage with one another. So, while it was not the preferred method of meeting amongst planners, organizations were left with no choice but to accept and adapt to integrating newer technologies to stay resilient and survive through the pandemic. Audio/visual companies and production companies rushed to develop creative and innovative virtual platforms. Zoom became one of the most common platforms for virtual events, and for a while virtual events became the new normal.
While virtual events have many advantages, we have witnessed some limitations. The virtual platform makes it difficult to build relationships and connections with other attendees when you are not interacting with them in person. Another challenge was to keep attendees engaged in discussions, and interactions, and stay attentive throughout the event. Hybrid events provide a solution to these issues by combining the best of both worlds. In-person events can offer interactivity and networking opportunities while virtual events can provide reach and convenience.
Hybrid events have become increasingly popular as the industry started to come out of the pandemic. Event planners and organizers have seen the benefits of hybrid events over in-person or virtual events. First, with hybrid events, organizations are able to reach a wider audience than traditional in-person events. Having the virtual component to an event allows attendees to join from anywhere in the world. This is particularly beneficial for corporations and associations that have a global audience or that want to attract attendees who might not be able to travel to an in-person event. Choosing the hybrid format for your event means many more attendees than an in-person event alone.
Second, hybrid events offer more flexibility. Virtual attendees of these events can attend from wherever they are, and they can participate in the event at their own pace. This is beneficial for attendees that have busy schedules, live in different time zones, have health concerns, or have travel constraints. Third, hybrid events can help organizations save on event costs to a certain extent compared to traditional in-person events and lower the carbon footprint. The event planner can rent a smaller venue or a smaller number of rooms and fewer chairs and tables. Employers do not have to pay for travel and accommodations for virtual attendees. There will be less travel by people, less transportation of props and furniture, and fewer wasted meals. Organizations are not only saving money but are also being environmentally conscious. Lastly, sponsors can increase their exposure by being in front of in-person and virtual attendees leading to more brand awareness and lead generation.
Hybrid events also come with challenges, however. The biggest challenge is ensuring that both in-person and virtual attendees have a good experience. Virtual attendees should not feel as though they are spectators, simply watching a live stream. Planners need to ensure that the virtual attendees feel as engaged and involved as much as in-person attendees. Technology has allowed planners to merge event experiences throughout the event via mobile meeting applications and gamification, as well as live-streaming portions of an event where questions from the audience can be gathered via tweet or text. Managing the logistics of a hybrid event, such as marketing, setting up the virtual platform, coordinating with speakers and sponsors, navigating time zones, and managing registration and payments can also pose challenges for the host organization.
Despite the aforementioned challenges, hybrid events are expected to be an attractive format going forward due to the benefits, primarily regarding the expanded reach to attract more attendees. Hotels are also adapting to the hybrid trend. First, hotels have invested in technology to improve the meeting experience for both in-person and virtual attendees. Some improvements include high-speed internet, video conferencing equipment, higher-quality video and audio, and touchless experiences. Second, hotels continue to rethink meeting space layouts to accommodate social distancing and other safety measures. This means smaller rooms, staggering meeting times, or creating more outdoor spaces for events. Third, hotels have continued to offer flexible cancellation policies to give planners and attendees peace of mind in case of unexpected changes. Continuing to do so as the industry emerges from the pandemic could help to boost bookings and reduce financial losses.
Lastly, hotels are still providing enhanced cleaning and sanitation protocols to keep their guests and staff safe. This includes deep cleaning of public areas, increased frequency of cleaning and disinfecting, and using electronic sprayers to kill viruses and harmful bacteria.
As the industry continues to evolve, hotels need to be agile, flexible, and responsive to meet the needs of event organizers and attendees. The event organizer and planner will make the decision on whether or not there should be a virtual component for the event. Some considerations that prompt that decision are as follows. Is it an internal or an external event? What are the goals of the event? What does the organization want the attendees to get out of the event? For example, when companies are hosting internal events for their internal stakeholders (e.g., employees, leadership, staff), it is feasible to have all the internal stakeholders in one room at the same time for a meeting?
In cases like this, planners can use a venue, such as the company's headquarters, and live stream the meeting to the stakeholders that cannot attend in-person. For external events when the target market is customers, prospects, and clients, hosting a hybrid event will help the organization reach a wider audience and lower the carbon footprint simultaneously.
While there is just one event, the experience for hybrid-based meetings is for both in-person and virtual attendees. It is therefore imperative to balance the two experiences. A hybrid event should not feel like it is two separate events. It should be one event with two experiences. The content should be relevant to both groups but delivered differently to both groups. For virtual attendees, video streaming service needs to work seamlessly. Presenters need to be prepared to speak in front of a camera and be recorded. The presentations should be engaging. As previously stated, it can be a challenge to keep virtual attendees engaged. Therefore, it is critical to make sure that the content translates well over the computer screen.
Certain sessions might need to be offered separately for each group, such as interactive networking sessions. There should be virtual-only interviews or panel discussions exclusively provided to virtual attendees. Sessions should not be too long. The content and delivery should be concise to keep virtual attendees focused and engaged. There should be interactive activities incorporated into the sessions, such as live polls or Q&A to ensure virtual attendees participate. Fewer live sessions per day and more on-demand content should be taken into consideration to account for the shorter attention span of virtual attendees. The planner should ensure this by managing the content and the overall agenda.
For registration, custom registration paths can be created separately for in-person attendees and virtual attendees so they can sign up for applicable sessions. For networking and scheduling meetings, an app or an appointment scheduling tool can be used so in-person and virtual attendees can communicate and set up meetings efficiently. When virtual attendees are joining globally from different time zones, it can be difficult to accommodate attendees from a scheduling perspective. Therefore, offering on-demand access to sessions would give those attendees the flexibility to see what they missed.
Additionally, live sessions could be offered multiple times so virtual attendees have an opportunity of the live experience. It is important to have separate hosts/emcees for onsite attendees and virtual attendees. For example, having only an onsite host could make virtual attendees feel like spectators rather than participants. A virtual host can address virtual attendees by announcing the agenda schedule, introducing sessions and activities throughout the event, and interacting with them by checking in and asking about their experiences. Lastly, it is important to evaluate and analyze your hybrid event. Follow up with your in-person and virtual attendees, sponsors, venue, and other stakeholders to learn from their experiences and make improvements to the next event.
Since 2022, live, in-person events have come back strong. Many organizations have chosen to resume live events as usual, without a virtual component, and others have chosen to go hybrid for the foreseeable future. Perhaps one of the most valuable takeaways the industry has learned from the pandemic is that the future is unpredictable. Through the pandemic, event organizers have discovered the extent to which the industry is resilient and has taught everyone that it is important to maintain flexibility and preparedness.
Therefore, it is recommended that event organizers and venues always consider utilizing hybrid options for their events. Should another pandemic, or unforeseen shutdown occur, a hybrid component would allow a planner to shift quickly to "plan B" and would make for a relatively seamless transition to virtual, should the need arise.
Reprinted from the Hotel Business Review with permission from http://www.hotelexecutive.com/.
