The spread of the coronavirus has caused an unprecedented shift in our personal and business lives. The first priority as we adjust to a new reality is taking precautions and staying safe. We hope you are.

Businesses are feeling the impact in many ways, including having important events canceled or postponed, eliminating a vital connection to customers and prospects. The challenge now is how to pivot quickly and continue to create experiences that mirror the benefits of in-person events and meetings. In this episode of P3, we shift topics somewhat from presentations, to discuss ways to plan for online events that don’t feel like a terrible webinar, something that will soon be all-too-common. We’ll offer ideas for how to create an event that attracts attendees, keeps them engaged, and ways to continue conversations after the event is over.

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Hello, and welcome to P3, The Perfect Presentations Podcast. This is Doug Borsch, vice president of Perfect PlanIt. Normally recording these podcasts are straightforward affairs. We talk about presentations, about how to do them better. However, it is the third week of  March, 2020, and nothing feels normal. And it feels like nothing will feel normal ever again. When we record content for our podcast we work hard to make it evergreen, so that no matter when you come across it, it feels useful and relevant. In the middle of a coronavirus outbreak where things are changing not even day by day but really hour by hour, it’s hard to know what the world is going to look like in three to four months. So this feels timely now. It may not feel timely then, but it feels important for us to do it.

Today I’m going to focus on something a little different. Before I do that I just want to say it feels almost frivolous to be focused on business topics right now in the midst of the daily news and this deluge of healthcare workers struggling and uncertainty about what the future looks like. Our hope is that you’re staying safe, your family is staying safe and you’re taking care of those around you.

The reason for doing this podcast is that we’ve been hearing from a lot of clients about the uncertainty they’re facing. And, rather than focus on presentations today I’m going to focus on events. Events make up a significant portion of Perfect PlanIt’s business. That takes the form of a couple of different things. First, organizing complete conferences, where we turnkey that service for the organization of the conference, sponsorships, food and beverage, securing attendees, etc. etc. and staffing it and executing it. And we also just take our clients to tradeshows and meetings and conferences and help them present there or exhibit or the other things you all are familiar with when it comes to conferences. And it goes without saying that int the past two weeks everything has shut down.

We don’t have a single client that has a conference on the short-term agenda. We have clients that are looking out into July and August and trying to make decisions about those going forward. The talk today was about the Olympics and it looks like those might be canceled. As you know events have a fairly long time horizon for planning those decisions need to be made early.

A podcast on a business topics feels removed from the reality right now. Goes without saying that we hope for your own health and safety, and of those you care for as well.

One of the things that hasn’t changed about events and one of the reasons we’ve been talking with our clients daily about this is that they need to stay in touch with customers and prospects, and to continue to participate in discussions around topics that are important to their business just like you do for your business. If you’re in sales, or an executive, you want to be considered a thought leader, which is where events typically come in. You are exhibiting, or speaking and certainly you’re looking to make contacts and establish relationships along the way.

For a lot of our clients, events are so fundamental to relationship building that it feels like they’re operating with an arm tied behind their back. Not one of them has canceled an event and said, “oh well, I guess we’ll just do something else.” No, they’re asking us how to continue their marketing efforts while essentially flying blind.

In the past two weeks alone we’ve pivoted three events from in-person to being completely virtual. We’ve done virtual events for a long time, but suddenly they are the only short-term option, and what we’ve learned over the years feels very relevant. So, I wanted to share just some high level thoughts about how to consider your own efforts as you work to continue those relationships and establish thought leadership.

This is not a step by step process. Every event and client will be different, but you might consider some of this as a starter package on how to reset both your expectations and your approach.

What makes for a compelling live event? Think about your in-person events. How would you spend your day? Most likely doing a few of the same things:

What doe all of these have in common? Well, for one, they are social. In the days before elbow bumps and social distancing, this was where you shook hands, met new faces and get engaged.  Second, they tend to be an adult version of a Choose Your Own Adventure story. No two attendees are going to do it the same way. Choosing sessions, and when to walk a show floor, and maybe you focus more on making new contacts where someone else may focus on improving existing relationships.

Keep those objectives in mind as you think about how you might create a virtual event.

First, let me tell you what else you’re fighting against. How many times have you signed up for a webinar, and not attended? I mean, it’s right there on your calendar, and you got the reminder in advance. But by the time it comes around a couple of things happened. One, you forget why it felt important to attend, because the topic seemed interesting, but maybe not essential. Second, your day got out of control, and you just decided to skip it in an effort to focus on more important things. Third, you figure you can listen to it later. Spoiler alert, you rarely if ever will do that.

Right out of the gate I can mention one of the biggest mistake we’re already seeing. That’s people saying, let’s just create a webinar. In fact, I’ll wager that me saying that created a negative reaction with you. The reason for that is that webinars stink. When you think of them you envision product demos, a droning presenter, maybe some time for Q&A at the end when people are dropping out. What you’ve created is an event, and I use event in quotes, that triggers the reasons I just mentioned for not attending.

And this comes down to what we think is one of the most important aspects of putting together a virtual event. And that’s that production value matters. We’re about to be flooded with really crappy “so called events.” Let’s think about things like live video, and recorded video. Recorded video? Why would you want to do that? We’re currently working with a fortune 50 client to put on a worldwide partner award summit. Now, this client was planning to fly in customers from around the world to learn about products as well as celebrate winners in a variety of categories. Just 3 weeks ago, as the coronavirus outbreak was escalating, they made the decision to shift to a virtual event.

Now, this client has something you most likely do not. A world-class studio for video production. But the lesson here doesn’t require that you have those kinds of facilities. Just that you think creatively about how to accomplish similar approaches. Their new event will feel very much like a conversation, with two hosts live to guide the content, and we’re creating a mix of preproduced video segments on topics of interest, along with short videos highlighting the winners of various awards, which will make for fun transitions between longer topics. It sounds daunting, but we pulled it all together in a short period of time, including in this case a trip around the world to film the winners. This highly produced approach allows for a marketing effort that makes missing out feel very much like skipping a true event. It also creates an opportunity for the sales team to have conversations by phone to make invites and create that connection that’s so important.

Before we move forward, let’s address the cost issue. The ideas I’m talking about here can range from very expensive to much easier to manage. But the pivot to “Virtual” also means you need to pivot on how you look at budgets. The cost of attending, including sending people, booths, hotels and airfares, makes some events a large investment to begin with. Think about how you are repurposing your event budgets to support production values and follow up campaigns and you may find it’s a wash, or even less.

Planning an agenda is key to finding an audience.

You can’t just throw together a series of speakers and call it an event. What you’ll end up with is likely to be a bunch of loosely related topics. But think about how you attend conferences. Often there are various tracks happening simultaneously. You choose those of interest to you. You don’t randomly walk in and hope to learn something important. Apply that kind of thinking to your planning around a virtual event. What you’ll end up with is a much more narrowly focused series of topics, but they will be related in a way that will be compelling to a specific group of people. Yeah, for sure you’ll have a smaller audience to target, but that audience will be valuable to you, and your content will be valuable to them.

One way to ensure the content is can’t miss is to spend time recruiting the experts in the field that are aligned to your offering. This is no different than any show or event with speakers operates. You have to find the right people. The good news for you is that everyone is struggling to get their message out. Now is a great time to secure speakers who are itching to present, and the entry barriers are often low because for recorded content there is no travel and timing can be more generous as you develop content.

Getting your audience engaged will be key to making the ROI on your efforts pay off. We’re working with clients to extend conversations through a variety of channels. A private group on facebook is an example, or linkedin. But these won’t happen automatically. You’ll need to encourage the interaction, and oftentimes relay some of that learning and discussion through other channels such as email to reach those who attended but are not inclined to participate on social platforms.

Your goal at an in-person event is more than just getting a message out. The entire premise is based on a two way conversation, where you learn as much from customers and prospects as they do from you. The beauty of virtual events is that rather than happening in conversations over coffee, which often get lost quickly, Chat, messaging and social platforms create a great two-way communication vehicle to capture valuable knowledge to help you move forward, perhaps improve products and services, and understand where your customers see gaps.

Look, we’re busy just like you trying to keep up and adjust. This feels like the start of a larger conversation on what to do well, and what to avoid. The biggest message I want to get across on this very short podcast is that a changing world requires a change in thinking. Just like you’ve heard throughout your career, the companies that are aggressive now in pioneering new ways to connect with customers are the ones that come out of moments like this in a stronger position than their competitors. If we can be of help, please reach out to us and let us know. I’m at doug@

Please stay safe, and take care of those around you. We wish you the best and hope to continue the conversation.