Steve Ellis : Analysts' view of virtual events: less travelling, less cost, less carbon

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Analysts' view of virtual events: less travelling, less cost, less carbon

Some informed opinions from two industry analysts - James Governor, Redmonk and Judith Hurwitz, Hurwitz & Associates, on success factors for virtual events.

Judith posted: What's the future of the virtual conference?

James posted: Cisco and Microsoft virtual analyst conferences

The back story is that Microsoft's Server and Tools Business (STB) held a virtual conference for analysts. Although a Microsoft event (which is a customer), we weren't involved in this one (big company, lots of initiatives going on, etc). Clearly, Cisco did likewise.

Both Judith and James highlight the main payoff for virtual events: less travelling, less cost, less carbon.

But to achieve those benefits trade offs need to be made. A virtual event is a different kind of experience, one that shouldn't be judged in a straight comparison with physical equivalent events.

I suspect because of the size of the analyst universe, these events were in the hundred or less attendees ballpark, rather than in the multiple thousands seen at big virtual launches. Obviously the number of online participants dramatically effects how much interactivity is desirable and can be managed effectively.

We are beginning to see different execution models for virtual events with requests falling into two categories:

Those with thousands of online visitors, where interaction is part of building buzz in and around the event and the activities that take place at it, but quality discussion has to be handled outside the main virtual presentations, in breakouts and supporting sessions.
And smaller events aimed at around 50 or less visitors, who are usually known to the client, where sessions can be interactively moderated and meaningful Q&A takes place efficiently.

Assuming that there would have been a considerable number of highly knowledgeable and critical tech analysts at each event (it was possible to track some of their activity through associated Twitter hashtags), it would be great to read more feedback from analysts on their virtual event experience.

Any feedback can only help advance the quality of the virtual event experience faster.

Tags: virtual events, Judith Hurwitz, Redmonk, James Governor

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Published 23 Jun 2009 by Steve

Comments

Clive Longbottom said:

Agree with both - virtual can work - but it needs to be used carefully. I found the second day of Cisco (the virtual bit) hard. Lots of presentations and fairly monotonic talking, with little in the way of real interaction and discussions, which you can get with small break out sessions, or in 1:1s. Also, Cisco did not let us see who else was in teh sessions - you thought you were the only one, and then found that there were another 10 or more people in on the call, so stifling any thoughts of true discussion. But, as James says, the same thing happens at many of teh main tent sessions at analyst events - we're given the Story According to <insert Vendor name>, and then asked if we have any comments at the end - that is not a discussion, and it is not a collaborative session.

For virtual sessions like this to work, make sure everyone knows who is on teh call, make sure it is a small number, make sure that everyone's expectations are set as to it being a 2-way thing. If there is information to impart, make it a short, hard-hitting 3 slide thing - and then open up for general collaborative discussion. If the tools can't deal with it, then you've got teh wrong tools.

Otherwise, just go back to using that Telephone thingy and we can have 1:1s by just talking to each other - or is that far too pre-Web0.1a for tech vendors?

June 23, 2009 22:20

Steve said:

Thanks for that Clive.

You make some good points - especially that, clarity on the driving purpose of each event will then set visitor expectations of how it should function - ie is it informational (broadcast, minimal interaction), or discussion (high interactivity, needs moderation), or even collaboration (shared tools, high preparation, agreed agenda and rules of engagement).

That last point, though, use the Telephone thingy? Interesting idea. I'll look it up on the interweb and get back to you.

June 24, 2009 13:04