Your speakers will have more fun, be more willing to share, and get more leads. Your attendees will leave with a bigger transformation and feel more connected to you.
As a result, you'll wind up with bigger profit margins and a great feeling about the incredible event you created.
Focusing on an Engaging virtual summit
Some virtual summit hosts don't do a single thing to bring engagement to their event. It's a summit run through email with no chat box during presentations or any way to interact with other attendees or the presenters.
Those summits are on their way out, and for good reason.
Focusing on engagement is beneficial for so many reasons.
- You're going to build a community where everyone is engaged, which is really what people crave.
- People come originally for those presentation topics. The community is what makes them stick around, bringing engagement.
- It makes attendees and speakers want to support you! When you connect with them and support them, they want to support you right back.
Overall, engagement gets the host, attendees, and speakers, better results.
Where To Focus On Building Engagement
There are a few key areas to focus on when it comes to building engagement into your virtual summit.
- Community building
- Facilitating discussion
- Be diverse and inclusive
Build a community that everybody can feel like they are a part of, including speakers and attendees.
You, as the host, need to make sure that the community being built allows room for people to have discussions and conversations. The community should allow for everyone to feel included and accepted.
How To Increase Engagement Before The Event
- Social Media - Promote your summit with a casual video to share your excitement.
- Welcome Videos - Post a welcome video on your registration page to build a quick connection.
- Registration Email Sequence - Tell attendees what you want them to get out of this summit, and invite them to your community.
- Facebook Community - Post a welcome video introducing yourself, what to expect from the group, and encourage attendees to introduce themselves; then respond to them!
- Daily Prompts - Post fun questions for attendees to chime in and answer. For example, "What's your favorite Starbucks drink?" Or, "What are your weekend plans?" People can connect over easy, fun questions and become more comfortable participating in your community!
- Quizzes - Create a quiz to help attendees figure out which presentations to attend and avoid overwhelm.
- Bonus Training - Ask attendees for their biggest struggle in regards to your summit topic, then do a quick, live training around that!
- Kickoff Call - The day before your summit starts or the morning it begins, give a rundown of the logistics, and help people plan to get the most out of their summit experience.
How to Increase Engagement During The Summit
- Daily Updates - Send an email and post in your Facebook community bout what attendees can expect for that day and any important announcements.
- Chat Boxes - Whether presentations are live or prerecorded, a chat box brings engagement and conversation.
- Live Q&A - Encourage speakers to go live in the Facebook group for a Q&A after their presentation. (But make it optional!)
- Speaker Shout Outs - Create a Facebook post about how great each speaker was and their big takeaway you noticed. Ask your attendees to share their biggest takeaway as well.
- Speaker Presentation Pages- Highlight your speakers on their presentation page.
- Giveaway Prizes - When attendees are in the chatbox, posting in the community, or commenting, they get entered into a drawing for daily prizes like a planner or books related to your summit topic.
- Games - Consider games like trivia related to your summit topic, scavenger hunts, BINGO, and fun things that get people engaged.
Increase Engagement After The Summit is Over
If you're not going to keep your attendee Facebook group open, be sure to invite them to follow you and each other on your favorite social media platform so that you're all staying connected for when you decide to do your summit again. If you have another Facebook group, invite them to join.
Provide a feedback survey with a prize for filling it out with thoughtful responses. You will learn something new for next time, and it shows your attendees that you value their thoughts.
The Big Takeaway
The more you show up for your summit, the more everyone else will. The more fun you make it, the more everyone else will want to be a part of it.
That means you need to go in with an engagement plan! Take the ideas we covered in this post and create a plan that works for you!
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The more engaging your virtual summit is, the more you, your speakers, and your attendees will get out of it.