Virtual Event Trends: 8 Tactics to Boost Engagement in 2022

Of course folks are itching to get back out into the world and socialize with friends and colleagues in real life after several years of pandemic-induced solitude. 

But that sure doesn’t mean virtual events are done for. 

Not by a long shot. 

There are many reasons why virtual events are still a stellar option for marketers looking to grow brand exposure and reach more eyeballs with exciting new offerings — which we’ll cover in the article. 

And, there are plenty of awesome trends that are shaping the virtual events industry into a place where people are actually excited to attend and engage — eight of which we’ll also dive into in this article. 

From the metaverse to gamification to upskilling, keep reading for all the insights you need to stay on the cutting edge of virtual events in 2022 and onward.

Why Virtual Events? 

Are we sure virtual events are here to stay? Let’s look at the facts.

The Demand is Still High for Virtual Events

The love for virtual events, as well as physical events with some virtual elements (aka hybrid events), is still going strong. 

In a 2021 study, 43% of people in the United States reported they’d still prefer to attend virtual events beyond 2021.

This lines up perfectly with what marketers have been thinking, too. Another 2021 study found that marketers predicted 40% of their events would be fully virtual and 35% would be hybrid in 2022. Together, that means three-quarters of their events would revolve around key digital elements. 

Virtual Events Have the Greatest Reach

People are attending a lot more events than they used to. 

Why? Because virtual events are so much easier to access. 

The Virtual Attendee Experience Report created by an expert in the event space found that, today, about half of their survey participants only attend one or two in-person events per year. But online events? Around half of respondents attend ten or more each year. 

Not only are some people hesitant to travel as COVID-19 lingers, price hikes in childcare and accommodations and inconsistent air travel make venturing away from home hectic and a budget-buster. 

Virtual events are more affordable and inclusive for everyone involved — giving them the greatest reach of all marketing event types. 

Get More Useful Data for Future Marketing Campaigns 

There are few pieces of gated content or other marketing materials that can capture data the way a virtual event can. 

Not only will you get tons of information about attendees when they sign up for events, with a live video platform that views itself as your marketing partner you’ll also have unprecedented access to engagement data to pair with that information. And with software like Sequel, you can even pipe all your new data to 3,000+ different tools to create perfectly personalized marketing campaigns that go the extra mile. Personalization being a hugely valuable virtual event trend that we’ll cover in a bit. 

Improved ROI Over In-Person Events

All the things that make in-person events tick add up to eat away at your budget.

It’s death by a thousand cuts — for your return on investment (ROI), that is. 

But it’s all worth it because of the outsized number of leads in-person events produce, right? Not necessarily. 

If you compare the number of attendees and the amount of data you’re getting from each event type and then consider how much each is costing you, it’s pretty easy to see that the ROI of virtual events is better than that of in-person events. This is especially true if you’re using virtual event software with pricing that lets you pay by the year (or month) and host as many events as you want. 

8 Virtual Event Trends to Boost Engagement

Now that you’re on the virtual events train, let’s make sure you pull off one hell of an event by pulling in a few of these modern trends. 

1. Include Elements of the Fastest-Growing Media Segment: Virtual Reality 

Virtual reality is the fastest-growing segment of the entertainment and media industry, increasing by 39% in 2020 and 36% in 2021. 

Virtual reality (VR) uses technology to immerse its users in three-dimensional, and often interactive, experiences. 

For virtual events, these experiences will of course need to take place on the screen the attendee is using to watch your event. So in digital spaces, VR experiences may look like 360° videos that enable participants to immerse themselves in a world you’ve created. Maybe one where they’re using your product in everyday life, or one where they’re touring the factories or offices where your latest offering came to life. 

Another way to pull off fully-virtual VR experiences is by building games that enable people to “use” digital versions of your product. Similar to how you pick up and use gems, potions, and other tools when playing video games.

If you happen to be thinking about a hybrid event, a VR headset and hand-held devices can go a long way toward simulating a whole new world. For example, check out how Adidas used VR to turn viewers into rock climbers scaling the gnarly Delicatessen route. 

2. Host Your Event in the Metaverse

While Meta, formerly Facebook, may come to mind — the metaverse isn’t a singular product that they, or anyone for that matter, owns. 

The, or rather a metaverse, is a digital space where virtual reality and augmented reality come together to create a fictional but typically realistic(ish) environment. 

Going back to Meta, their Horizon Worlds project is a good example, as it’s built around hosting virtual meetings that almost make it feel like you’re there in person. There are several platforms that enable you to host your virtual event in a metaverse. Microsoft Mesh and Party.Space are a few examples. 

If your business is deep in the tech space, and/or your audience is especially tech-savvy, you can start exploring metaverse options now and host your next event right at the edge of what’s possible for virtual events. 

3. Alternatively, Choose a Virtual Event Platform Everyone is Comfortable Using

If that last option doesn’t seem quite right for your audience, we have another solution. It’s high-tech, but it’s also intuitive enough that any event planner and every attendee will feel comfortable using it. 
Sequel is the only virtual event platform for hosting live events, pre-recorded events, and even hybrid event sessions right from your own website — no code required! 

What does this mean for marketers?
It means easy-to-build, always-on-brand events ranging from large industry webinars to intimate launch parties and everything in between. With Sequel, you can flawlessly run events — no event professional certification required, drive attendees right to where you want them to boost conversions, and of course view deep real-time analytics that tell you exactly where and how your audience is engaging.

And for your attendees?

Sequel means easy access to an engaging event where they can enjoy high-quality 4K live streaming, interactive chats and polls that fight off Zoom fatigue, breakout rooms that ward off monotony, networking tools that keep them connected to other attendees, and plenty more attendee-focused features. 

Way too many virtual events use tools that aren’t intuitive for attendees. 

In fact, lack of event tech knowledge and support is one of the main reasons event attendees have poor virtual event experiences! 

Combat the virtual event burnout and make the most of event marketing at the same time with Sequel. 

Book a demo right now to see how Sequel will put you back on the cutting edge of events in your industry. 

4. Prioritize Rest and Restoration 

Work-related stress is on the rise for the largest generation in the workforce — millennials. So you should be thinking about this group a lot when it comes to virtual event planning. Plus, what’s good for them will certainly be good for everyone attending your event.  

What can you do at your virtual events to ease stress and make attendees’ experiences fun (another important factor we’ll talk about more later)?
Keep sessions short, prioritize rest between sessions, and even build in restorative or wellness-focused sessions (yoga, anyone?) that give the brain a break and lighten the mood.

5. Inject Intimacy to Drive Loyalty

“Everyone knows that emotion is what drives brand loyalty,” Liz Lathan, founder of Haute Companies, told Hopin. “You see it in marketing, and you see Psychology Today release studies saying ‘you have to evoke emotion’ … ”
Lathan, and others with their pulse on the finger of engagement, believe that emotion — and the resulting brand loyalty — are best evoked through “micro events.” 

A micro event can be any smaller happening inside your bigger virtual event that puts people in a more intimate setting. These events may look like: 

• Breakout sessions in smaller virtual rooms, organized by topic or time zone 
• Workshops where small groups get to work together to solve something
• One-on-one video chats

In these surroundings, attendees are free to connect on a personal level and develop real emotions about their fellow attendees and the larger event as a whole. 

In the age of infinitely-scalable digital events where it’s easy to become nothing but an avatar lost in a crowd, it’s critical to plan smaller sessions where attendees can really be themselves — and develop loyalty to the business that gave them that opportunity. 

6. Add Gamification Events to Up the Fun Factor

Along with more breaks and more one-on-one time, today’s event attendees also want to have a little more fun! 

When compared to in-person events, virtual events are perceived as less fun. 

What better way to make your event more fun than to tap into the gamification trend?

Gamification is the process of using game elements — such as races and prizes — outside of game settings to reward certain actions and inspire engagement. Today, gamification is growing in popularity among event organizers because of the advent of event-hosting software that can host digital, gamified interactions. 

Here are some ideas for adding gamification to your virtual experience to inspire more fun and more engagement:

Actions to Reward:

• The most social media shares before the event 
• The most tweets during a session 
• The most or fastest poll responses 
• Best question asked in the chat
• Most sessions attended
• Best shared pic from the event

Rewards to Give Out:

• Gift cards 
• Digital certificates 
• Special event-branded badges for their attendee profile 
• A discount on your product/service 
• Let them brand a session for free
• Let them host a session, breakout, etc.

7. Use Virtual Event Data to Hyper-Personalize Marketing

For those in marketing, it seems like personalization has been on-trend for a decade now, right? 

However, the demand for personalization has jumped even higher recently. 

Twilio’s 2022 State of Personalization Report found that 62% of people will ditch their brand loyalty the minute a brand delivers an unpersonalized user experience. 

What’s wild is that’s almost a 20% jump from the percentage of people who said the same in 2021! 

Personalization is especially pivotal for the marketing messaging that comes out post-event. This is your chance to re-ignite the passion attendees found for your brand during the event, follow up on specific questions they had in a session chat, share resources that align with the sessions they were interested in, suggest product lines for their industry, and take other personalized steps that show you understand their needs and are ready to forge a partnership — aka move them to sales — as soon as they are. 

Don’t have the data it takes to get to this level of personalization? That’s just another reason why a digital event platform that collects all of this information for you is one of the most important tools a trend-setting event marketer can have. 

8. Focus on Teaching Skills — Attendees Today Are Looking to Learn

When it comes to digital events, attendees are more interested in learning and less interested in networking. For in-person events, the opposite is true. 

So if your virtual events have been heavily focused on networking up until this point, it may be time to make a pivot.
But pivot to what? 

New skills seem to be all the rage in our post-pandemic world. 

Many people find themselves with more flexibility in their work schedules, giving them time to learn new skills. Plus, since the start of the pandemic, digital transformation has bloomed. People who are looking to change jobs or move up the ladder are realizing they may need more tech knowledge than before. 

What might people want to learn about? A good place to start developing ideas is lists of in-demand workplace skills, like this one from Indeed: 

• Animation 
• Digital-ready journalism 
• Industrial design 
• Blockchain 
• SEO/SEM
• UX design 
• Audio and video production 
• App development 
• Translation 
• Analysis 
• Sales 
• AI 
• Cloud computing 

How Will You Boost Virtual Event Engagement?

Whether it’s fun gamification, restorative breaks, exciting virtual reality videos, intimate breakout sessions, or some combo of all of the above and more — we’re stoked to see marketers stepping up their virtual events in ways that create deep learning, real joy, and ongoing brand engagement. 

Don’t squander it. 

Instead, capture and act on virtual audience engagement with the only easy-to-embed virtual event platform for hosting high-value events, building community, and inspiring action.

‍Sign up for your free, personalized Sequel demo today and see what all the hype is about.