Unprecedented! – A Virtual Convention Case Study

This guest post comes from our friends at the Washington Health Care Association.

Washington Health Care Association recently presented its 2020 annual convention, Unprecedented!, as a virtual event. Although we missed our in-person convention format, our virtual alternative went smoothly. This is a short case study describing the steps we took and lessons we learned for future online events.

Setting up and managing the online sessions

We used GoToWebinar (GTW) for our live session platform. We had used GTW many times for webinars before the pandemic, so our presenters and members were already familiar with it and knew what to expect. If our 2021 convention ends up being virtual, we would be happy continuing with GTW. But, we also expect to look closely at Zoom, and possibly other platforms.

Here are some of the meeting platform features we consider important:

• Easy session registration, including the ability to bulk upload convention registrants
• In-session chat, especially connecting a session sponsor to the attendees 1:1
• Ability for session sponsors to introduce topic and speaker or share a sponsor message
• Ability for attendees to ask questions and participate in chat
• Easy loading and launching of in-session polls
• Simple, reliable pre-event reminders and follow-up emails
• Detailed, session-by-session attendance tracking and reporting
• Easy session recording for later archive access

An additional thought about the third bullet point: Our convention and session sponsors value one thing above all – the ability to engage with our convention and session attendees. In a virtual convention format, that means giving them an active role in the education sessions they sponsor. That starts with excellent visibility in our convention app – see below – and includes an active presence during the sponsored session, including the opportunity to introduce the topic or speaker with webcam on, an ability to offer commentary during the presentation, an ability to do live chat with individual attendees during the session, and receipt of the attendee list following the session. Our session sponsorships cover the session archive, too, so a sponsor’s engagement opportunities continue even after the live session.

From our perspective as the convention organizer, the session platform has to offer a simple, foolproof interface that allows session organizers to manage multiple live sessions. GTW was easy to use. And Zoom, as the dominant provider of virtual meetings during the pandemic, is a safe bet as well.

For our recent convention, the organizer performed these functions:

• Scheduling each education session and setting up attendee registration
• Scheduling pre-session reminders and post-session follow-up emails
• Making sure the presenter, any panelists, and the session sponsor are comfortable using the platform, including in-session polls and other engagement features
• On the day of the session, sending a welcome chat message, conducting an audio and slide check with the presenter (and panelists and session sponsor), opening the event and starting the recording; and for some of the sessions, introducing the topic, session sponsor, and presenter
• After the session, preparing and posting the event archive

Our online event portal

The convention app we have developed with IlluminAge, our web communications partner, is built around a feature we called EYE2i. Its role is to make it fast and easy for our business partners to connect one-on-one with convention attendees who are customers or prospective customers. For our virtual convention this year, one of our top priorities was adapting EYE2i as a tool for inviting and scheduling virtual conversations by phone, email, or Zoom.

We also had a second requirement for this year’s online event portal: Because our event would be virtual, we felt it would be essential to add a more dynamic way for our business partners to use the app to showcase themselves and their products and services.

Our event portal, fall2020.WHCA.org, was our convention’s information hub, containing session schedule, session details, profiles of speakers, sponsors, exhibitors, and the attendee list. The app was also a revenue source through sale of multi-level (event, session, affinity) sponsor ads.

Our business partners used self-editable showcase pages to list their reps and contact information, initiate EYE2i conversations, describe their business, and upload photos, resource links, PDF documents, and video. The app design also allowed each business partner to name their own information pods, which added variety to the showcase pages.

Promoting our convention and convention app was obviously going to be important. So, we appreciated the fact that IlluminAge’s app support package included a custom welcome video, which we posted to our website (https://www.whca.org/fall2020video/), and included as a link in convention emails.

Evaluating how we did

Our 2020 WHCA convention was like none of our past conventions. But, given the circumstances, we consider it a success.

For many of our attendees, the downside of not attending receptions and education sessions in person was offset by the convenience of learning and earning CEU credits remotely. The convenience factor is multiplied, too, by the fact that registered attendees could take advantage of the education sessions either when they were offered as live events, or by accessing the session archives and taking a short quiz any time during a 90-day period following the convention itself.

For our sponsors and business partners, the visibility available to them through their self-managed showcase pages and session sponsorship opportunities was significant, especially as shown by our convention’s post-event app performance report. And, it goes without saying, revenue from our participating sponsors and business partners is what makes our convention possible.

The bottom line

Did we miss our usual, in-person format during this year’s convention? Yes, of course. But we know our experience managing multiple online sessions will help make our ongoing slate of stand-alone webinars even more popular with our members and session sponsors. And, whether our 2021 convention is once again virtual, or in-person, or some sort of hybrid format, the improvements we made to our online event portal will continue to serve us in informing and connecting all our event participants.