J Spargo recently completed a pre-show survey of the members of Hospitality Sales & Marketing Association International (HSMAI) that showed that the majority of their meeting planners felt that virtual meetings would never replace face-to-face meetings.
Here are the key elements of the physical experience they reported technology cannot replace:
1. Socializing and networking spontaneously
2. Helping attendees best put names with faces
3. Allowing more free and open dialogue between attendees and vendors/presenters
4. Training effectively via live and personal interaction
5. Paying greater attention to others when face-to-face
6. Engaging in real-time conversation that is not interrupted by technical glitches
What virtual events ARE good at is to cost-effectively extend an event’s reach to a much larger audience.
October 6, 2009 at 10:04 am
I could not agree more on this topic.
Maybe I’m one-of-a-kind, but removing the noise and distractions from my office is difficult. Hence getting something out of a virtual conference is tough. Whereas going to the event site get’s you completely focused on networking and learning.
Face-to-face meetings are preferred hands down over virtual events by this meeting goer!
Now, I do believe having a solid online event community (something more robust than twitter) is essential to facilitate your list of six above. Allowing speakers to engage online with attendees and vice-verse before the event, in the evenings at the event and days after would be a great complement.