We caught up with our Head of Audio Visual and Event Production at Church House Westminster, Bradley Hill, to find out why Cisco WebEx Events ticks all the boxes for him as a flexible end-to-end event platform for managing and delivering high-quality virtual and hybrid events.
Q: First of all, do you use WebEx Events exclusively at Church House?
Not at all! We regularly run hybrid events using a variety of other online platforms. When a client wants to use a specific online platform, we naturally use the client’s preferred platform to produce the event. I’d say the big advantage of using WebEx Events is for clients who are unfamiliar with organising online events. For some this part of online event planning is still unchartered territory. Our in-house Audio Visual and event production team at Church House is fully trained on running WebEx Events successfully. This adds an extra layer of reassurance for organisers as we take care of all the technical aspects. The platform gives back control to the organiser in terms of event managing and marketing, which delivers an immersive event experience for attendees.
Q: How is WebEx Events different from other online event platforms?
As an end-to-end event management platform, it’s scalable – supporting up to 3000 participants in a single event with up to 1000 panellists on video. It’s also a highly secure platform, used by major banks. Cisco WebEx employs a multilayer security model (128-bit TLS and 56 AES for data encryption). It requires no new software or hardware. Easily join events with mobile devices to allow attendees to feel they are in the same room for large scale events and webinars.
Q: So often we hear that ‘one size fits all’ when it comes to online event platforms. What’s your take on this?
I disagree. For event organisers to deliver ROI on their event, a flexible and customised online platform like WebEx will provide the best results. We all want a smooth (and straight-forward!) event execution and we’ve seen first-hand how WebEx Events allowed clients to stand out from their competitors by offering an engaging event experience.
Pre-event
- Registration – automated registrant approval and customized forms and filters. Capture all registrant information, and automatically assign lead quality scores based on your own criteria.
- Customisation – easily create branded invitations, confirmations, reminders, and follow-ups.
- Ecommerce – opportunities to monetise your hybrid or virtual event by accepting credit card or PayPal payments to access events and recordings, along with promotion codes to encourage faster registration.
During the event
- The host has full control over invitees, based on assigned roles: Panellists (remote speakers, presenters, moderators) and Attendees (who are muted automatically upon entering).
- Breakout rooms – for workshops, classrooms, outside of the main meeting. Up to 100 people can join 100 breakout rooms.
- Threaded Q&A panel – attendees post questions, without distracting the panel. Analysts respond, questions can be assigned to a specific analyst to answer.
- Start a public or private live chat (public or private).
- Run real-time polls and surveys to monitor interest and use the attention indicator tool to identify high-value attendees.
- Rehearse, before going live – join a practise session where panellists can talk, share content, without being seen by attendees. When ready, end practise session and then show time!
- Broadcast live in HD video. Record with one click. The integrated video and audio makes for a high-quality attendee experience. Up to 720 HD videos of the presenter and panellists can be displayed, along with active speaker functionality. The view will adjust automatically when content is being shared, keeping the focus on the presentation. With integrated audio, the host can control participants’ audio and everyone can see who is speaking
- Engagement – share high-quality video and compelling multimedia content, presentations, applications, whiteboards, and streaming video files, and annotate shared content in real time. Show preloaded content and play hold music while attendees wait for the event to begin. Participants can choose from a variety of different layouts focusing on what or who they need to see. They have complete control to resize the panels and windows. They can even move panels to a secondary monitor for better viewing.
Post-event
- Create a post-event survey and email campaigns to get feedback and keep the conversation going.
- Upload and analyse valuable registration and attendee information to your Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and marketing automation systems.
- Direct attendees to a marketing URL or other destination to view or download additional product information or to contact sales.
Q: So, for event organisers looking to host online company meetings or to virtually market services or products to a broader audience, how can they find out if WebEx Events is for them?
Get in touch. Our in-house audio-visual team offers free and no obligation consultations and best practices advice. We include as standard a dry run, in-event assistance, and guidance on post-event reports and transcripts.
For more information please do get in touch via our contact form or give us a call on 020 7390 1590 to discuss your event.