Content Strategy for Digital Events: Part II – Before Your Event

Before Event strategy

In the inaugural post in this series, I made the case that while everyone is rushing to launch digital events during this indefinite in-person vacuum we’re experiencing, content, which everyone agrees is the most critical element of any event, digital or otherwise, is being ignored. I also included this warning…

“If you choose to put your face-to-face content online without first modifying it for digital consumption and the unique challenges the digital environment presents (cynically referred to as “Lift & Shift”), you may do irreparable harm to your event, your brand, and your reputation.”

No other element will matter more to your digital audience and their experience than relevant, meaningful and outcome-oriented content, provided you do it right.

Following is a task list based on decades of research for how to efficiently and effectively analyze, design, develop, implement and evaluate quality content for any event.

It’s divided into three sections: what to do before, during and after your event (Parts I, II, and III).

Before your digital event

Analyze

During this phase identify a goal, challenge, or problem you’re interested in addressing. We strongly suggest you solicit input from your stakeholders and your target audience via interviews, surveys, etc., as opposed to making even an educated guess. Guessing is no match for sound, data-based decision making.

Only content that’s relevant to this goal, challenge or problem should be included in your event. Nothing more. Nothing less.

This crucial, initial phase should answer the following questions:

  • What are the business goals and objectives for your event?
  • Who is your target audience and what are their characteristics?
  • What are your participant’s goals and objectives for the event?
  • What knowledge or skills do your participant’s already have?
  • What knowledge or skills do your participant’s need to know?
  • How will you determine your business and your participant’s success?

    • Hint: See goals and objectives.

Design

During this phase, synthesize the information you collected during the analysis phase and use it to design your event program. This is where you translate participant goals into objective statements and align those statements with your evaluation instrument. For more on this, see the Evaluation phase in Part IV.

The design phase is also where you identify all relevant content, outline the most efficient and effective sequence for that content, and create interactive activities, exercises, quizzes, knowledge checks, polling questions, etc.

More than your content, these tools and techniques determine the quality and quantity of participant engagement, retention rates, and most importantly, the transfer of any new knowledge and skill back to the job, resulting in some measure of individual or organizational improvement.

This is the ultimate goal of any event, digital or otherwise.

Finally, you need to consider your media selection and balance (variety of text, video, images, etc.).

The design phase is often overlooked because it’s beyond the event professional’s expertise. However, it contributes more to meeting or exceeding participant  expectations than any other phase.

Either your digital event is designed to accomplish its goals and objectives or it’s not.

Key design tasks include:

  • Identify 2-4 specific participant objectives based on participant feedback.

  • With those participant’s objectives in mind, and in consultation with your subject matter experts, review all existing content for relevance – must know, should know, and nice to know (but not necessary to include).

  • Create a content outline, storyboard or wireframe in order to help optimize the participant experience, improve communication between subject matter experts and cost-savings (fewer revisions).

  • Determine your delivery strategy (synchronous (live), asynchronous (archived), blended (combination of live/archived), facilitated or self-paced). Not all digital events have to follow the traditional live format. Use the format that makes the most sense for your content and your audience. Consider the benefits of blending these formats (sharing content in advance and afterwards to augment the online experience).

Develop

During this phase, the relevant content identified in the design phase is assembled into your event program and uploaded to your digital platform, if necessary. This is also where you develop and test prototypes (alternative approaches), pilot your program and address any outstanding issues before implementation.

Pre-Event Marketing and Promotion

Marketing and promotion content should be considered part of your overall content strategy and not independent of it.

At this point, you should be able to write an event description (2-4 sentences), including 2-4 specific objectives (using bullet points) and include relevant information about your presenter. Prospective participants want to know what specifically qualifies your presenter to address this issue. Keep this bio brief (2-4 sentences) and on topic.

It is also helpful for managing expectations to identify the level of content (beginning, intermediate, or advanced) and what job roles might benefit most from attending. If there’s any pre-requisite knowledge that would be helpful, mention this or provide a resource to help potential participants get up to speed.

Marketing/Promotion tasks include:

  • Plan and execute a comprehensive email marketing campaign for your event. Email subject lines should be succinct (40-50 characters or 5-7 words) and compelling (clearly explain “what’s in it for me” or the “WIIFM”). Both are key to open and response rates. In the email body include the event description, participant objectives and your presenter’s bio. All this information is designed to help your potential participants determine whether your event is a good use of their time.
  • Post the same information or a registration link on your social media platforms. Facebook and Twitter are still the most commonly used events industry platforms. Make sure you know where your audience resides online and meet them there.
  • Invite your presenter to record a brief video introduction to the event for marketing purposes, again, referencing the event description, participant objectives and their relevant background. At the same time, have them solicit questions about the event and its content from prospective participant’s. What questions do they have? What more do they need to know? What do they expect to be covered? Use any feedback received to focus and customize your content.
  • Alternatively, simply invite prospective participants to submit questions in advance directly to your presenter. Again, use any feedback received to focus and customize your content. 
  • Presenter should prepare the following:
    • Introductory, overview slide (event description, objectives and bio)

    • Agenda slide (main topics to be covered, in order)
    • High-level, talking point slides to cycle through during the presentation, using more images than text
    • Detailed talking points or notes for distribution to participants, ideally before the event

  • Prepare a script for your facilitator/moderator with approximate runtime (housekeeping, platform navigation or functionality issues, sponsor info, etc., allow time for Q&A).
  • Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse. There’s a reason TED Talks are so universally  admired yet challenging to replicate. And of course, the more presenters you have, the more you need to rehearse.

Summary: As this task list shows, there’s much more involved in creating compelling digital content than simply “lift and shift.” It’s not easy but it’s not all that hard either if you follow a tried and true content development process. A standardized process will result in higher quality content, more satisfied participants and, of greatest importance to your stakeholders, more effective digital events.

If you have some ideas to enhance digital content before the event, email us info@event-strategy.net and we’ll add it here.

For Content Strategy for Digital Events: Part III – During Your Event, click here.

A slightly edited version of this series appeared on https://www.northstarmeetingsgroup.com.