NY Times
THERE are no stale bagels at virtual trade shows. And no free knickknacks. But this new kind of gathering, which takes place in cyberspace, does deliver something real: sales prospects with more than a passing interest in your products or services.
More businesses are holding conferences and other events online rather than in hotel ballrooms or convention centers. Like their real-world counterparts, virtual trade shows come with panel discussions and speeches by industry experts, exhibit booths from sponsoring companies and open spaces where attendees can mingle amidst trade show displays.
While still an experiment, virtual events have the advantage of reducing costs associated with staging a physical convention with trade show booths. According to executives at companies that have taken the plunge, exhibitors can track online visitors’ activity, helping them determine who might be a serious prospect.
“We can show people not just who came in and how long, but really show the specifics of the content that they interacted with,” said Robert Rosenbloom, a co-founder and chief executive of PlatformQ, a virtual event start-up in Needham, Mass., that is planning its first two events for this fall.
Because visitors to virtual trade shows tend to feel they are more anonymous online than in person, they often spend more time looking through information than if a sales representative were staring at them from across an exhibit booth, Mr. Rosenbloom said.
A hot prospect might leave behind traces of five or six points of contact, said Les Yeamans, the founder of ebizQ, a media company in New Rochelle, N.Y., that produces dozens of online conferences each year. “It’s a very efficient ecosystem,” he said.
EbizQ was an early customer for Unisfair, a Menlo Park, Calif., company that has been host to more than 250 virtual events. Founded in 2002, Unisfair has developed an Internet-based environment not unlike the 3-D world of the video game Second Life, except that it showcases exhibit booths, presentations and other information related to a particular event or topic.
“We have to make sure that within 30 seconds to a minute that people know what’s possible,” said Brett Arslaner, vice president for marketing at Unisfair.
The cost of virtual trade show exhibits depends on variables like the number of sessions it hosts simultaneously as well as the number of attendees and the number of exhibitors, but it is generally far less than a physical production.
“This makes all sorts of sense for a large distributed audience,” he added.
Mr. Arslaner said many Unisfair clients, including Hewlett-Packard, which employs the technology for meetings of its customers in more than 90 countries, consider virtual events a complement to regular conferences. “By no means do we advocate that physical events are going away,” he said.
Keeping the intimacy of a live event was a big concern for Richard McDonell, a group manager of product marketing for the PXI and Instrument Control division of National Instruments.
“We wanted to preserve the eventlike feel and the sense that this was something important to attend,” said Mr. McDonell, who converted an 18-city industry road show, called the Automated Test Summit, into a consolidated virtual conference last May.
The online conference — and an archived version that remained available for 90 days — drew 1,950 visitors. That compared favorably with the roughly 100 people the previous year’s show attracted at each stop. It also included more participants from abroad.
The event delivered more customer prospects than anticipated more quickly, while significantly reducing costs for the sponsors, Mr. McDonell said.
Many companies have begun offering virtual trade-show services, although none has the name recognition of Unisfair, said Jeffrey Mann, an analyst with Gartner, a market research firm.
“I think a lot of the basic hurdles and problems are going away,” he said.
PlatformQ plans to provide online conferences for financial services, educational, health care, real estate and construction businesses and industry associations.
The common trait of a successful event — real or virtual — is good content, and trade show rentals Mr. Rosenbloom said. “The reason people come to events is the programming,” he said.
As Mr. Mann echoed: “You want to see busy booths, run into friends. You want to avoid the sweaty rooms and waiting for taxis, but you want to keep the buzz and the live feedback.”
More businesses are holding conferences and other events online rather than in hotel ballrooms or convention centers. Like their real-world counterparts, virtual trade shows come with panel discussions and speeches by industry experts, exhibit booths from sponsoring companies and open spaces where attendees can mingle amidst trade show displays.
While still an experiment, virtual events have the advantage of reducing costs associated with staging a physical convention with trade show booths. According to executives at companies that have taken the plunge, exhibitors can track online visitors’ activity, helping them determine who might be a serious prospect.
“We can show people not just who came in and how long, but really show the specifics of the content that they interacted with,” said Robert Rosenbloom, a co-founder and chief executive of PlatformQ, a virtual event start-up in Needham, Mass., that is planning its first two events for this fall.
Because visitors to virtual trade shows tend to feel they are more anonymous online than in person, they often spend more time looking through information than if a sales representative were staring at them from across an exhibit booth, Mr. Rosenbloom said.
A hot prospect might leave behind traces of five or six points of contact, said Les Yeamans, the founder of ebizQ, a media company in New Rochelle, N.Y., that produces dozens of online conferences each year. “It’s a very efficient ecosystem,” he said.
EbizQ was an early customer for Unisfair, a Menlo Park, Calif., company that has been host to more than 250 virtual events. Founded in 2002, Unisfair has developed an Internet-based environment not unlike the 3-D world of the video game Second Life, except that it showcases exhibit booths, presentations and other information related to a particular event or topic.
“We have to make sure that within 30 seconds to a minute that people know what’s possible,” said Brett Arslaner, vice president for marketing at Unisfair.
The cost of virtual trade show exhibits depends on variables like the number of sessions it hosts simultaneously as well as the number of attendees and the number of exhibitors, but it is generally far less than a physical production.
“This makes all sorts of sense for a large distributed audience,” he added.
Mr. Arslaner said many Unisfair clients, including Hewlett-Packard, which employs the technology for meetings of its customers in more than 90 countries, consider virtual events a complement to regular conferences. “By no means do we advocate that physical events are going away,” he said.
Keeping the intimacy of a live event was a big concern for Richard McDonell, a group manager of product marketing for the PXI and Instrument Control division of National Instruments.
“We wanted to preserve the eventlike feel and the sense that this was something important to attend,” said Mr. McDonell, who converted an 18-city industry road show, called the Automated Test Summit, into a consolidated virtual conference last May.
The online conference — and an archived version that remained available for 90 days — drew 1,950 visitors. That compared favorably with the roughly 100 people the previous year’s show attracted at each stop. It also included more participants from abroad.
The event delivered more customer prospects than anticipated more quickly, while significantly reducing costs for the sponsors, Mr. McDonell said.
Many companies have begun offering virtual trade-show services, although none has the name recognition of Unisfair, said Jeffrey Mann, an analyst with Gartner, a market research firm.
“I think a lot of the basic hurdles and problems are going away,” he said.
PlatformQ plans to provide online conferences for financial services, educational, health care, real estate and construction businesses and industry associations.
The common trait of a successful event — real or virtual — is good content, and trade show rentals Mr. Rosenbloom said. “The reason people come to events is the programming,” he said.
As Mr. Mann echoed: “You want to see busy booths, run into friends. You want to avoid the sweaty rooms and waiting for taxis, but you want to keep the buzz and the live feedback.”
