Event planners are gathering session topic proposals for their events to stay top-of-mind during the coronavirus lockdown.

Lockdowns and social distancing measures due to COVID-19 are creating huge uncertainty for the events world at the moment. Uncertain income and cashflow are obviously major challenges for the whole industry, but uncertainty creates particular headaches for event planners: how much planning should you do if you’re not sure if or when your event will take place?

How is Corona impacting the events sector?

Coronavirus has already created a huge impact on the event industry. It started with strict health measures and rules to minimize the health risk of event attendees. Now, many of the events, from conferences to musical festivals, are being cancelled or postponed in order to stop the spread of coronavirus and ensure the health of attendees.

How Can Technology Help?

The meeting and event industry is no stranger to crisis. Natural disasters, political unrest, health scares, or an unimaginable act can happen at any time, anywhere in the world. Event organisers must be prepared to pivot and act quickly. You’ve likely dealt with one-off event disruptions for years, and hopefully have a crisis management plan in place to address those situations. But when massive, widespread disruption strikes, the stakes are even higher.

As we enter the second month of the Covid 19 crisis, a lot of the talk within the events industry has honed in on the need for diversification by way of virtual events and meetings. Perhaps understandably so given that the live events industry has come to an almost complete standstill. However, are we placing too much emphasis on the need for companies to diversify into the virtual sphere once we finally reach the daylight at the end of this unprecedented tunnel?

Everybody who works in the event industry knows how vital it is to maintain strong engagement levels with their participants. High ratings and positive feedback often follow when event organizers are able to successfully involve participants throughout a meeting! There are plenty of good activities to use in a physical meeting in order to promote engagement, but what if the participants are participating virtually and calling in through a conference platform?