Level Up Your Virtual Events With Vouchermatic
Keep your audience wowed with exciting minigames!
By Elayne Law
When the pandemic took the world by storm, people had to stay at home. Thanks to that, the popularity of virtual events surged. Held over video conferencing software, these virtual events worked almost like real events, although participants could only attend from the comfort of their own homes.
Even after restrictions loosened, some companies are sticking to virtual ones. In fact, 92% of businesses still intend to hold them despite physical events being allowed to resume. Additionally, 46% of companies intend to host more virtual events in 2022 than 2021.
Needless to say, virtual events have peaked in popularity and they are here to stay.
#1 Challenge of Virtual Events: Audience Engagement
According to Markletic, audience engagement is the topmost challenge when it comes to virtual events. First of all, an average of 35% of people who signed up for virtual events don’t attend. Even worse, 53% of attendees experience “virtual fatigue” during these events.
Because of this, it is the organisers’ priority to ensure that their audience doesn’t “turn off” during the event. It didn’t take long to realise that the best way to keep their audience focussed is through interaction.
There are many ways to interact with your audience. Audience engagement tools include holding live hangouts before or after events, Q&A sessions, and, of course, gamification.
Gamification in Virtual Events
Gamification refers to the addition of gaming elements into non-gaming environments. It appeals to your audience’s sense of excitement, of fun. It keeps them on the edge of their seat, eager to see what happens next.
49% of businesses say that clients interact the most with engagement elements, with gamification being one of them. Moreover, 86% of event attendees rated an event app as one of the top three reasons why they enjoyed an event.
Doubtlessly, your virtual event can benefit from a sprinkle of thrill and enjoyment. But how can you incorporate gamification into your event?
Virtual Event Gamification Ideas
There are many kinds of minigames and gamification elements that you can utilise out there. Point systems, badges, AR… If you’re fresh out of ideas, here are some that you can consider using for your upcoming virtual event(s).
Stamp Cards
Just like a physical event, virtual events allow participants to head to different booths to interact with the stallholder.
To encourage participants to visit as many booths as possible and to maximise stallholders’ interactions with potential customers, you can consider implementing a digital stamp card program.
These cards allow participants to collect a stamp each time they visit a booth. When they reach a certain number of stamps, they can exchange these stamps for prizes.
It doesn’t matter how many speaker sessions or booths that you have — a good stamp card program should let you customise the number of stamps that you can collect on your stamp card.
With the reward dangling in front of their noses, participants would be naturally inclined to visit many booths and seminars to collect enough stamps to exchange for prizes. This guarantees audience engagement and attendance at your virtual events.
Scratch Cards & Spin-the-Wheel
Scratch Cards and Spin-the-Wheel are both luck-based games where participants stand to win a prize when they play.
The chances to play this game can be awarded to participants who complete a certain action during the event. For example, they can receive a Scratch Card after they made a purchase. Or, they can have a chance to Spin the Wheel.
The allure of rewards is one thing to keep audiences engaged. However, you mustn’t forget about the exhilaration that these games provide. The brief moment of not knowing whether or not you get the prize is comparable to that when you crest the peak of a rollercoaster.
The stomach-dropping tension that runs through your participants as they scratch the card or spin the wheel is addictive. This electric feeling compels them to do more at your event to increase their chances at winning your grand prize.
They get their excitement, and you get their engagement. Both sides win in this scenario.
Digital Lucky Draws
This is an event that involves everyone. By accomplishing a certain action at your event, just like with Scratch Cards and the Spin-the-Wheel games, participants can put their names down for your event-wide lucky draw.
A digital Lucky Draw is simple in implementation, and if held online or in-app, easy for your audience to register and participate as well.
The awe that lucky draws bring is akin to the lottery. A grand prize awaits the winner. If your name is chosen, you have beaten the odds. It’s great at effecting a sense of pride — an intrinsic reward alongside the big-ticket extrinsic one.
Digital Lucky Draws can be streamed, and prizes can be awarded to participants in real-time. This speed appeals to audiences’ desire for immediacy as well.
Furthermore, digital Lucky Draws work best when they are held as your event draws to a close. After all, who wouldn’t want to end it with a bang?
Conclusion
The rah-rah available through physical events cannot be translated over to virtual events. As such, it is necessary to engage audiences in a way that is unique to virtual events.
Stamp Cards, Scratch Cards, Spin-the-Wheel, and Lucky Draws are simple ways of prompting your audience to engage as fully as they can with your event. If no-one is listening to your speakers, no-one is visiting booths, then how can you call your event a success? It hasn’t added value to anyone’s lives.
Want to start your own virtual event gamification campaign today? Well, Vouchermatic can help you with that!
If you are in need of any of the four games listed above, we are more than happy to implement an iteration that would suit your needs. Not only can we help you with the gamification aspect, we can also incorporate our own voucher management system to help you distribute your rewards quickly and easily.
With an API-first platform, we can seamlessly integrate our software into your existing web page or app. Technology-wise, just leave it up to us! Focus on designing how you’d want your game to look like, and the types of rewards that you want to hand out.
Interested? Hit us up here to discuss your gamification strategies today!
Originally published at https://vouchermatic.app on June 22, 2021.
