You’ve got your live events and you’ve got your virtual events. Now, producers are discovering the benefits of merging the two platforms together to fortify the event brand, reach untapped, distant markets and offer an appealing option to second and third-tier sponsors who would otherwise be shut out of a live opportunity. UBM Studios has been bullish on the virtual event platform and has incorporated the technology into live events in a variety of ways—as both an attendee benefit and a revenue growth engine.

What Is It?

“We’re defining it as an event that combines in some way a physical event with a virtual event,” says Kate Spellman, SVP/managing director of UBM Studios. “We’re finding that hybrids are becoming more common. They can be as simple as video streaming, and they can be used as audience recruitment for the live event.”

How you determine the kind of virtual event component depends on the live event model already in place. Fundamentally, however, there are three basic models: Pre-event, during the event and post-event. Pre-event virtual shows generate buzz and can act as powerful live event audience-building tools. Run simultaneously with the live event, virtual shows offer an opportunity to tap previously unavailable markets or audience segments—think out-of-the way geographic locations and demographics that don’t quite make the cut for the live show. Post-show virtual events obviously extend the life of the brand, but also provide a way for attendees who couldn’t be in two sessions at once, or even make the original event, to access content on an ongoing basis.

UBM is running a hybrid event for its Black Hat conference in late July in Las Vegas. It’s based on a pay model—attendees pay for selected, key content—and the company is leveraging the virtual component to target international markets. “We’re promoting the virtual part to the international audience,” says Spellman. “It gives us an opportunity to brand and test in different regions. We’re discussing a virtual retail show in Turkey for the fall, which will precede the live event and offer a great way to test the market and content.”

Spellman says they’re taking a two-tiered marketing approach. The international marketing for the virtual component started much earlier given that the domestic audience is already familiar with the brand.

Other benefits to the hybrid model, says Spellman, include the option for executive staff to allow their junior teams to attend the virtual portion, and the ability to slice and dice the virtual component into a variety of different content models. “Many people think a virtual trade show has to mimic the live event. What we’re seeing is more variations of it. It can be just the sessions, for example, which opens up a new revenue stream.”

Revenue Models

Two years ago, says Spellman, there was concern that virtual events would cannibalize live events. “We’re over that,” she says. “There’s a lot more interest now on how to expand the community and how to extend reach and business from the sponsor’s standpoint. We find some of the best ways to do that is to package it with the event you have, and upgrade into the virtual buy. The upsell is probably the simplest way. Other ways to sell the virtual portion is to give platinum sponsorships to companies that can’t do the live event—second and third-tier companies.”

Costs to build a hybrid event are all over the map, says Spellman, and they haven’t settled in yet. Platforms can be as simple as a resource center and go all the way up to a major event environment. Accordingly, says Spellman, costs range anywhere from $20,000 to $30,000 on the low end to “the sky’s the limit.” One constant is the more custom the event, the more expensive it will be to build.