Today’s work culture was compelled to adopt a remote culture, which now appears to be an excellent way to get everyone from the organization together at the same time. Online meetings are here to stay even after all the restrictions on traveling and lockdowns will be lifted. But the question is how to make these Virtual Meetings more effective? How should one make up for the deficiency of face-to-face interactions?
To cope up with this, we have compiled some vital steps that will help you conduct even better and productive virtual meetings;
1. Define Your Virtual Meeting Objectives
Every online meeting needs to have a definite objective. Discuss with different managers and leaders of your organization what should be the goal of your meeting. Ask a few questions to yourself such as;
- What will be the KPIs of your meeting?
- How will you achieve the meeting objectives?
- What will be the Meeting Agenda?
These essential questions will help you conduct a successful virtual meeting that will recreate the experiences of an in-person meeting.
2. Plan The Meeting Agenda
A virtual meeting Agenda offers a pre-decided order that needs to be followed during the meeting to avoid any confusion. It is necessary to map out the meeting Agenda and mention the same in your invitation emails. This way, the participants will have the complete meeting information beforehand for easy reference.
3. Set Ground Rules
First thing, you need to follow some basic rules. A good meeting needs to include some ground rules for participation to be followed by all the attendees. For example;
- Do not leave the meeting without informing
- Mute your mic when someone is speaking
- Use raised hands to feature if you have any questions
- Introduce yourself before speaking or asking any question, especially if it’s an audio call
- Ask your employees or attendees to log in at least 5 minutes before the meeting
- Encourage your attendees to restrict any distractions like background noise to put their entire focus on the meeting
Setting these vital ground rules helps maintain the decorum of any virtual meeting. It also keeps everyone updated regarding the ongoing and upcoming sessions.
4. Schedule Your Meeting Carefully
It is important to decide the meeting’s date and time carefully to welcome more attendees. When you schedule your meeting, make sure to consider the different time zones of the attendees. With people attending the Meeting from different parts of the world, this becomes even more necessary.
Also, make sure that your virtual event does not collide with any other distinguished events of the industry. You can use several tools that can help you plan the meetings even more efficiently.
5. Invite People
Conducting a virtual meeting needs a proper protocol. First, pen down a list of attendees who you want to involve in the meeting. Then, send out the meeting invitations. These invitations should look professional. Make sure to include the following information:
- Compelling subject line to convey the purpose of the Meeting
- The names of some important speakers to lure more attendees
- The list of the specific ground rules
- The complete meeting Agenda
- The time and date of your virtual meeting
6. Keep Shorter Sessions
Distractions are just a click away for virtual attendees. Hence, this is why it is necessary to keep short sessions or include breaks between the sessions to keep everyone involved. We understand that it can get super monotonous for attendees to sit at a place for long hours. Therefore, plan your sessions properly.
Consider keeping a break or refresher just before an important session. Attendees can use this break to either have a coffee or they can simply stimulate themselves. It will pump their energy, and it would be easier to deliver the message of the upcoming sessions rightly.
7. Promote 2-way Interactions
It is important to make way for 2-way interactions to conduct a successful and engaging virtual meeting. Make the most of the live chat feature, live polls, surveys, and Q&A sessions to encourage real-time interactions.
So, be very wise while selecting the virtual venue partner. It is important to look for a virtual trade show or meeting platform that has brushed its skillset to include features like virtual networking tables, AI-based recommendations, networking lounge, CXO lounge, and many more to make your meeting more interesting.
Consider starting with an icebreaker activity to keep your attendees engaged right from the beginning. You need not necessarily begin with the meeting sessions instead you can ask the attendees about things like “Which activity did they miss the most during the lockdown?”, “What new did they learn during the lockdown?”, or you can ask the attendees about their latest accomplished goal that they are proud about. A few moments of a casual chat allow attendees to connect and interact with each other.
8. Leverage the Right Technology
Now, that you are familiar with the steps involved in holding a successful meeting, it is time to decide on the technology and virtual meeting or AGM platform. There are enormous platforms available in the market, so do your research and then pick your enterprise solution carefully.
Your virtual meeting platform should be able to organize live polls, surveys, or Q&A sessions that can help attendees learn, interact, and connect.
It should also have a strong data trackability feature to provide comprehensive data regarding attendee navigation and the KPIs of your event. It will help you gauge the success of your online meeting and make necessary improvements to plan even more successful events in the future.
Another notable feature that the platform should possess is 24/7 customer support. This feature ensures that if the audience faces any issue while signing up, immediate assistance can be provided by a mindful team of experts.
Wrapping Up
Working remotely and virtual meetings are sure to persist. Hence, it is vital to keep conventional practices at bay to make way for new features and innovations. To elevate the level of your online meetings, make sure to pick the right virtual event software.
We hope the above-mentioned ideas will help you plan even more successful and effective virtual meetings.
