Planning a successful virtual or hybrid event comes with a lot of planning. One key metric of success is stakeholder engagement, do people come away from your event feeling connected, engaged and inspired? It might feel a daunting goal to reach for, but today we want to outline how the humble swag bag, reimagined for the digital age, is a great tool to utilise.
What is a virtual swag bag?
A swag bag is a familiar give-away from all kinds of in-person events. Standing for Something We All Get, the swag contained is usually branded freebies from event owners and sponsors, aiming to keep their organisation in delegates minds, even after the event day buzz has worn off.
A digital swag bag takes the same concept but instead of a branded tote bag, a digital platform serves as the bag, which is loaded with digital items to giveaway. Your digital Swag bag can be filled with whatever content you choose, discounts, downloads, competitions, e-learning resources or even physical swag order forms, are just some examples of great digital swag.
Why go virtual?
There are so many reasons to upgrade your swag bag offering from physical to digital!
- 1. Its more accessible
With a physical swag bag, you need to physically attend to collect your freebies. This means that virtual audience members are totally missed out. A bad deal for virtual attendees and a missed opportunity for marketeers. With a virtual swag bag, you can access the great content wherever you are in the world, creating a greater sense of event community.
What’s more using a digital goodie bag platform that has been rigorously tested to ensure digital accessibility (check out swagablebag.com as a great example) means you are being fully inclusive in your offering. The UC Berkely definition of digital accessibility is that “websites, tools, and technologies are designed and developed so that people with disabilities can use them”. Given that the World Health Organization estimates that in 2024, 16% of the worlds population have a disability, offering an access anywhere, digitally accessible Swag bag is a simple but hugely effective way to boost interactions with your event swag.
- 2. Its greener
Replace single-use items that are destined to be thrown away (think branded notepads, bags and pens) with an online booking link, access to keynote or speaker resources, a coupon for a discounted service or even a free coffee (to name but a few) and take a big step toward making your event a more sustainable one.
The reduction in shipping and storage by removing (or even just reducing) physical swag offerings will also reduce the overall carbon production of your event, and lower costs.
Businesses in all sectors are being increasingly driven by consumer behaviour towards greater consideration of the environmental impact of their activity. Within the events space, this shift has led to many well-known multinationals enacting a no-swag policy for their events. A virtual Swag bag can offer an effective work around for this, providing all the benefits of a swag bag but with far less waste.
- 3. You can use it before, during and after your event
With a customisable swag bag service (such as a Swagable bag) you can take greater control of how you utilise the marketing and engagement potential of your giveaways, and you can track your success to finesse future offerings.
Before the event: Rather than just on event day, why not offer your virtual swag bag to delegates from registration and then use the space to build momentum for the event, get people involved with quizzes and competitions and even provide resources ahead of time.
During the event: On the event date your Swag bag could be a place to network and book in meetings or referrals with exhibitors or other hybrid delegates. You can also drive traffic toward specific sessions with giveaways offered via the virtual swag bag and offer speaker notes when the presentations have been delivered.
A virtual swag bag also has unique potential to foster a sense of event community with a hybrid or fully virtual audience. Why not consider offering delegates a chance to order a branded item (hoody or coffee cup for example) to use during the event itself. Or provide a voucher for everyone to grab a coffee from their local retailer, to share together at online event breakouts.
After the event: Once the event is complete, your virtual Swag bag can be used by sponsors for those all important giveaways and referrals. In built within the Swag bag, data capture means trackable return on investment for everyone who contributes Swag. Via your virtual Swag bag you can even offer access to the digital release of a new ap or online course at a later date, keeping interest in the bag going for longer and offering greater value to your contributors. A digital swag bag can also work as a great repository for best-practice and feedback sharing post event.
Conclusion
Having looked at the benefits for event planners, delegates, sponsors and even the environment of the virtual swag bag, we would love for you to take a look in more detail and find out how a customised Swag bag will boost your next event. Head over to Swagable.com (a Chati partner) now and you can book a free individual demonstration to get you started.
