Top 10 Must-Have Features in a Virtual Event Platform

Virtual event platforms enable companies worldwide to plan and host engaging and fun virtual events for many individuals, including students, clients, customers, employees, and others. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of virtual event platforms has increased dramatically, allowing for greater diversity, inclusivity, and connectivity for individuals from all over the world. 

When hosting a virtual event, choosing the right virtual event platform is crucial. This enables you to meet the goals of your virtual event needs, whether it’s specific features or seamless engagement. With the number of virtual event platforms increasing every year, researching the right platform to meet your goals will enable a successful event for both you and your attendees. 

Here, we will examine the top 10 essential features for searching for the right virtual event platform. These include user experience, engagement tools, customization, content delivery, interaction features, and more. By doing so, you will better understand the key features that you could use to make your virtual event much more successful. 

When choosing the right virtual event platform, intuitive navigation or finding things quickly and easily should be a top priority. This enables your attendees to seamlessly navigate your virtual event without the need for outside assistance, giving them a sense of comfort and ease even before they begin to engage with other attendees and guests. 

Additionally, the virtual event platform that you choose should emphasize a user-friendly interface for attendees and organizers. This further enables a seamless user experience since all features and tools will be easily accessible for everyone without the need for outside assistance. 

The final aspect of finding a virtual event platform with a seamless user experience is accessibility considerations, as your attendees and organizers will most likely require seeing- and hearing-impaired accommodations and might even require outside assistance to navigate the event. Additionally, some might have concerns regarding their internet connection, and choosing a virtual event platform that can assist them with this will prove instrumental in ensuring a better user experience. 

All successful virtual events need interactive engagement tools, and choosing a virtual event platform with these features will ensure a successful virtual event. One of these features is live chat and Q&A, which enable attendees to engage and interact with each other and guest speakers throughout the virtual event.  

Another engagement tool you should look for in a virtual event platform is polls, surveys, and audience feedback mechanisms. These enable attendees to provide valuable feedback throughout the event, which organizers can use to make real-time improvements without needing to wait for future virtual events. 

Finally, gamification elements have become an essential method to boost engagement for virtual events, and ensuring your virtual event platform has gamification features is strongly recommended. Gamification offers your attendees the opportunity to engage and interact in a fun and friendly environment where they can earn prizes and points for their work.  

As a virtual event organizer, one of your goals should be customization, as you might find your goals and objectives for your virtual event differ from those of other organizers. Therefore, the ability to customize event pages and registration forms for your virtual event platform is highly recommended, as this will provide you with the freedom to create your virtual event according to your vision, goals, and objectives. 

This also includes branding opportunities throughout the platform. You want a virtual event platform that will enable you to seamlessly showcase your brand throughout the virtual event, which your attendees will remember for future events. 

Finally, personalization features for tailored attendee experiences are even more critical than customization features for organizers, as virtual events are designed to maximize the experience for attendees worldwide. Therefore, choosing the right virtual event platform that enables personalization for attendees is highly recommended for a successful virtual event. 

Other interactive features you should consider in a virtual event platform include support for live streaming and on-demand content. These features will enable your attendees to participate in real-time with guest speakers while having access to their talks later in case they need to refresh on the topic or miss it entirely.  

To ensure seamless live streaming and on-demand content, the importance of high-quality video and audio playback for the virtual event platform that you choose cannot be understated. This will ensure your attendees have a seamless visual and audio experience throughout and after the virtual event. 

Finally, compatibility with various content formats, including presentations, videos, documents, and much more, is essential for a successful virtual event and is highly recommended to search for when finding your virtual event platform for your event. Through this, your attendees will be able to seamlessly access all content without the need for outside assistance or experiencing glitches. 

All successful virtual events strive to maximize their engagement features, which is accomplished through virtual networking lounges and breakout rooms, enabling your attendees to interact in a one-on-one setting. Therefore, finding a virtual event platform with these features will ensure your attendees have the most engaging experience possible.  

Another interaction feature you should pursue in a virtual event platform is AI-powered matchmaking for relevant connections, as this will enable you to connect the right attendees or even the right attendees with the right speaker. You significantly increase diversity, inclusivity, and connectivity for everyone through this.  

Finally, social media integration for seamless sharing and engagement is an essential feature of whatever virtual event platform you choose. This enables you to use social media to promote the event and even post live updates for your attendees and speakers.  

A perk of virtual events is the ability to collect expansive attendee data. Something in-person events may struggle with.  Seamless analytics and reporting ensures the success of your next event. Real-time data insights during events are essential when choosing your virtual event platform. They let you monitor engagement metrics and interaction between attendees and guests in real time to see where your attendees are congregating, what people enjoy, and spaces they may avoid. Through this, you can take the necessary steps to provide real-time improvements, ensuring your attendees have the most engaging experience possible. 

Additionally, post-event analytics for performance evaluation is another feature you should pursue in a virtual event platform, as this ensures you will gain the necessary knowledge and feedback for improving future virtual events. 

This all ties into tracking attendee behavior and engagement metrics, which your virtual event platform should provide to enable you to provide your attendees with the most engaging experience possible.  

Security and privacy are essential for all online endeavors, and ensuring your virtual event platform is safe and secure is critical to a successful virtual event. This includes end-to-end data security encryption, ensuring your virtual event is safe and secure from start to finish and that hackers won’t be able to sabotage it at any time. 

Another virtual event platform feature you should pursue is secure access controls and authentication methods, as this enables you to easily control your security features throughout the event, ensuring a safer and more secure virtual environment for everyone.  

Finally, compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDRP) and other data protection regulations are essential features to look for when searching for a virtual event platform. This ensures the platform is following all security protocols for protecting your event, which brings you peace of mind when hosting your event and future ones.  

Along with ensuring key features, the virtual event platform you choose should also be able to handle large attendee numbers in case your virtual event is anticipated to be larger than expected. This will ensure seamless features and engagement without overloading your platform with too much data at once.  

Additionally, your virtual event platform should possess reliable infrastructure for seamless performance. This ensures your virtual event will operate at full capacity without the need to fix glitches and bugs throughout the event, enabling your attendees to have the most seamless experience possible.  

Finally, your virtual event platform should provide scalable solutions to accommodate growing event needs since a successful virtual event will mean more significant virtual events in the future. Therefore, a platform that can meet the growing event needs is essential for maintaining successful virtual events for years to come. 

The virtual event platform you choose should provide excellent customer service for both you and your attendees. This includes responsive customer support channels that can be accessed in real-time and interact with real people. 

Additionally, onboarding assistance and training resources are essential support tools you should pursue when looking for an appropriate virtual event platform. This ensures both you and your attendees have a seamless experience when familiarizing yourselves with your virtual event and future virtual events.  

Finally, proactive technical assistance from your virtual event platform during events is essential to ensure smooth operations throughout the event for both you and your attendees. Through this, you ensure seamless, real-time help for any technical and logistical glitches that someone might encounter without pausing the entire virtual event. 

As noted above, integration is essential for choosing your virtual event platform. Seamless integration with customer relationship management (CRM), marketing, and payment systems is also essential for your attendees to have the most seamless experience possible, specifically when it comes to paying for the virtual event or other items related to the virtual event. 

Additionally, compatibility with third-party apps and software is an essential tool that you should pursue for your virtual event platform. This enables you to seamlessly integrate outside tools and software into your virtual event, ensuring your attendees have a more enjoyable and engaging experience. 

Finally, the virtual event platform you pursue should possess an application programming interface) API access for custom integrations and development will enable you to provide seamless communication and connectivity between multiple systems, both inside and outside your virtual event. Through this, you provide your attendees with seamless engagement and interactivity with each other, guests, and support personnel.  

Here, we introduced several virtual event platform features crucial to event success, including user experience, engagement tools, customization, content delivery, interaction features, and much more. It's important to keep these features in mind when determining the right virtual event platform for you, as they will ensure seamless engagement experiences for your attendees and provide real-time feedback and support. With the right virtual event platform, you can provide successful and impactful virtual events for years to come while increasing diversity, inclusivity, and connectivity for individuals worldwide.