What is a CPD virtual event?
Medical practitioners who are engaged in any form of medical practice are required to participate in continuing professional development (CPD). CPD must include a range of activities to meet individual learning needs, including practice-based reflective elements, such as clinical audit, peer review or performance appraisal, as well as participation in activities to enhance knowledge such as courses, conferences and online learning.
A CPD virtual event facilitates learning in an online environment, that has been optimised for an online audience and is provided through a dedicated online platform— making it accessible to more people, in more places.
What are the benefits of a CPD virtual event?
Some of the benefits of taking your CPD event online is that it’s cheaper than accommodating in-person attendees because of reduced variable costs such as catering and venue hire. A virtual event also greatly widens the net to an unlimited audience from around the world; travel time and costs for participants is a non-issue because they simply log in from their home or office. Finally, a virtual CPD event allows the opportunity to continue the education by providing recordings of the presentations as “on-demand content”. Organisers can choose for how long this content stays live, providing further value for attendees and more opportunities to continue the conversations post-event.
What is the process of planning a CPD virtual event?
- Choose the right virtual event partner
Just like any professional presentation, preparation and a seamless delivery is key to a successful CPD virtual event. And while preparation means finessing your content, another vital element is choosing the right partner to host your event.
Look for a partner who:
- Can manage your event, if required – remember to consider elements such as registration, marketing and sponsorship
- Has proven experience providing managed virtual business events
- Will record your event for future training and marketing purposes
- Provides unlimited technical support
- Can supply attendance analytics for fast CPD calculations
- Has ideas to help increase profits, if that is a goal
- Will work to your objectives.
- Design a marketing strategy
There’s no point hosting a virtual event if you don’t have any attendees. Therefore, it is essential to put time into researching and developing a marketing plan that will help you reach and attract your target audience.
Your marketing plan could include:
- Engaging EDMs that focus on the value of the event, including teasers of content and speaker highlights
- Identifying and securing partnerships with organisations such as universities to help promote the event
- Creating a compelling social media campaign, including on-brand graphics and videos
- Designing (if required) a user-friendly website, which will become the centre piece for information and registration for attendees.
- Engage sponsors
Securing sponsors will not only help to drive revenue, but these organisations can be used to help promote the event. There are multiple ways to involve sponsors and provide value in a CPD virtual event, such as:
- Sponsored coffee sample packs (delivered to attendees’ homes)
- Sponsored sessions/ plenaries
- Logo and brand placement on event platform/ app
- Sponsored registrations for early career professionals
There are endless possibilities for sponsoring virtual events – it just takes a bit of creative thinking, a strong event partner and working with the sponsor to deliver on their objectives.
- Create an engaging environment
Content delivery is crucial for CPD virtual events, however screen fatigue is a real issue for attendees. Work with your technology provider to discover all the features of your platform and use them to their full potential. One tool to maximise is gamification elements or activities – this not only helps to break up speaking sessions but, if designed purposefully, can be used to demonstrate return on investment for sponsors. Using pre-organised polls and live Q&A sessions are other ways to hold the attention of attendees, as well as provide more value for your event; having direct access to industry leaders is a key selling point for your virtual event.
Continue the conversation post-event
- Continue the conversation post-event
Once the CPD virtual event finishes, it doesn’t mean the end of the conversation with your audience. With the right post-event communications plan, you can leverage your hard work and continue providing attendees value well after they log off. Ideas may include;
- Providing on-demand content for as long as you wish – this has been known to attract new registrations post-event, increasing overall revenue and value to attendees
- Using post-event data to tailor your communications
- Maintaining regular communications with attendees to alert them to future CPD virtual events of interest
- Obtaining a detailed post-event report on attendees and engagement.
evexus provides all of the technology solutions and the expertise to make your vision a reality. Speak directly with our team today for an obligation-free demo or more information.
