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Giveaways have content they can share with their audience to demon-
strate thought leadership. And LinkedIn's conversational
"There are so many cool things you can do to create a full ads are very effective for summits. If your audience is easy
experience around your virtual event," Papakonstantinou to target on LinkedIn, it's an effective way to use a chatbot-
said, adding that short sessions, post-session analysis and like conversational experience to promote your event."
speed-networking drive value and save the audience's
time. He also recommended adding physical components, Connections
such as mailing swag bags to attendees, offering virtual
daycare by hiring a magician to teach tricks to kids at Sean Murray, chief editor and publisher of deBanked, has
home and sending out mojito kits for happy hour. seen growing excitement leading up to Broker Fair. The
third annual finance gathering he'd organized was set to
The March 2020 Identiq Member Summit drew fintechs return to New York City in May 2020; it quickly transi-
from around the world, including Blackhawk Network, tioned to a virtual setting in June. A two-for-one confer-
Eventbrite, Gett, Green Man Gaming, Intuit, PayU, Plastiq, ence package enables participants to attend the 2020 vir-
Udemy and Via. Attendees, who received personalized tual and March 2021 on-site Broker Fair, he noted.
goodie bags ahead of the virtual event, wore their con-
ference lanyards to the Zoom meetings, according to Itay "Broker Fair will not be another webinar," Murray said.
Levy, Identiq CEO. "We designed a virtual world with a real tradeshow floor.
Attendees will be able to walk around the exhibit hall, in-
Levy recalled that weeks away from the planned event, it teract with avatars, attend sessions, take pictures of the
became apparent that a physical conference couldn't hap- event and do everything they normally would at a confer-
pen. Despite the rapid change in plans, the summit was a ence."
success, he stated. Participants discussed how to use Iden-
tiq technology to fight fraud and improve customer expe- "There's no substituting in-person networking events,
rience without sharing user data. Attendees from leading but kudos to the deBanked team for taking a chance and
security brands shared knowledge and drew on their ex- gauging the potential of an additional form of networking
pertise to engage with this new possibility. we can utilize in the future," added Ken Peng, director of
business development and marketing at Elevate Funding,
"An important part of what made it worthwhile was that a Broker Fair sponsor. "Any new platform for us to inter-
it gave folks an opportunity to see and meet other people act with potential and existing partners is very exciting to
outside their day-to-day [contacts]," Levy said. "In an era of me."
working from home, it felt almost a bit normal for a couple Omnichannel strategy
of hours. I think, in the current reality, that's an important
thing: finding the balance between something that feels Andrew Hernandez, managing partner at Central Dili-
special and something that feels reassuringly normal." gence Group and Broker Fair sponsor, expects to see more
standalone and hybrid virtual conferences going forward.
Takeaways "We like the idea of connecting and engaging with people

Papakonstantinou pointed out that virtual events are in a new way and forming relationships with people we
asynchronous, which enables planners to do more with may have not met otherwise," he said.
content. They could intrigue the audience with 20-second
snippets of golden nuggets from a talk or by taking some- Several days after wrapping TRANSACT Connect, Kelley
thing out of context, then directing viewers to sign up for said virtual events will be top of mind as she reviews mo-
the event to see what the speaker really meant, he advised, bile app and survey data and explores future possibilities.
adding that planners could also share an insightful analy- Just as the payments industry has embraced omnichannel
sis of a talk, then ask viewers to sign up to get access to the commerce, the ETA will consider deploying tailored of-
full presentation. ferings through multiple media to reach people wherever
they are, she stated.
Virtual conference attendees expect high-quality, action-
able content, Papakonstantinou stated. The best way to "There's a lot to learn, but humans have a powerful need
stand out is to demonstrate what they will get at your to connect, and there are certain ways we can deliver con-
event. This means highlighting content and what they tent online and foster connections," she said. "It will be in-
will learn. Live polling and chat can help drive engage- teresting to see how many people registered for the event
ment, and pre-recorded content can be used to promote who had never been to a TRANSACT.
the event. Short clips can be shared on social media, pay-
promoted on YouTube and posted on LinkedIn, he noted. Dale S. Laszig, senior staff writer at The Green Sheet and managing
director at DSL Direct LLC, is a payments industry journalist and content
"Sharing on LinkedIn can be very powerful when you tag development specialist. She can be reached at dale@dsldirectllc.com
your speakers, because they can share and their audience and on Twitter at @DSLdirect.
gets to see it," Papakonstantinou said. "Your speakers now

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