A guest column by John Knightly, CMO, BlueJeans by Verizon
According to a recent Forrester Consulting survey of key decision makers of marketing event strategies, 66 percent of firms are struggling to achieve the same success from virtual events that they would get from in person events, with 94 percent having experienced issues with their current virtual/hybrid events software. To take a forward look at addressing these challenges, Verizon Business today announced new BlueJeans Events features and partner integrations designed to help bolster the virtual event experience.
As virtual and hybrid event volumes are expected to increase by 36 percent after the pandemic, organizations will require the right tools to help them meet their marketing and growth goals. With new capabilities designed to enhance the overall attendee experience and improve how moderators can customize their events, BlueJeans Events addresses key marketing and communication requirements to increase audience engagement for use cases such as webinars/webcasts, brand activations, tradeshows/conferences and other live events.
The latest enhancements to the BlueJeans Events platform include:
- HTML Embed Enhancements: Event hosts now have the ability to deploy individual BlueJeans Events widgets for chat, Q&A, and polling on any HTML webpage to complement an embedded livestream player. This flexibility provides hosts with the ability to fully customize their landing page environment to ensure consistency with brand elements or other Event requirements. Additionally, closed captioning is now fully supported within embedded BlueJeans Events for no additional charge.
- Event Customizations: Further enhancing the attendee experience, Event hosts now have the ability to upload any mp3 file up to 10MB to provide attendees with a customized audio playlist before the event begins and once the event wraps. For event invitations, admins can now include their company name within the ‘from’ field to ensure communications reflect the appropriate branding.
- Presenter Support: Hosting secure events is mission critical for organizations that present sensitive content for internal audiences. While Restricted Events allow admins to keep unwanted participants from joining via domain-specific invitations, admins now have the ability to allow exceptions and invite specified external presenters to join, while ensuring the integrity of the Event. Allowing speakers, emcees, and event managers to hash out last-minute logistics with an exclusive group chat box, BlueJeans Events now allows “backstage chat” for presenters and moderators to eliminate confusion and streamline communication among on-camera and behind-the-scenes participants.
- MootUp Integration: Now in the BlueJeans App Network, MootUp brings a compelling new dimension to audience engagement by pulling BlueJeans Events into MootUp immersive 3D spaces. Organizers can create, customize and brand their own 3D virtual world where avatars can explore, mingle and engage in their Events.
- Zapier Integration: Zapier allows admins to connect a variety of applications to BlueJeans Events to streamline event logistics and ensure interconnectivity with a host of marketing automation platforms. These integrations will make it easier for Marketers to gain visibility into attendee engagement across the entire Event lifecycle.
Unlocking Value from Virtual Events
The same Forrester survey, commissioned by BlueJeans, found that more than 80 percent of firms agree that with improvements to their virtual or hybrid events strategy, they can achieve the same or greater success as in-person events. Those who look beyond the obvious stop-gap approaches to converting face-to-face events to virtual events will be more likely to execute on the precise combination of technology and creative that underpins delivering a superior, personalized digital experience.
To better support marketing teams and organizations as they work to create a more polished and professional look and feel for their virtual and hybrid events, customers can now tap into Premium Production Services, powered by The Palmer Group. Working in partnership with award-winning broadcast and event producers, these premium services provide end-to-end production capabilities to help customers deliver exceptional on-brand experiences that are streamed at scale with BlueJeans Events.
As marketers look for new ways to position their organization for market leadership and growth, virtual and hybrid events will become more purposefully integrated into the overall marketing strategy. Customers such as Adobe and NASCAR are already using BlueJeans Events to reimagine their marketing strategy to successfully meet customer and partner expectations and achieve engagement, marketing, and sales goals—driving greater value inside and outside of their organizations:
Adobe Case Study: Virtual Tradeshow/Conference
“BlueJeans played an important role in the delivery of Birds of a Feather, a peer-to-peer networking experience, and Meet the Teams, a Q&A session with the product teams developing Photoshop, Premiere Pro and Illustrator,” says Thomas Finet (pictured right), senior marketing technology architect, Adobe. “These two elements of our virtual event toolkit helped make Adobe MAX 2020 a fully digital, immersive experience featuring keynotes, learning sessions, and social events for 56 hours nonstop. By embedding BlueJeans Events widgets directly onto MAX pages, we were able to customize content surrounding our live sessions and brand viewing experiences from beginning to end. This meant that everything from the background and event logo, to colors and banners reflected the look and feel of the Adobe brand to provide a seamless virtual experience for attendees.”
NASCAR Case Study: Partner/Customer Engagement
“For NASCAR, it was critical that we continue to deliver high-quality service to our brand partners as we look to drive value for their businesses in the wake of the world going virtual,” says Michelle Byron, vice president, partnership marketing at NASCAR. “Courtesy of BlueJeans Events, we were well-positioned to do just that—as their suite of tools helped us re-create the in-person partnership experience in an entirely virtual landscape.”
“The pandemic has forever redefined the marketing event strategy,” said Eric Spadafora (pictured right), VP and GM, BlueJeans by Verizon. “While COVID-19 forced marketers around the world to quickly pivot to virtual events, leaders are now taking a step back to reevaluate their virtual and hybrid events strategies and technologies to determine the best path forward. As we look ahead, BlueJeans is poised to help organizations find success with their virtual events so that they can exceed customer expectations.”
For more info about how BlueJeans is empowering organizations to transform their virtual event strategy to deliver real business value, visit www.bluejeans.com
John Knightly (pictured left) is the chief marketing officer of BlueJeans by Verizon. He has 20+ years of marketing, product management and sales experience spanning pre-IPO, mid-sized and Fortune 500 enterprises. He can be reached via Linkedin at www.linkedin.com/in/johnknightly/
