What Should I Think About First When Hosting My Event Online?

Starting the process of thinking about an online event can be head-spinning – what resources are out there? What services do I need to translate my event online?

No matter which direction you want to go, early in your online event planning process you’ll want to decide on your virtual event platform.

A list of virtual event platforms

The virtual event platform is where your digital attendees will experience the online event. You can think of the event platform as the online venue for your digital attendees.

Nearly all of today’s virtual platforms are DIY: the platform offers an online venue where your attendees will assemble, but you’ll need to DIY your own content – that means planning Zoom and Skype calls, testing browser connections, sorting out technical issues, going back and forth with presenters to figure out whether their internet is fast enough, or collecting quotes from other streaming services to produce video that will stream to the platform via RTMP.

Here’s a list of some virtual event platforms that are available options for online events when you don’t mind DIY’ing your own content:

DIY Event Platforms:

  • Runtheworld – A useful complete package, especially for nonprofits and community organizations running free events to build awareness of initiatives
  • Hopin – An all-in one platform – everything that happens at a physical event replicated online
  • Crowdcast – A livestreaming video service with features specifically focused on creating an online event experience
  • Remo – For online networking focused events
  • Airmeet – Online events produced using in-browser features like your laptop webcam

When you are ready to go beyond DIY’ing your own content

When you want to deliver a professional online event with quality video and engaging presentations which avoid all the intermittent connections, fuzzy cameras and dropouts that are par for the course when you DIY your own content – choose Jumbo.

The Jumbo team provides a full service virtual event platform that includes a remote control room where our producers will ensure everything is 100% before taking it live. No more ‘can you hear me’ pauses or interruptions.

Fully Integrated Event Platforms:

  • Jumbo – Virtual event platform with a control room producer integrating your remote and local speakers with production graphics