Earlier this year, we shared a blog post as part of our Collaboration Drives Innovation series that touched on engaging digital experiences. This week, we had the opportunity to dive deeper on that topic with our partners at Susan G. Komen® and our friends at the Peer to Peer Professional Forum.
In case you missed it, we wanted to share some key takeaways that you can immediately integrate into your virtualized event planning for the fall. Here are 5 guiding questions you can ask yourself as you design an online experience for your participants:
- How is your event truly unique? On the Susan G. Komen 3-Day®, we have a captive audience for an entire weekend, and we refer to that world as the “3-Day Bubble” or the “Pink Bubble.” The different components of the event, from the inspiring opening ceremony to the long but energizing walking along the route, the hilarious and supportive crew, the emotional remembrance ceremony and the uplifting closing ceremony all contribute to this immersive experience.
- How can you tap into those key experiences and emotions and bring them to life? For the 3-Day, it was key to start by selecting the right type and frequency of online engagement events to keep the participants engaged and supported through 2020. We settled on three types of online events: Social Hours, Virtual Walks, and Kick-Off Events. Each had its own goals, program, and atmosphere, but each tapped into special aspects of our live 3-Day event that translated to an online experience.
- What makes your participant community special? On the 3-Day, we’re all about passion. Our dedicated fundraisers, teams, survivors, and crew are so vital to the program’s success, and the majority of them come back year after year. Mostly, our participants missed each other and the connection they get to feel on-event so our roster of online events provided this opportunity for connection and engagement.
- How can you bring them together? Pro-tip: go where the people are. Instead of investing in new technology, we chose to leverage existing online tools like Zoom, Facebook Live, Instagram, and YouTube videos to combine pre-recorded messaging, live conversation, outdoor activity, and meaningful live storytelling. No one wants to be talked at for hours, so we mixed up the programming for each type of event to keep participants engaged throughout the day.
- How can you inspire your participants to continue making an impact? At the end of the day, successful and engaging online events should result in more dollars raised. As peer-to-peer fundraising programs continue to virtualize, providing online engagement will be more important than ever and with each virtual online event the 3-Day has held, we’ve seen a correlation in increased fundraising for that week.
Want to hear more about how you can create engaging online experiences for your community or signature P2P fundraising event? Check out our webinar here.
