The future of events in a post-Covid landscape

An example set up of The Belfry Live

By Katie Niland, sales director at The Belfry Hotel & Resort

It has been a challenging year for everyone, and the events and hospitality industries in particular have been hit hard by the pandemic. We are seeing light at the end of the tunnel now that millions of people have been vaccinated and venues are beginning to fully reopen. The pandemic has meant that virtual events have played an important role for businesses, but how will this shape the industry going forward?

Adapting for the future

Over the last year, venues have had to rethink and redefine their options for delegates. At The Belfry we have introduced new facilities and equipment to enable businesses to stay connected, including The Belfry Live and Belfry Studio, our professional virtual meetings and events solutions that allows organisations to connect live with audiences across the globe.

Virtual meetings have been vital during the pandemic and this will continue to be the case even as physical meetings and events start up again. New tech was always going to come; however it has accelerated because of the pandemic.

Having no option but to host hybrid events much more frequently has given us the opportunity to innovate and create new ways for us to run conferences and events, and it won’t be temporary.

Virtual events allow brands to be seen by a lot more people as it enables them to increase the size of their audience. The content is being recorded and reused and has a longer life span, which will likely

The virtual Women in Security Awards 2020

encourage companies to invest more in their brand and their messaging which will in turn have benefits to the company.

With greater awareness of what a virtual event can now deliver, we have seen an increase in enquiries for hybrid events throughout the year. It enabled us to provide a platform for a new product into an established meetings market as both an alternative and an exciting new way to host events.

The best of both worlds

While the number of attendees is restricted at physical meetings and events due to venue capacity or travel restrictions, hybrid events allow planners to extend their reach. This makes it more cost effective and a more inclusive experience for both planners and attendees, which is a real positive.

I believe hybrid events are here to stay, but we know that many people, including our clients, are looking forward to the return of face-to-face meetings.

As the industry recovers, we have the benefit of a variety of options of how we host events going forward. We are still taking lots of enquiries for large events as our clients still want events to take place in person, when it is safe to do so.

Hybrid events have introduced a whole new way in how our industry will work in the future as it offers a number of new benefits to the sector and is a cost-effective way to communicate and connect with a larger audience. This isn’t the end of face-to-face events but virtual events offer a terrific alternative when meeting in person isn’t possible.