Categories: OLD Media Moves

How The Information succeeded in taking its events online

Sara Jerde of Adweek writes about how tech news site The Information has been successful in putting its events online during a pandemic.

Jerde writes, “The Information’s WTF virtual conference took place over two days in early September, featuring a lineup of speakers including Facebook’s COO Sheryl Sandberg and chief diversity officer Maxine Williams, according to Lessin. In total, over 500 attendees bought tickets costing $1,000. For comparison, 2019’s event hosted fewer than 200 attendees in Times Square.

“To recreate the interactions between attendees, The Information used software Hoppin to chat with people during appointed network breaks in five-minute intervals. The publisher also uses Zoom for its virtual events. Most of the speaker sessions were pre-recorded, which helped with preparation but limited their timeliness. In the virtual world, attendees were more inclined to interact, ask questions and chat, too. According to Lessin, this model generated greater revenue and far lower costs than its physical event.

“Both the Autonomous Vehicle Summit in June and its WTF Summit in September retained the sponsors from their physical equivalents, which included Helm.ai and Roku. ‘It was incredible,’ Lessin said, adding that she can’t envision a world in which the publisher would go back to offering just in-person events without a virtual component.”

Read more here.

Erica Thompson

Recent Posts

Dynamo hires former Business Insider executive editor Harrington

Former Business Insider executive editor Rebecca Harrington has been hired by Dynamo to be its…

2 days ago

Bloomberg TV hires Kerubo as desk producer

Bloomberg Television has hired Brenda Kerubo as a desk producer in London. She will be covering Europe's…

2 days ago

Jittery CNBC staff reassured by new boss

In a meeting at CNBC headquarters Thursday afternoon, incoming boss Mark Lazarus presented a bullish…

2 days ago

Making business news accessible to a wider audience

Ritika Gupta, the BBC's North American business correspondent, was interviewed by Global Woman magazine about…

2 days ago

Rest of World hires Lo as China reporter

Rest of World has hired Kinling Lo as a China reporter. Lo was previously a…

2 days ago

Bloomberg rises to No. 7 biz news website

Bloomberg News saw strong unique visitor growth to its website in October, passing Fox Business…

2 days ago