The "front" and "back" of virtual event platforms
There are two sides to a virtual event platform: we refer to them as "front of house" and "back of house."
The front of house is the management components that happen around the event, before, during, and after. These are the tools the organizer sets up and that speakers, attendees, sponsors, vendors, and teams interact with to run the event.
The back of house is the technology that powers the actual event — the video, chat, data, email, user interfaces and functionality that make the event a great experience for everyone.
Most virtual event platforms pick just one to provide: either the front or back of house.
For example:
- Front of house: CVENT, Eventbrite, Bizzabo, Splash, HeySummit
- Back of house: Streamyard, Zoom, YouTube, Twitch, OBS
And they do a good job, but in order to provide all of the components needed for a great event, multiple applications need to be cobbled together. The end result tends to be a disjointed and clunky user experience.
RingCentral Events is the first to provide the front and back of house, all-in-one place. It's simple, streamlined, and seamless for all stakeholders.
6 ways RingCentral Events is different from other virtual event platforms
The main reason we hear the most often: RingCentral Events feels just like an in-person event.
- RingCentral Events is an all-in-one, end-to-end solution. No need to cobble together multiple platforms. Everything you need to host a highly-rated event is on RingCentral Events.
- RingCentral Events' design is sleek, modern, minimal, and efficient. It puts the focus on people, not powerpoints, artificial visuals, or avatars.
- RingCentral Events has a Reception, Stage, Sessions, Networking, and Expo area.
- RingCentral Events is flexible and modular to work with all types, shapes, and sizes of events—from yoga and fitness, to conferences or team meetings, to corporate and recruiting events, to education, to sports, to music, and even to magic shows!
- RingCentral Events is robust. Deep analytics and user data for lead generation and marketing objectives.
- RingCentral Events scales to hundreds of thousands of people.
How RingCentral Events is different from a webinar
At a webinar, only a few people talk. Everybody else listens. Passively. When one person talks for an hour, and 50 or so people are on mute, it feels a little one-sided, not like an interactive event.
Bystander effect takes place; everybody starts to think the other people on the call will volunteer to speak up.
If you’re at all like me, webinars and video conferencing are a chance to hit mute and kick my feet up. Eat something. Surf the web. And go on Twitter.
If you’re an event organizer, or professor, or speaker, you know this is a frustrating problem. You want people to be engaged.
Yes, it’s nice that people can join a webinar from home, but if they’re non-participatory and bored, it’s not really an effective initiative.
The way to solve the disengagement problem with webinars and large video-conferencing events is to put people — building connections — at the center of it.
This is exactly how we built RingCentral Events. RingCentral Events is people-centric, not powerpoint-centric.
If you're looking to put on an event, not a meeting or a webinar, then RingCentral Events may be your best option.
RingCentral Events facilitates unique live video interactions between participants, including automated, random (or targeted) one-on-one networking, multiple concurrent virtual roundtables for breakout group discussions, a stage for live broadcasting to hundreds of thousands of people, and an expo booth for interacting with sponsors and vendors.
Research shows that people learn better in a community. Relationships help people care about learning.
With RingCentral Events, education is applied immediately, whether it’s in personal conversation or group sessions. You can structure a learning environment where people absorb content and practice communicating it with others on the call. Then come back together for another lesson.
From tickets to moderated discussions to Expo areas, RingCentral Events makes it easy for people to gather together, learn, and grow in knowledge, skills, and relationships.
So next time you have to organize a large group video-conferencing event, set up an event on RingCentral Events and watch the enthusiastic smiles spread across the faces on the screen. Leave behind the antiquated and broken webinar platforms and RingCentral Events to the future of virtual events.