2020: The Year of the Virtual Conference

This time last year, many of us had never attended a virtual conference or an online meeting. Now, it’s practically second nature.

The one thing this pandemic has achieved is to push companies to take a fresh look at the way they do business. Business events have been forced to adapt by holding virtual conferences. In fact, it is predicted that in 2021, video and web conferencing will account for 80% of all internet traffic.

AWL has embraced the virtual conference with enthusiasm. After all, while it sounds like a logistical nightmare to coordinate over 85 global partners online, remember we do logistics for a living. For us, it’s a just another business challenge.

During November 2020, our national teams attended two of our Global Partner Networks via scheduled Zoom, Teams and Skype appointments.

With both networks taking place within a three day period, our teams were certainly kept busy. They met face to face with over 85 global partners, all in 15-minute slots. Now that’s an example of logistics working successfully.

So, what will happen to virtual conferencing once the world gets back to normal? How many organisers will permanently move their conferences to a digital platform?

Many experts predict that virtual conferencing will definitely remain part of all upcoming business events. While meeting in person is always a preferred option, the experience of reaching millions of attendees around the world is too good to be quickly forgotten.