Hybrid Event

A Hybrid Event is a fundraising event that is has both in-person guests and virtual attendees. Within your BetterUnite account, you will click the START button and create either a Virtual Event or an Event - either module will serve your purposes and offer all that you need.

Essentially, you will create your event as an in-person event with a live stream component, but there are many things you can do to make this flow more smoothly for your guests. Some of this will come down to communications, and we will walk through set-up below, but first a few Pro-Tips.

TEST, Test then Test some more: Silent Auction and Event Testing

Testing is key to any event or campaign in BetterUnite (or any other software, for that matter). Before you send out the ticket sales or registration page, move through the ticket purchase or registration process yourself. Take a look at the Guest Experience page. Look at your Auction. Before your Live Stream, test the live stream feed using our How to test/preview live stream before your event feature or by creating a  copy, see: Live Stream Virtual Event: Helpful Tips, of your event and testing there.

PRACTICE CHECK IN

Click on Check-in Guests as shown below.

Guest Check In page will look like below.

You can look up a guest in the Search box on top of the page by:

• Any part of their name
• Email address
• Paddle number
• Registrant name (i.e. the person who purchased the ticket)
• Table name

• Practice guest check in and write a script for check-in table workers to use. Consider if there is a live auction that requires Paddles and bidder numbers, if you're preauthorizing cards using card swipers or encouraging guests to their guest page, if you have table names or numbers. 
• If you are conducting an in-person and virtual Live Auction, your MC or Auctioneer will need a monitor that they can see from the stage that shows them the Manage Auction page within BetterUnite. Someone else should be advancing online bidding increments (not your MC or Auctioneer). This often means a monitor near the stage or a designated person who will wave or indicate in some way that an online bid has been made at different increments and then a way for that person to communicate the online bidder's name. 
• The same monitor will be useful to your MC or auctioneer as they manage an online and in-person Paddle Raise. You can make visible the Thermometer to both the audience and the MC/auctioneer, which will indicate a rolling scroll of donations and new donations as they come in.

• You can also use the monitor to show the Guest Activity  page that will show a running list of donations that have come in and also highlight new donors.

Turn on Advanced Messaging

This will allow you to send different texts to the guests that are in-person at your event and those that are attending virtually.  You can also use this feature to schedule a set of messages before, during and after your event.

Consider choosing to Pro-Up your event with BetterUnite: we've worked very hard to make BetterUnite as intuitive and easy-to-use as possible. Hybrid Events, however, are complex by nature and often require quite a bit of nuance and some guidance. We recommend, if it's possible, that you opt-in to Event Set-Up Support HERE. 

EVENT SET-UP

BASICS

Follow the prompts to detail the specifics of your event and make sure to include a start date and time that corresponds with when you would like your event reminders emailed (they will go out 3 days, 8 hours and 1 hour prior to the event), a physical location.

You can enter the Live Stream information when you first set up your event, but it is not necessary until the time of the event (or when you begin testing your event, which we highly recommend). If you are adding restrictions around your event (i.e. only certain ticket levels can view the live stream), please follow the instructions Here Further Information on Live Stream options can be found Here (Live Streaming Options).

We strongly recommend that you consider using the Show Placeholder feature. As people register or buy tickets, guests will automatically receive the link to their personalized guest page by both text and email. The Placeholder image gives you an opportunity to talk to guests about what to expect and where to go if they are attending virtually. Here is an article detailing the Show Placeholder feature.

CONTENT

This is a first opportunity to explain your vision for the event to your guests. Common things to address:

Content specific to a Hybrid Event might include:

• What is the experience like and what options are available if they come in person?
• What is the experience like and what options are available if they attend virtually?
• Can they change their mind and come in-person or vice versa?

For Hybrid Events:

• It is advisable to use Pre and Post Checkout Commentary boxes to provide information about the nature of your Hybrid Event, as this experience is still new to many guests. 
  • An example of Pre-Checkout Commentary for a Hybrid Event could be: If you purchase an in-person ticket for our event and are unable to attend, you are always welcome to join the live stream!
  • An example of Post-Checkout Commentary for a Hybrid Event could be: Make sure to check your text and email to get your Guest Experience link and check out our Silent Auction now! This is also where you will be able to watch the live stream, no matter where you are.
• The Event Reminders are essential to getting your virtual attendees to the event. We strongly recommend that you DO NOT opt to turn these off, unless you plan to create your own branded reminders with the guest link - the is the only way your virtual attendees have to interact with your event.
• If you upgrade to Advanced Messaging, you can customize the Ticket Purchase Acknowledgement Text to say something like, "Whether you attend via live stream or in-person, please take a look at your unique guest page for auction items...", etc.

Guest Experience

For a Hybrid Event: 

• Allowing credit card preauthorization on checkout (when your guest purchases their ticket) will reduce the number of people that need to swipe a credit card as they check-in to your event

• We recommend leaving Guest Link Visibility in our default mode of allowing your system to send the guest their link at the time of purchase. Your guests will receive 3 default email reminders with their personal link and you can also choose to (and we recommend it) send those out via text just before or at the time of the event.
  
  

ADVANCED

• Under Purchaser Checkout Requirements, we recommend that you leave PHONE as a Required field. This allows you to text your guests and makes sure they receive their guest link via text as well as email.
• If you've created Group Tickets - please make sure that you look through Guest Requirements and if you need additional information from your ticket buyers' guests, create Custom fields Here is an article on custom fields.

EVENT OFFERS

Please read about Giving Levels Here and items for sale Here. There are no specific notes about this topic as it relates to Hybrid Events.

RAFFLES

Please read about Raffles HERE. There are no specific notes about this topic as it relates to Hybrid Events.  If you need to distinguish between attendees in-person versus online, you can do so based on the purchased tickets during your random drawing within the system.

TICKERS

For a Hybrid Event, we would strongly encourage the use of Custom Tickers in advance of the event to communicate what time the show starts, that this is the page to view the live stream, etc. These messages will scroll across the bottom of the guest experience page and can be used before, during and after your event.

AUCTION

Please read about Silent Auctions HERE.  Your virtual and in-person guests will interact using the same interface so there are not hybrid-event specific instructions. However, if you wanted to offer specific items to in-person guests or vice-versa, you can use the exclusive auction feature to distinguish based on ticket type.

Please read about HYBRID Live Auctions HERE. Reminder: this is a very important piece to practice before your event since you will be handling requests coming online as well as in-person.

MANAGE EVENT

Back to your Manage Event Dashboard. A few things are handy here when it comes to your Hybrid Event:

• Advanced Guest Managing: A reminder that it is advisable, particularly for a hybrid event, to opt-in to our Advanced Guest Messaging, so you can filter and schedule the text messages that you send out to your guests. 
• Guest Activity: Great for seeing who is online at any given time and a log for your MC/Auctioneer of who has given to your event (particularly useful during a paddle raise).
• Table & Team Management Overview
• Guest Check In

 

 

Thank you for reading! Let's go do some good.