What comes into your mind when you hear the word ‘Virtual Stage’?
You might get a glimpse of lights, anchors, cameras, stage fright, and actors, along with an online broadcasting system. With the advent of technology, we have seen the emergence of virtual and hybrid events, which have transformed the way the stage used to look like in the past.
Now, the stage could be your living room, a production studio, or maybe a café, from where you can interact with your audience and sponsors. Social media is also acting as a catalyst to democratize the conventional stage.
Applications like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and YouTube allow anyone to perform or present their views at any time from virtually anywhere. A virtual stage has turned into an innovative platform used to perform and present ideas and stories to audiences.
What is a Virtual Stage?
A virtual stage is a platform where the audience and attendees can interact, access content, view event-specific information, and communicate with each other. People do have a notion that a virtual stage is like a live streaming or Zoom meeting.
However Virtual Stage goes way further than that. It acts like a blank canvas, which could be used as a keynote stage, could be utilized to organize a Q&A breakout session, or simply for displaying the services and products.
You can share the virtual stage information and joining link with your audience, which they can access via their emails or social media accounts. A virtual stage could include live streams, a live chat, pre-recorded content, and numerous other content for the attendees.
Common Elements of a Virtual Stage
A Virtual Stage usually consists of the following elements:
Video Player: It streams live and pre-recorded content. It could be integrated with YouTube, Zoom, WebEx, Google Meet, and numerous other video players.
Virtual Stage Scheduler: This enables the organizers to schedule the sessions and allows attendees to view the event agenda and join current and forthcoming sessions.
Public Chat System: This section allows attendees to communicate with each other and engage with the speakers as well.
Language Translation Ability: This component translates the content and offers it in different languages to the attendees so that they can avail content in their preferred language.
Sponsor logos: It allows organizers to put sponsors’ and other stakeholders’ logos below the video player and other strategic locations so that viewers can click on them to visit their website directly.
Popular Use cases of Virtual Stage
Well, the virtual stage is getting good traction among technology enthusiasts. It has been used in the following use cases by people across all the verticals.
- Virtual events
- Drag Performance
- Interviews
- Interaction of Head of State
- Meditation Session
- Virtual Gyms
- Educational Seminars
Large enterprises and people have started implementing the Virtual Stage for its overwhelming potential. It allows you to expand your creative footprints to bring much-needed change into your digital transformation initiatives.
You can explore the 10 most innovative Virtual Stage examples for inspiration.
Salesforce World Tour Sydney Reimagined
Salesforce was among the first enterprises that started holding virtual stages and events due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It organized a world tour event for its customers, employees, and salesforce community members. It is one of its kind of online experience, that eliminated the need for audiences to travel to Sydney and attend in person.
Salesforce organized numerous virtual stage events, where Salesforce development company, developers, entrepreneurs, and end-users were able to interact with each other and discuss the Salesforce ecosystem and future offerings. This virtual stage was a massive success as it attracted more than 80,000 viewers for its live stream service, whereas it gathered more than 1.2 million video views across all the social media platforms.
The NBA Restart
This was not a usual virtual stage event, it was indeed a restart of the 2019-20 NBA season. The audience was waiting for this season with bated breath, as was shut down for more than four months. However, due to COVID-specific restrictions, no viewer was allowed to enter the league’s “bubble” in Orlando in person.
NBA found a way out, it used innovative technology that enabled the viewers to watch the games while being projected on in-arena video boards for viewers, players, and coaches. This virtual stage experience was created with the help of Microsoft Teams’ Together mode. It uses an AI segmentation technique to bring viewers together into a shared background, just like an arena, coffee shop, or conference room.”
VidSummit
It is an annual conference for the video industry. This is where video makers, entrepreneurs, marketers, renowned brands, and influencers come together and discuss various aspects of their businesses. As the creator economy is becoming mainstream, a large number of professionals are exploring different methods to accomplish their passions and professional requirements.
At VidSummit, the video creators discuss and learn exactly that stuff. It offers a seamless platform where people can discuss the technical aspects of their video-specific businesses, while they can review and test numerous gadgets online. VidSummit launched a video-on-demand service in 2019 as a hybrid-event alternative. It enabled viewers to replay in-person stage events from the leisure of their homes.
Step+
Step+ is among the most renowned media companies in the Middle East. It works with entertainment companies and various other brands. It has created a niche space for its ability to organize live events, virtual stage events, and Step conferences. They have launched Step+, which is an extension of their online conference and in-person virtual events.
It enables users to set up panels, upload talks, conduct interviews, and publish keynote speeches of accomplished leaders and speakers from a wide spectrum of industries. The videos could be streamed via a web browser on any internet-enabled device. Content could be accessed later via on-demand services as well.
SBC Digital Summit
It is virtual gaming and betting industry stage event, which took place from April 27 to May 1. It has been designed to offer the audience an interactive experience. It uses an innovative digital platform to offer full-fledged virtual stage and event spaces to the viewers. It features numerous advantages of the exhibition and physical conferences.
The virtual audience can connect to the Lobby Area, from where they can access the virtual venue based on their access. An audience can visit the exhibition hall, explore various booths, meet with exhibitors, and view their services and products as well. They can watch presentations and listen to the speaker panels. It allows audiences to use Networking Lounge, to interact with others privately or in group conversations.
World’s Greatest Motivators
It is a live-stage event that brings together popular motivational speakers and celebrities to the stage. It helps the audience to gain real-life experience while interacting with their beloved celebrities.
This platform helps audiences to learn from others’ experiences and implement best practices to live happier, fuller, and healthier fuller lives. This virtual stage solution offers a video-on-demand platform that puts hours of stage performances, seminars, and keynote speeches in your pocket.
Tomorrowland Around The World ” The Digital Festival
It is one of the most popular music festivals in the world. This Belgian music festival started offering virtual stage events experience from July onwards. It provides a never-before-seen experience to its audience by offering music stage shows, webinars, workshops, interactive entertainment, and various other activities on a unified platform.
It brings highly popular performers such as Steve Aoki, Katy Perry, Martin Garrix, and David Guetta. The platform features various artists performing on virtual stages, where thousands of virtual fans get connected via the internet on a virtual 3D island. It also offers laser shows, special effects, sound effects, sound effects, fireworks, and more ” just like a conventional music festival.
YourStage.live
It is a Swiss organization that brings local stages and performers to a wider audience via an online video platform. It’s an affordable yet powerful service for performers and small groups or theatres who want to attract a global audience without much investment.
It allows partners and performers to upload their pre-recorded video or live performances on YourStage.live’s video-on-demand platform. It accepts videos in a wide range of formats, genres, and styles, with a well-maintained content catalog devoted to them. It also runs a monetization scheme, that helps content creators to generate income via a quarterly revenue share program, which is calculated based on numerous internal metrics.
Quad City Symphony Orchestra
It is a symphony orchestra based in Davenport, Iowa (USA). This orchestra is representing the quad cities for over 100 years. This 96-member strong orchestra is performing live shows and concerts at Augustana College in Illinois and Adler Theatre in Iowa for many decades.
Quad City Symphony Orchestra changed its strategy post-COVID to engage its audience in a better way and keep its members performing via a virtual stage platform. They have created an online premium video-on-demand platform, which allows the audience to access the live streams and even purchase the stage events. The price of these tickets is at par with the in-person concert ticket, whereas the audience can also rent a performance replay.
Opera Australia
It is Australia’s national opera company, which performs at Arts Center Melbourne and the renowned Sydney Opera House. They were scheduled to perform numerous stage events in 2022, but due to the unprecedented impact of COVID-19, they were forced to cancel all their events abruptly for the entire year.
This situation demanded an innovative solution, and that’s exactly what they did to stay connected with their audience. They created a digital strategy to kick off virtual stage events and devised a concept of OA TV. It is a freely available video-on-demand platform that offers opera and other interesting content to viewers. On this platform, viewers can access opera stage performances, celebrity interviews, documentaries, and other events from the leisure of their homes.
Final Words
We hope this blog must have enhanced your understanding of the concept of Virtual Stage events. You can take a cue from the above-mentioned examples to create a Virtual Stage solution for your organization, which can improve the engagement with the audiences and vow potential users as well.
If you have any sort of doubt or concern, then kindly get in touch with our expert consultants. We can certainly help you transform your idea into a full-fledged virtual stage organizer solution in no time.
Author
Gourav Sharma is a Digital Marketing Strategist at Arka Softwares, a leading mobile app development company. He has 4 years of experience in the Information Technology industry. He spends his time reading about new trends in Digital Marketing and the latest app development technologies.