If, like many organizers, you’re new to virtual events, you might be feeling just a bit nervous. Whether you have years of in-person event experience or this is the first event you’ve ever worked on, getting the chance for you, your speakers, and any other important participants to practice their roles in a dress rehearsal can be an important part of guaranteeing a smooth event day.
Rehearsal Sessions can give you the confidence in your event you need to start sleeping soundly. In addition to rehearsing everything through the same platform you’ll be holding the event, rehearsal sessions are invite-only, meaning you don’t have to worry about confused attendees stumbling in as you plan for event day. Besides rehearsing sessions, it can also be an opportunity for speakers to meet beforehand and network as they prepare! With a rehearsal or two under your belt, you can stop worrying about technical issues during the event and start enjoying what you’ve put together.
Allow speakers, presenters, and other select participants to practice their roles
Giving speakers and other participants a chance to practice can be one of the biggest benefits of conducting a dry-run. Speakers and presenters will rehearse presentations. At the same time, they will also likely want to upload any of their material and run through it to make sure it goes off without a hitch. Moderators will need to understand how to mute and unmute panelists while also accessing Q&A.
Whova lets you keep these rehearsals organized and easy to navigate by selecting who should participate in which sessions. The organizer can quickly select broad categories of participants like speakers, sponsors, organizers, and other roles (particularly helpful if you’re organizing a big event!), or be more specific by choosing participants manually. From there, participants can practice their parts in the upcoming event without confusion!
Address any potential issues before the big day!
In addition to getting the chance to practice, rehearsal sessions can be an important opportunity to resolve any unanticipated problems as they’re brought up. Is your Internet speed much slower when livestreaming than you realized? Is there poor audio or any technical issues with your browser?
Whova’s Rehearsal Sessions allows you to start your event with your best foot forward, rather than hurriedly dealing with unanticipated problems on the morning of.
Don’t worry — attendees won’t accidentally peek at your rehearsal
No need to worry about confused attendees joining rehearsal sessions while you’re still getting things figured out; Whova keeps your rehearsals both accessible and secure.
While the rehearsal sessions can be easily joined directly through the Whova platform, only invited participants can view them. The event organizer specifically chooses which roles or individuals will have access to the rehearsal session.
Go through all the steps of running a virtual session
Rehearsal sessions are set up much like you would a normal session, meaning you can choose to add speakers, pre-recorded video, livestreams, and more. Livestreams can be added through a link or instantly integrated from a Zoom meeting with Whova’s Advanced Stream Integration. Once all of this is set up, practice playing the videos and holding a livestream with the speakers and moderators to ensure that all these features will run smoothly on the day of the event.
Running different types of sessions? Quickly set up multiple rehearsals
If you want to schedule multiple rehearsal sessions for any reason, such as conflicting schedules or wanting to rehearse different functions with different participants, you don’t need to re-enter all the same settings. Instead, just clone an existing session, create a new session in a matter of seconds, and then make any changes to the settings you want.
Rehearsal sessions can be scheduled for blocks of up to three days, but if plans change last minute, it’s easy to delete or reschedule them! If you’ve set up lots of rehearsal sessions and are planning on moving all of them, the entire rehearsal can even be moved altogether to save time and eliminate more manual work.
Ensure a smooth event day with a dress rehearsal
With the right preparation, even a first time event organizer can put on their virtual event without any issues, and Whova’s Rehearsal Sessions is there to help make preparing for any possibilities easier than ever!
If you’re interested in how else Whova can help your virtual event go off without a hitch, schedule a free demo here: