Case Study: Adobe Off-Site Event Goes Virtual

Editor's Note: This is a story that we are hearing over and over. As budgets get tightened live events are being canceled and organizations are forced to find alternative ways of reaching their audiences. Given this we asked Jason Parker from our Adobe IT team to share his recent experience with this to share our story for how we had to rapidly pivot and figure out how to run this off-site event virtually.

Recently Adobe had the opportunity (and challenge) to convert what was originally planned as a 4-day off-site event focusing on our EMEA community to a virtual event with a worldwide audience.

This virtual event was comprised of three 2-day events focused on our major Geos in their local time zones (Americas, EMEA/India, Japan/APAC).

Each day started off with a General Session which included a combination of live video, presentations and pre-recorded videos. The General Sessions were followed by multiple breakout sessions and hands-on workshops all hosted through Connect Pro and integrated with our Video Bridge. We leveraged Connect Pros capabilities with session specific branded Connect rooms, breakout rooms, chat, Q&A, music and games with the goal to keep the sessions as interactive and engaging as possible.

The event involved over 300 attendees plus an additional 110 of our partners from across the globe all managed by a staff of four (not including presenters and MCs). This event was hosted in over 38 Adobe facilities with many, many more remote attendees who joined us via Connect on their laptops.

One of the many benefits of producing this event via Connect Pro was the ease and ability to record all of the sessions making them available for those who were unable to attend the live event. Another cost saving benefit is we did this without the expense and delay of post-production commonly incurred when recording to tape.

The total savings for this on-line event was 99.6% less than the estimated budget! This was factored from a pure spending perspective comprised of; estimated man-hours of internal staff, catering, hotel accommodations, A/V, conference room rental, badges, signage and logistics staff. Our budget did NOT include the estimated cost of travel or increased number of presenters who became involved since they did not have to travel.

In conclusion, Management was so thrilled by the results and feedback of this inaugural event a second event is already in the planning stages and has become the foundation on which to plan future events.