Event marketers are in a unique, albeit unenviable, position on marketing teams. Typically, events take up a large portion (if not a majority) of a marketing team’s operating budget for a year. This means that every dollar needs to be meticulously accounted for and, on the backend of an event, the results had better match the investment. Tracking, analyzing, and reporting on event metrics can make or break a marketing team’s entire strategy for the year to come.

As event marketers have shifted to virtual-first events, the approach to event marketing metrics has also had to shift. There are a few things to note here before we dive into critical virtual event metrics to track:

• First, although virtual events may not be as high-dollar as in-person events, there is the chance to host or attend more of them throughout a year. So, even though marketing events might not take up as much as the budget, they will be more commonplace throughout the year.

• Second, as your team takes the leap to virtual events, the tools you use to track and manage virtual event metrics may look different from how you managed live events. Because you aren’t scanning badges or tracking conversations, those tools should instead make way for digital-first engagement tracking, messaging platforms, and dashboards to visualize audiences.

• And finally, your event marketing goals shouldn’t have to change too much from in-person to virtual events. Whether your bottom-line goal is to collect new leads, move prospects through the sales funnel, or close a current account renewal deal, these can all work with virtual events – if you are tracking the right metrics.

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Now, let’s get into some of the critical virtual event metrics your team must be tracking this year:

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1. Registrations

‍This is a critical metric for any event but can be incredibly informative when tracking virtual event metrics. Look at registrations – and where they are coming from – to identify your top advertising channels moving forward.

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2. Attendees

‍This number is typically looked at in comparison to registrations. If you’re hosting your own virtual event, this number should be pretty high to help track towards a good ROI. Suppose you are attending a virtual conference or networking event. In that case, the number of attendees can help determine if this should be part of your overarching event marketing strategy down the road.

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3. New contacts:

‍A favorite virtual event metric for many event marketers, new contacts are fresh, new leads not yet part of your system. Many teams have found virtual events to be a great way to attract new contacts from social media, online postings, or shares that may not have heard of the event otherwise.

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4. Average length of attendance

‍One creative virtual event metric to track is the length of attendance. If you’re seeing a mass exodus of attendees during your webinars around the 45-minute mark, this could be a sign to start running 30-minute webinars instead.

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5. Attendee engagement

‍Just because you’re not face-to-face doesn’t mean you can’t track lead and attendee engagement. Instead, virtual event metric tracking looks at questions, hand raises, post-event follow-up, and other types of interactions to see how engaged your audience was during your event

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6. Post-event lead movement

‍This is the significant virtual event metric that everyone (including executives!) is looking at when gauging ROI. What are some tangible numbers we can attach to the virtual event in question? Were any deals closed? Did a prospect change to an opportunity? Tracking these details in your CRM – while linking back to your event – can put real dollars next to your event.

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Stay on track with Circa

With Circa, event marketers can track engagement and ROI from their virtual events in real-time. With seamless visibility into all of your virtual event metrics, event marketers, department leaders, and executives can easily understand and collaborate on one of the most exciting channels in marketing. You can learn more here.