Best Practices for Virtual Seminars and Events

During the coronavirus pandemic, we have an ongoing and essential responsibility to serve our members at Elevations Credit Union, and help relieve their stress around money during this difficult time. In addition to providing loan deferment programs, taking health and safety precautions, and making donations to support those impacted by COVID-19 in our community, we knew we couldn’t lose sight of our commitment to financial education.

Our objective is to provide our members, as well as the entire community, with unbiased information. One way we do this is by hosting dozens of free financial seminars that are open to the public. Topics range from home buying and financial planning to Social Security, retirement planning and more. We also bring in speakers for topics like wellness and leadership, and we even run a tremendously successful classic film series. In 2019, we hosted 99 seminars that more than 2,200 members and community members attended.

The coronavirus pandemic presented a unique challenge for our seminar series. Historically, all of our seminars were presented in person at locations along Colorado’s Front Range. This format did not align with the new health and safety precautions of the pandemic. So, we decided to shift our seminar format so we could offer all of our seminars online. This has allowed us to bring our members and community together with access to our events while we all stay safer at home.

Tasked with the challenge of moving these seminars online, we worked to provide this experience via an online, interactive conferencing solution. Since April 9, we have provided 25 events online to over 700 attendees.

Five Key Takeaways for Hosting Online Seminars

1. Directing the community to a central location to view our upcoming seminars has been and remains a key to our success. We house our calendar of events at elevationscu.com/events. We promote our seminars through member emails, social media, our website and local media outreach.

2. We now require attendees to register two hours ahead of the seminar start time so we can ensure they receive the link to the seminar. This link is sent in an email confirming their sign-up.

3. We designate facilitators from the Elevations team to set up each online invite, monitor the event and be present online throughout each seminar. This allows for seamless interaction, introductions, the fostering of questions and answers, and assistance with any technical difficulties.

4. We prepare our seminar speakers. Our events team provides speakers with information on how to use online conferencing tools, tips for creating a visual experience, and insight for navigating conversations and questions.

5. We send a follow-up email to attendees after the event with a link to the recording and contact information should they have follow-up questions. In addition, we include a customized survey for each event that collects information on what they thought of the speaker and content, and invites attendees to submit ideas for future events. We also give them the opportunity to request a follow-up communication from a professional at Elevations.

Transitioning to a virtual platform was a natural fit for continuing to provide our members and community with the valuable content they’ve come to expect from the seminar series. As we continue to stay safer at home, these seminars offer educational, engaging and timely opportunities.

Jeffrey Kash is Community Development Manager for Elevations Credit Union in Boulder, Colo.