I'll Drink to That
Total Expert Inc. turns sour grapes into sweet results via a virtual wine-centric replacement for its in-person outings. In normal times, Total Expert Inc., a customer-experience platform for financial services, feeds the sales pipeline through fun networking opportunities ranging from sports games to food tours. When COVID shut down in-person gatherings, Traci Saliterman, the company's experiential events producer, needed to adapt the strategy to online engagements in a way that replicated the success of her prepandemic offerings.

Saliterman's goal was to develop a series of virtual meet-ups to connect key prospects with some of Total Expert's best customers who would sing the firm's praises. "These events are not sales pitches, but fun networking opportunities to get our best customers in a room with our top prospects and sales reps," she says. "And then the magic happens."

She hit on the idea of hosting a wine-tasting series dubbed Summertime Sips throughout the summer of 2020 – because who couldn't have used a few glasses of wine with others during that dark time? And she opted to use Zoom since just about everyone was already familiar with the video-conferencing platform.

Total Expert's sales development reps and customer engagement team got to work targeting and scheduling attendees, who are typically chief marketing officers and heads of experience – i.e., people who appreciate wow factor. They aimed at grouping prospects and customers by region to create intimacy and ensure everyone could network with new faces from their area. Saliterman cultivated the right ratio of participants for each encounter: two-thirds prospects and one-third existing customers along with a sommelier, a co-host, and a couple sales reps. The company limited each event to 25 participants since it seemed the right size to promote on-screen participation, and it worked perfectly with Zoom's five-by-five layout.

Saliterman interviewed several sommeliers before landing on Jason Kallsen, founder of Twin Cities Wine Education, because his captivating and energetic personality really shined online. Next, she sourced items for a wine box mailer that included a trio of half bottles of vino (rosé, chardonnay, and cabernet), a wine opener, three plastic wine glasses, three coasters, and a personalized letter with instructions for prepping the wine. Finally, she partnered with Jack Nadel International, a promotional merchandise distribution company, to package the materials and ship the boxes prior to each gathering.

The wines arrived in the mail a few days before each tasting, giving attendees enough time to chill the whites. Just before each event, everyone filled their glasses and hopped on Zoom. Sue Woodard, chief evangelist officer for Total Expert, and the sommelier emceed the 60-minute tastings and kicked things off with a round of introductions. When existing customers introduced themselves, they inevitably launched into their experiences working with the company, which is just what Saliterman hoped for. "That's the magic," she says. "Customers who are big fans leave a positive impression that you can't form in any other way."

Then the wine tasting began with Kallsen educating participants about each vintage as they sipped away. About halfway through the event, he thanked Total Expert for bringing everyone together and played a 90-second video overview of the company and its services – and then it was back to the wine. To ensure everyone stayed engaged, emcees sprinkled in a few queries such as "If you could travel anywhere, where would you go?" and a polling question about each person's favorite wine.

After an hour of networking, learning a bit about Total Expert, and enjoying wines, the soiree wrapped up. But work on the company's end did not. Saliterman followed up with a personal email to each attendee and a survey about the engagement. A few days later, attendees received a "Wine Pager" newsletter in their inboxes, which thanked them for joining the tasting and provided tips from the sommelier about how to best enjoy wine in the future. And, of course, the sales development team continued to connect with prospects.

Saliterman had initially planned to host a series of 10 tastings throughout the summer but ended up adding two more because the social buzz – no pun intended – had prospects and customers asking for invites. And even though exact sales results are difficult to calculate be-cause of the long sales cycle, Saliterman estimates that the events generated more than 15 times the investment. Cheers!

Back in the Game
Verizon Media uses gamification and friendly competition to lure employees to its internal corporate event. Twice a year, Verizon Media holds Build It, an internal conference at five of its campuses designed to celebrate its brands' accomplishments and provide employees a first look at new products and services. The event, however, was forced to make the all-digital leap for the first time in April 2020, and Verizon only had three weeks to pull it off. But the marketing team wasn't going to be satisfied with a snooze fest featuring a prosaic parade of speakers, which was the MO of many virtual gatherings early in the pandemic.

So Verizon Media rebranded the conference Build It: WFH (Work from Home) and connected with the Orlando-based experiential agency MVRK LLC to design a web-based experience. "Verizon Media was looking for a solution to a problem we would all later learn would be an industrywide issue: How do we keep our at-home audience engaged, interested, and connected during a time of isolation?" says Sarah Bolandi, MVRK's director of client services.

MVRK came up with the idea of a gamified experience where attendees would move a game piece around a virtual board. "With a main goal to inform and promote educational moments, gameplay tactics were the ideal way to deliver important messaging to employees in a whimsical way," said Melissa Conlon, lead strategist for MVRK. The virtual game board featured a brightly colored cityscape with a sidewalk consisting of 14 squares (one devoted to each of the company's brands that had information to push out) that meandered through the city beginning at a house in one corner and ending in the final space, which was "back at home" in the opposite corner. The concept was to reflect a physical journey through a day in the life of consumers as they interacted with Verizon Media and its brands, from waking up to Yahoo News alerts to checking Yahoo Mail and passing billboards powered by its ad technologies.

Build It: WFH kicked off with a live keynote from the company's then-CEO Guru Gowrappan. From there, attendees had five days to log in and complete the experience at their own pace. With the click of a trackpad, participants moved a peg-like game piece one square at a time, and each square's content depended on what that particular brand had to share. For the most part, each began with a brief video followed by a couple trivia questions. Others featured product demos and augmented-reality photo ops where users were encouraged to take and upload selfies or photos with an AR Yahoo logo. After players completed all the tasks – and consumed all the info – at one square, their game pieces moved to the next.

An element of competition also ran through the event. Key spots in the experience activated branded mini games where attendees earned points based on speed and performance. In one activity featuring Cashay, Verizon Media's personal-finance brand, players attempted to decode a string of emojis to arrive at finance-related terms. In another game, attendees matched Yahoo Mail inbox features with their tasks. Scores were tallied on a virtual leader board, and top point earners won exclusive Verizon Media prizes that were shipped to employees following the event.

The gamified experience was a massive success. More than 5,000 employees learned about the company's new offerings through a total of 70 minutes of prerecorded video, 42 activities, and four product demos that were embedded throughout the game board. The platform drew more than 206,000 views and kept participants engaged an average of 32 minutes per visit, thereby proving that workday gaming can encompass more than solitaire and Minesweeper – and be a lot more productive.

Give 'em a Break
ServiceNow Inc. enhances its online event with "brain breaks" that help visitors decompress – and entice them to come back for more educational content. ServiceNow Inc.'s Knowledge gathering usually brings together a community of information-technology professionals to learn how the firm's cloud-based platform helps clients efficiently manage their workflows. Due to COVID, ServiceNow Knowledge 20 needed to offer the same opportunities in a virtual format. But with an excess of 1,100 customer-led breakouts, demos, and labs on more than 20 different platform channels, the show's educational offerings were in danger of overloading the audience.

In response, ServiceNow made a couple tactical changes. First, instead of hosting the event across the usual four days, the company opted to spread it out across six weeks to help accommodate its global audience, with each week focusing on a new theme. The altered format gave sheltering attendees the opportunity to flex around busy schedules and still accomplish work tasks – an important consideration for visitors trying to juggle the early WFH lifestyle.

Even with the lengthened timeline, the sheer volume of educational content was potentially daunting. So the company reached out to George P. Johnson, a Project Worldwide agency, for a solution. "As ServiceNow was coming close to launch time, the organization noticed it was missing opportunities for attendees to take breaks," says Roberto Miranda, director of special experiences for GPJ. Marketers therefore had to find a way to keep attendees energized between sessions – and motivate them to come back to the conference each of the six weeks. Importantly, ServiceNow wanted those breaks to include that ever elusive online element: fun. GPJ dove in and began producing 24 "brain breaks" that fell into four categories: entertainment, food and beverage, family friendly, and health and wellness.

Whenever attendees needed a quick reprieve from educational offerings or were waiting for their next panel to begin, they could take advantage of the decompressing content on the platform's Fun Activities channel. Those needing some midday fuel could tune in and follow along as a chef from the San Francisco restaurant Tacolicious whipped up a quick batch of salsa. And at the end of the day, they could unwind by joining one of the eatery's bartenders in concocting a margarita. Attendees with children could check out the family-friendly content, such as a video of Lego master Tyler Clites transforming the building blocks into cute animals.

And since sitting in front of a computer for hours on end can be tough on the body, GPJ produced videos to work out the kinks. Visitors could get the blood and body moving with a variety of yoga sessions and HIIT (high intensity interval training) workouts. After raising their heart rates and breaking a sweat, guests could exercise their gray matter by diving back into the educational content. And those simply looking to relax a bit more could tune into jam sessions featuring acoustic melodies from Xochitl or the upbeat vibes of musician Chris Clouse.

To ensure educational content remained fresh and incentivize attendees to keep coming back, each Monday GPJ added four to six new videos to the activity channel. By the end of the conference, the two dozen brain breaks helped ServiceNow's Knowledge 20 reach more than 11,000 attendees in 140 countries. It goes to show that all virtual visitors benefit from a little break (and fun) every now and again.