While meeting and event planners are bombarded by news of the in-person event making a comeback, there’s good news to share in the virtual realm as well. Live attendance is up for both virtual events and webinars, with an increase in attendee engagement pre- and post-event via resource downloads, live chat and on-demand replay.

Intrado Corporation, a technology-enabled service provider, recently released a 2022 Benchmark Report for Webinars and Virtual Events through its Notified business segment. Every year, the company creates a data-supported report to help meeting and event planners design impactful experiences optimized to meet and exceed attendee expectations. This year’s report analyzed customer data from Notified’s webinar and virtual event technology using a subset of customer webinars and virtual events taking place between June 2021 and June 2022.

Highlights from Notified’s 2022 Benchmark Report for Webinars and Virtual Events include:

  • 78% of virtual events are less than three days long.
  • Tuesday and Wednesday are the most popular days to run a virtual event.
  • 20 is the average number of speakers per virtual event compared to just six in 2019.
  • The addition of gamification to virtual events increases attendee engagement. Approximately 112 million minutes were spent playing in-event games during the study period.
  • Wednesday and Thursday are the most popular days to host a webinar.
  • 77% of webinars include video compared to just 61% in 2019.
  • Live attendance for webinars is up approximately 66% in the last two years.

“With the widespread adoption of event technology over the past several years, some norms and best practices around conducting webinars and virtual events have been persistent, and some new trends have started to emerge,” according to Dan Lotzof, chief revenue officer, Notified. “As we analyzed this year’s data, the two core themes that stood out are agility and optimization. As marketers and event planners continue to evaluate their strategies and budgets for 2022 and beyond, they’re seeking ways to keep audiences highly engaged through meaningful experiences and formats.”