Q&A with Rashim Mogha, Founder - eWOW, Keynote Speaker, Startup Advisor, Women in Tech Evangelist, Author, Podcaster

"Now more than ever before, the world needs ideas that are socially profitable. And ideas need nurturing!"

M7: Are you pivoting to virtual events or planning to re-invest the money elsewhere?
RM: We are definitely all in when it comes to virtual events. We have several virtual workshops planned with corporate organizations. Infact our eWOW Virtual Incubator program that we launched is also a 4 week online program. Now more than ever before, the world needs ideas that are socially profitable. And ideas need nurturing!

The eWOW 2020 Virtual Incubator Program democratizes idea nurturing through the power of technology. It helps entrepreneurs to take their idea to the pitch stage.

M7: Are you facing security issues while organizing virtual events? What changes would you suggest to avoid cyber threats during vitual events?
RM: We use Zoom Webinar solution for our virtual events. Given the security issues, we have implemented the registration process that allows only the approved registrants to attend the webinars. Enabling features like passwords and waiting room are some other ways to avoid security issues.

"There is merit in in-person events and those won’t go away."

M7: What day to day processes have you had to re-tool to be able to pull off your online events successfully? What does your tech stack look like?
RM: From a tech stack perspective, we use Eventbrite for tickets. For the actual event we use Zoom webinar and Slack for networking and for ondemand viewing we leverage Origin Learning’s Fractal portal. Media 7 was our exclusive media partner. We had to re-define the process and integrate these applications for online events. We also had to do multiple rounds of preprations with our speakers to ensure that they were comfortable with Zoom and Slack and the audience had a seemless experience. Infact the eWOW 2020 Virtual Summit was rated as the TOP 10 online events happening on April 25 by EventBrowse alongside Salesforce and Microsoft Azure events.

M7: How are your sponsors responding, and how are they customizing programs or sponsor packages?
RM: Of course there are COVID-19 reasons because of which many sponsors are hesitant to allocate money to sponsorships right now. They want to put the resources and dollars to keep the business running as opposed to sponsoring given the shakeup in businesses due to COVID-19. But the sponsors are embracing online events for enhancing their brand, scouting for talent, and keeping their employees motivated. eWOW 2020 Virtual Summit was sponsored by Linkedin Learning, Facebook, Origin Learning, Sureskills, KG Cloud Advisory, SocieteGenerale and Marsh Labs. Facebook loved the idea of eWOW summit being a virtual summit. For many sponsors, it was the only event that didn’t go through a format change because of COVID.

"It is time now that events move to an online format to be inclusive. The reach of online events is huge."

M7: Are you noticing any difference in the audience engagement comparing the virtual with in-person events?
RM: It is known that the audience enagement reduces in virtual events. However, there are various ways in which this can be addressed. For eWOW 2020 Virtual Summit, we built in interactivity in our 8 hr long summit. We had 14 sessions, 3 built in breaks, a parallel Slack channel for audience to network with their peers and speakers, and a virtual job lounge during lunch. This kept the audience engaged throughout the summit. We had attendees from countries like India who attended the entire summit even though it ended at 4:00 am India time.

M7: What was your strategy for promoting your virtual events, and how was the response?
RM: Our collaboration with Media 7 as our exclusive media partner worked very well. They promoted our event within their extensive network. We also leveraged LinkedIn and the eWOW podcast which has audience in over 35 countries to promote the event. The excitement around the event was huge and we had 50% of the tickets sold within the first week of announcing the summit.