Best Practices for hosting a successful Smart Connect℠
Hosting a Smart Connect℠ event puts you at the center of meaningful connections between your Group and Alliance members. You are the host of the party and how you set up your attendees will help determine how successful their experience is.
When you bring the energy, keep them engaged, and are able to answer questions as they arise, you become the event host with repeat attendance!
We have outlined a few best practices to keep in mind that will help you and your attendees make the most of these amazing events.
Creating the Event
When creating your networking event, you should select the Smart Connect℠ option when you intend on running 6 or more 1:1 breakout sessions in an hour. This ensures members of your group get the right email notification when they register and know what to expect from the event. This will also make the event searchable in our event discovery page and group carousel for additional visibility.
- You will no longer need to have the words Smart Connect in the name of the event, you can use shorter event titles that focus on who they will meet/what value they will get from the event e.g., "Meet 1:1 with Women Business Owners" or "Meet a New Connection every 7 Minutes"
If you are running a different variation of a networking event, an educational event or want to do a hybrid event where you have no breakout sessions or fewer than 6, you can still run your event on Alignable by choosing the Host your event on Alignable's video platform option.
If you want to run an event using an external join link such as zoom, webex, meet ect.. Please select the Host your own online event option.
- Note that if you use an external join link, the event will be displayed in your group carousel and searchable in our events discovery page but will not get additional email promotion.
If you are an Ambassador of a local Alliance group you will have a 4th option to create an In-Person Networking event. This option will be exclusively available to Ambassadors
Joining the Event
To ensure you have the best experience possible, we have outlined some general support tips here to help you navigate through potential issues that could arise when joining events in a virtual space. This will also help you answer questions that come up from attendees.
In addition to the general support tips linked in the support doc above, we have a few host specific tips to remember below.
If an attendee shows up as offline in the Smart Connect℠ or types in the chat that they can’t get in but can see the chat.
- Tell them to try refreshing their browser, and if that doesn't resolve the issue you can direct them to the troubleshooting document linked above.
If the breakout room button doesn’t move people into breakouts.
- Wait a few seconds! This will resolve itself on its own and start to send the attendees out to breakout rooms while the server catches up. Now is a good time to repeat your ice breaker question to keep the energy going!
If the screenshare is not working
First give your browser access to record your screen.
On an Apple® Mac® computer using macOS® Catalina® version 10.15 or later, let Firefox® or the Chrome Browser access your computer’s screen recording:
-
Go to System preferences
click Security & Privacy.
- Click Privacy.
-
On the left, click Screen recording.
For Mac users: On the bottom left, click the lock to make changes. In the window, enter in your password click unlock. - On the right, check the Google Chrome or Firefox box.
Reminders
- The latest version of Chrome or Edge are going to provide you with the best experience. Firefox and safari are fine for attendees, but we recommend hosting from chrome or edge
- Once you Launch Event, the event is open for attendees. So if you want to test anything prior like screen share or audio, make sure you do so before launching the event.
- Mobile devices are not yet supported for attending a Smart Connect℠ event.
- All hosts must manually skip, cancel or reschedule upcoming events with at least 24 hours notice. This must also be sent as an event announcement so that registrants are aware of this change.
Bring the Energy!
Greet your attendees with energy and excitement as they are joining! We recommend having fun, upbeat music playing to set the tone of the event. To share music in a Smart Connect℠, open the source you will be sharing the music from (E.g. youtube, spotify ect..) > share your screen in the Smart Connect℠ > share the chrome TAB with the music you want and then you can click play to share the audio.
Ice Breakers
Networking is not always easy, especially if you are more of an introvert by nature. We recommend giving your attendees an ice breaker before each breakout session to help them ease into the conversation. This also gives you something to engage them with when they return to the main room, asking 1 or 2 attendees to share their ice breaker answer.
We have put together some of our favorites here, but please feel free to add yours as well!
Before ending the event
Make sure to leave 3-5 minutes at the end of the event to thank them for coming, invite them to your next event and to share a few important reminders. We have highlighted some of the most important below.
- When leaving the event, do not exit out of your browser. You must click the red End Event button which will take you and attendees to a page with everyone who they met with in a breakout session to continue the conversation after by connecting.
- If they joined from the event page they can also see all of the attendees from the event if they want to connect with others who joined.
- You can view the attendees you met with by visiting the event page as well, after the event has ended.
- Remind them to join other events this week! Smart Connect℠ events are happening across the platform with new ones to join every hour!
- Invite them to check out your Group or Alliance if they are not already a part of it. Remember during networking week you may see brand new members joining your event so make sure you tell them what your community is all about!