“Will offering online video undercut the ticket sales and attendance of my event?” It’s one of the biggest concerns we hear from event organizers when they are considering videotaping and live streaming their event. Event organizers spend months organizing their event or conference, and don’t want to jeopardize ticket sales or attendance numbers.

While understandable, it’s an unfounded fear and and the simple answer is: No.

Online video does not cannibalize ticket sales and event attendance.

In fact, the opposite is true: Online video boosts ticket sales and event attendance.

Here’s why: Even the best-looking online video cannot replace the experience of attending your event in person. An attendee on the floor of your event gets valuable face time with their colleagues and the opportunity to network with potential clients during event hours and afterward at hosted parties and cocktail hours. These valuable face-to-face interactions are a major reason (if not the #1 reason) that your attendees come to your event. Video just can’t compete with that part of your event experience.

What video can do is allow those individuals who can’t physically attend your event this year for whatever reason - scheduling, geography, other conflicts - to still get a part of your event experience. They won’t get those valuable interactions with colleagues and clients, but they will be able to virtually attend sessions and keynotes.

In fact, many event organizers with whom we work to videotape and distribute their event video online have seen an increase to their event attendance the following year. This is because video allows individuals to actually see what they missed, how awesome the event is, and to make plans to attend the next time around. The trend is seen for all types of events and in fact the data shows that 67% of people are more likely to purchase a ticket to an event, after watching a live stream of a similar event.

It is a revenue generator for future events as 77% of professionals said that attending a virtual conference made them want to attend the physical conference, with 68% saying they either did or will probably attend the physical meeting in future years. Furthermore, 25% of people said they would probably never attend the physical conference without the exposure from the virtual conference. This demonstrates the power and ROI of live streaming events.

Looking to get started with live streaming your event? Check out our "Guide to Professionally Live Stream Events: The Basics to Best Practices" for information for marketing novices to seasoned event organizers, to help plan and execute a successful a live video production.