Absolutely. Actually just about to publish an article on facilitating virtual group discussions. Not live yet, but you can see the draft here if you want to take an early look: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fcOTcsBLFbn7fVzjOksgGPkyKG5UzlILAuL70vmbWj8/edit The answer is really going to depend on what kind of group you're gathering in your event and what the format is. If it's a small-group discussion, you can facilitate the discussion, and make sure every group has a facilitator, to call on people who haven't had a chance to speak up, and to drive the conversation. For a webinar or larger event, it's easy for people to sit back and watch. A lot of people are coming with the intention to consume, not create. You can get them engaged by having the presenter ask for feedback, talk directly to attendees, and make it feel interactive, breaking that 4th wall, and letting attendees know it's not just a pre-recorded talk. You can also seed the community with some questions from members by asking them to jump in privately. That'll help set the example for other attendees to jump in and ask questions/chat. Model the behavior you want to see. ... View more

hey kelly! great to see you here (=   we're moving quick on switching to virtual and a lot of our local hosts have already started hosting theirs we're vetting all the different virtual event vendors and setting up partnerships now. And will continue to publish a lot of content around what we're learning so the community can leverage it for their own programs ... View more

Thanks Jacob! Hope everyone is holding up okay out there. It's been a bumpy ride over here but it feels like we're starting to pivot in the right direction. Our community has been hyper active during coronavirus as a lot of community pros are coming together to figure out how to adjust their plans. The biggest impact has been with physical events, which is something we have a ton of experience with, pivoting to virtual events. All conferences and local meetups are on hold. We're pivoting our own strategy at CMX in the same way. All our local events are switching to virtual events. We're organizing a global virtual event for our entire community in April. We're still planning to host our big in-person conference, CMX Summit, on schedule in October, but we're playing it by ear and getting everything ready in case we need to switch to virtual. Here to help with any questions about online community, pivoting in-person events to virtual, or anything else that you're struggling with. ... View more