Virtual events have taken off in the past year, moving way beyond webinars and remote team meetings to encompass online trade shows, conferences, fundraising galas, social gatherings, and more. As people have embraced online events, the technology has evolved rapidly — yet in most cases, the engagement still doesn’t come close to real-world mingling and networking.
Video conferencing has lost its novelty; it’s just a daily fact of life in modern workplaces. It helps you communicate, collaborate, and ideate through a virtual platform – much needed in the current pandemic situation.
Shindig is the turnkey solution that helps you create interactive and engaging virtual events that go way beyond presentations to passive attendees locked in a grid of on-screen boxes. It’s power-packed with tons of features that provide organizers with innovative capabilities, and participants with autonomy and the freedom to mix, mingle, and network at large-scale online events.
This review will focus on Shindig and will discuss the following:
Introduction To Shindig
While many vendors facilitate online events, one company that has disrupted the market is Shindig. A platform for large-scale virtual events, Shindig was founded long before the COVID lockdowns of 2020. The SaaS platform was created with the goal of changing the dynamics of online events helping foster new economic and social opportunities from the digital space. A leader in innovation and functionality, Shindig has reinvented the base architecture of the video conference by eliminating the two class admin-based structure found on most other video chat platforms and putting participants in control of their experience.
Shindig smashes the myth that online events have to be boring, mismanaged, and a waste of time. It enables guests to mingle freely with each other, just like they would in real life. Participation is what Shindig encourages – it empowers audience members to ask questions, share ideas, and socialize freely. Additionally, event hosts can open a podium to the event at-large, allowing any participant to take the stage. The whole idea is to blend the individual’s personal agenda with the group agenda to make the event successful and more participatory!
While most existing video conferencing platforms are built on an outdated telephony architecture existing since the 1880s, Shindig is multi-dimensional in approach. It utilizes state-of-the-art technology to conduct all kinds of virtual meetings and can be used for school reunions, online classes, work meetings, orientations, interviews, social gatherings, and formal conferences. The platform is highly customizable – you can personalize event backgrounds, user meta-data, console settings, and reminder emails.
Shindig provides robust support for multi-day and multi-session events. This makes it easy for people to navigate between sessions within events smoothly and to collaborate with different individuals and small groups. As a participant, you can jump from a keynote session to a meet-and-greet event and then pop over to a trade show booth as you like – you choose what you want to attend!
Geared for complex large-scale production, Shindig allows you to have up to four administrators. This streamlines workflows and enhances overall event coordination by making it possible to distribute functions such as greeting guests, security, and mic management.
A winner in the domain of video-conferencing, Shindig is just what you need to interact, collaborate, and drive energy in your virtual communications.
Key Features of Shindig
Let’s dive in and explore its key features:
1. 1000+ Active Participants
Shindig helps you create the dynamics of an in-person event on an Internet-scale. “The bigger, the better” is Shindig’s motto. It provides full video conference interactivity for groups of 1000s and facilitates meaningful social interaction. The platform provides an array of innovative features (such as integration with question management tools for prioritizing and customizable widgets) to structure events smartly and promote audience engagement. To top it off, there is no rigid hierarchy for event participants, making text-only guests a thing of the past.
With Shindig, you can shine the spotlight on any audience member by inviting them to the stage. Your audience members can join the podium to ask questions face-to-face by webcam, or use the question function to type it to be read and displayed on-screen to the audience by the host. The best part is that you don’t have to scroll through a massive list or unmute participants; all you have to do is prep them backstage and bring them on!
3. Video Chat Mingling
A key feature that boosts engagement is private video chat mingling, enabling people to form small groups and interact with each other freely. It is a transformative technology – it promotes at-will association and allows you to chat with whomever you want without disturbing others. Even the host can easily interact with any individual guest through the sidebar option. Just like a physical event, audience members can form small clusters that result in social productivity.
4. Live Stream Integration
With HD quality live video streaming options, Shindig enables you to let unlimited members enjoy your event on social media channels. It allows you to broadcast events as they happen on Facebook Live and Youtube Live. This increases audience reach as you stream real-time videos to millions of followers around the globe. It’s a great way to take your video strategy to the next level and drive awareness about your virtual event!
5. Monetization
Shindig enhances your virtual interactive events with various monetization options. Authors, publishers, and event organizers can choose to generate revenue through sponsorship or branding activities. Shindig enables you to charge participants a fee to join online events, and even to sell customized merchandise. Sponsorship of live interactive sessions is a lucrative proposition for advertisers, making Shindig a great platform that can boost your revenue streams exponentially!
6. Customized Branding
A perfect solution for branded online events, Shindig gives you access to a large audience base and lets you promote anything with ease! You can create customizable event backgrounds, banners, and widgets that are perfect for paid sponsorship. This is highly useful in e-commerce contexts. Shindig is the ideal tool for using online events to expand your brand awareness and enhance your brand reputation.
7. No Open Mic
Nothing ruins an online event faster than having unwanted disruptive intrusion. With Shindig, there is no chance of online miscreants bombing your event by sharing disturbing or distracting content. It does away with the open mic concept, ensuring that your event carries on smoothly without any uninvited gate crashers wreaking havoc! The administrator has the right to open the mic for participants as and when required. This prevents any unwanted noise and bad actors from spoiling the environment and mood of your virtual event.
8. Open or Exclusive Admission
You can choose to have open public events with Shindig or can go the exclusive route. Shindig enables you to host guest-only events where only invited attendees are allowed to attend sessions. You can send attendees a password-protected event link through email that provides instant access to an online event. Alternatively, you can create ticketed events and have your attendees purchase event passes through multiple payment channels.
9. Social Media Integration
One of the biggest benefits of Shindig is its social media integration capabilities. It has an optional Facebook integration that allows you to invite friends who are currently online to your event. The optional Twitter integration lets you broadcast live tweets during the event to build community awareness and drive traffic to your online session. Integrated social media collaboration is a big plus for event organizers as it amplifies audience reach and helps you draw huge crowds to your live session!
10. User-Friendly Interface
Another one of the best aspects of Shindig is its simple, user-friendly, easy-to-navigate interface. It’s highly customizable and allows you to control every detail to ensure your event is a success. There is no requirement for any complicated downloads, installation, or account registration. Shindig is a browser-based platform with top-notch functionalities – it makes handling large-scale virtual events a breeze!
11. Green Room Management
In physical events, you always have a green room to prepare participants before they come before an audience. Shindig allows you to screen audience members before they appear on a podium at your event. Virtual green rooms allow the emcees and hosts to interact with participants coming on the podium. This lets you screen questions and participants as well as inform them about the sequence of events and how they will be asked to come onstage.
12. Invite/RSVP System
Organizers can use Shindig to manage their event guest lists efficiently and send out virtual invitations to attendees. You can automate an RSVP system to keep track of the intended and actual turnout. Further, Shindig enables you to customize email reminders for your guest list and encourage them to attend. It simplifies operations and serves as an online guest manager for conferences, book launches, parties, reunions, and corporate events.
The Final Verdict
A class apart in the video conferencing software arena, Shindig has carved out a niche for itself in the industry. Some notable clients who have recently hosted Shidnigs include Amazon, Accenture, Fandom, Harvard, the Gartner Group, Informa, Tracfone, Human Rights Campaign, Global Citizen, P&G, Viacom, Unilever, the UN Foundation, and Yale University.
Since Shindig does not lock users into one conversation, it provides a more natural and conversational online event experience.
With mobile-friendly applications for iOS and Android users, Shindig enables users to access live events on-the-go. The pricing is highly competitive in terms of the excellent functionality of the product. Shindig also provides great customer service and responsive support 24×7 through live chat, email, or FAQs.
So, it’s a definite thumbs up for Shindig. A one-time investment, Shindig can change the way you experience online events. Try the platform and witness the magic for yourself!
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