Since the launch of its Zoom Events offering last year, Zoom has continued to add features and functionality to the product as it looks to compete with established event platforms and improve the user experience for customers already using Zoom for webinars and events.
During its Work Transformation Summit this week, Zoom announced several new enhancements for Zoom Events, which will be available to customers beginning April 17th and which bring the platform more in line with other popular virtual event offerings.
In a blog post announcing the changes, Zoom’s Integrated Marketing Manager Robin Bunevich notes that “…simply streaming a panel discussion online or presenting a thrown-together deck isn’t a ‘virtual event’ by today’s standards,” which reflects Zoom’s efforts to adapt to the changing virtual event market.
Among the new features is Backstage for Zoom Events, which provides a dedicated space for speakers and moderators to meet virtually and prep in advance of a session — a standard feature on most virtual event platforms. Speakers and production crews will also be able to leverage Backstage during sessions to support Q&A without being on camera and after sessions to debrief, celebrate, etc.
Zoom users will now also be able to customize the branding of their webinar sessions, including branded wallpaper as well as custom name tags and virtual backgrounds for presenters. This feature will be available to Zoom Webinar license holders for use in both webinars and events.
Finally, Zoom has followed other event tech platforms in taking a page from the social media playbook by implementing emoji reactions, which allow attendees to react to sessions in real-time with various emojis. This feature will be configurable by event hosts, who can enable or disable it as they see fit, as well as by attendees, who can choose to hide audience reactions if they find them distracting.