Hosting the perfect virtual event for friends or family

With the holiday season upon us and people gearing up to come together virtually with the friends and family they won’t be able to see in person this Christmas, hosting the perfect virtual event is going to more important then ever. As experts in hosting awesome virtual events and parties for groups of 8 to 80 people, here are our key tips:

Make a guest list

The number of people you invite can make or break a virtual celebration so it’s worth giving some thought to your guest list. It’s important to keep it smallish, so, if you‘re thinking you’d like there to be conversation then, 8-10 guests will be fine. For a games-based party, you won’t want more than 20.

Choose the right platform for you and your guests

Zoom has been the most popular platform for virtual get-togethers during the pandemic, so it’s an easy, natural choice. But if you’re not paying for an account, you only get 40 minutes. But it’s likely that someone in your group has a pro account so it’d be worth asking around to see if they can create the actual event and then make you the host on the night.

Alternatives to Zoom are FaceTime, Google Meet, Skype and Facebook Messenger Rooms but they all limit the number of people that can connect at once although from 10 to 50 these may be more than fine and the upside to all of these other options is that none of them have a time limit.

Be mindful of the non-techies

Although it feels like the whole world is on Zoom already, you still can’t assume that everyone on your guest list knows how to work it so it’s worth including some instructions when you send the invites and make yourself available to answer questions before the night.

You could ask your guests to download and try whatever software they need ahead of time and how to get the party on gallery view, so there’s time to solve problems because nothing kills the vibe that helping someone figure out their technical problems while the rest of your guests wait.

Plan some fun activities

We spend so much time working online that the thought of attending a party online, even with your faves, can feel a little underwhelming. So to separate out work from play, and depending on your budget figure out some ways to entertain your guests and we’re not talking about hosting a quiz because we’ve all done way too many of those.

Check Citysocializer for loads of ideas you can host virtually for your event, like a cocktail-making session, sending out the ingredients to bring in advance; hiring someone to entertain you — live magic, music, comedy — there are loads of companies now offering virtual entertainers for hire; a karaoke night using Youtube and the share screen and sound feature; sharing your Spotify party playlist and hosting a virtual disco; team games to get the camaraderie and banter going — Pictionary, Charades, 20 Questions — these are all free and easy to play and take very little pre-organisation.

If you only want to have organic conversation, be mindful that sometimes, virtually, that can be hard so you might want to have some conversational games, like Never Have I Ever or 2 Truths and a Lie, to hand.

Set the tone (and build hype) for your Zoom party in your invite

Just because it’s a virtual event, don’t forget to pay attention to your invite and jazz this up to get everyone hyped about your event. You should include some idea of what to expect, encourage people to bring drinks and snacks and even better, set a dress code (Back In Black, Glamour Queen, Christmas Crazy..) which gets everyone excited, thinking about what to wear and then dressing up on the night helps get everyone get into the party mood. Plus, when the event starts, showing off your outfits is a great icebreaker.

Make sure your WiFi is as stable as possible

If you have a dodgy WiFi connection and you’re the host of the event, take an extra precautions you need to make sure you don’t leave your party host-less.

Sit as close to your router as humanly possible or even better plug yourself in via your ethernet cable.

Introduce people to one another who haven’t met before

In the same way you’d introduce people to each other at a real world party you host, you should definitely do the same at a virtual event and introduce your friends to one another if they haven’t met before because then it makes it less awkward for people to engage in conversation with one another.

Don’t control the conversation but be aware of who’s being included

Because everyone is part of the same conversation during a Zoom party, but only one person can talk at a time, it can drain the vibe if someone starts monologuing or two or more in the group start catching up in a way that’s more suited to a one on one, or diving into a conversation that is hard for others to join in with.

Hopefully with so much experience on Zoom we’re all more aware of (not) doing this but, without controlling the conversation, it’s important as the host to be mindful of this and gently make sure that everyone is included in the conversation, nudging it toward people who may have been quiet for a while.