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The video discusses the rise of virtual coworking, and how it has helped to promote coworking as an industry. It promotes two different initiatives that came during the pandemic: the virtual edition of the Coworking Spain Conference and the virtual coworking community created by several coworking operators from Japan, including the DECK, using a tool called REMO.
Digitalization of Coworking.
00:05:00 The conversation starts by discussing the rise of virtual coworking, and how it has helped to promote coworking as an industry. Manuel Zea, Founder of Coworking Spain, mentions that the conference started in 2012 and has grown over the years, with digitalization playing a significant role. They initially used tools like Facebook for marketing and communication, but have since expanded to other online tools like Instagram and WhatsApp, which is used frequently due to its popularity. This year, due to the pandemic, they moved their conference online bringing together 185 people.
Manu explained that the decision to cancel this year’s Coworking Space Conference was made early on due to low ticket sales during the early bird period and concerns about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. They were afraid that the situation would worsen and decided to cancel the conference immediately after the state of alarm was declared in Spain, to avoid wasting resources and losing money.
Turning to Tomokazu Morisawa, he took us through how they launched a virtual coworking initiative with other coworking spaces from Japan called “Beyond the Community.” They had formed this association before COVID-19 to connect coworking spaces and members, but when the pandemic hit, they needed to change their mindset and business models. They initially considered using Zoom but found it insufficient to deliver a similar experience to physical coworking spaces. They eventually found and implemented Remo as their virtual coworking space.
Touring around the virtual coworking space set up by a community of Japanese coworking operators using Remo.
00:15:00 Tomo demoed the virtual coworking space they created on Remo.
“The virtual space provides a similar user experience to physical coworking spaces, and users can move to different rooms depending on their needs. Our virtual coworking space includes a reception, working rooms, and whiteboard rooms and it is currently free for users.”
The initiative includes people from different parts of Japan, both big and small cities. It was initially promoted through word of mouth, with the organizers inviting members and other coworking space owners. Later, a Facebook group and other social media accounts, including Twitter, were created to further promote it online.
As the virtual coworking space they set up as 8 floors, each participating space created their own “private” floor on top of the shared one.
Opportunities rising from moving Coworking Spain Conference Online.
For Coworking Spain, when the pandemic hit and everything was shut down, Manu recalls how they had to think about what to do. They decided to try hosting virtual events and started with trial and error. They promoted the events through word of mouth and social media, and while they used Zoom for the events, they recognize that it might not be the best tool for larger conferences.
But according to Manu, moving the Coworking Spain Conference online also brought some new opportunities as it became accessible to people from all over the world. He expressed their desire to make the conference more accessible to people in Latin America by possibly creating an online platform. Attending conferences in person can be expensive, hence keeping an online conference format allows people to easily join from anywhere.
Monetizing Virtual Coworking Events.
How did Coworking Spain Conference monetized its online event? Going back to his point on trial-and-error, Manu confessed that they attempted to charge for webinars but found that people didn’t want to pay, so they relied on sponsors to monetize their events. They also sent an email to attendees after the event to ask for voluntary contributions. This was somewhat successful but not as effective as having a sponsor. They hope to monetize future events without relying solely on sponsors.
As per the virtual coworking space created by the Japanese community, Tomo explained that they cover the cost by asking members to chip in to contribute $200 per month. In the future, they plan to test new approaches, such as offering a proof of concept space for corporate sponsors.
Balancing physical and virtual coworking space experiences.
According to Tomo, people are still experiencing stress working from home, especially in Japan, where houses are small. Tomo sees this as an opportunity to offer a physical, more comfortable space for work outside of their offices and to attract people virtually to their space by having a recognizable coworking space in Osaka.
Reflecting on COVID-19
“People have realized the necessity of having a separate space for their work and home life, so we can provide that kind of environment. Additionally, people require reliable wifi to continue their business, especially when joining Zoom meetings. We can offer these opportunities to our clients. More people are recognizing the importance of this type of space, and they will likely search for coworking spaces online. This will allow us to attract more people to join us physically.” -Tomokazu Morisawa, The DECK.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has made people realize that working from home or a home office is not an ideal environment to work in as it mixes the familiar and social space with work. This presents an opportunity for people to work out of the office in a prepared and professional environment. However, there are challenges that need to be addressed.” Manuel Zea - Coworking Spain