The one constant in our world is change. In this dynamic world, learning is a lifelong endeavor. That’s why webinars can be successfully used at every stage of the buyer journey. While they require an investment of money, time, and energy to be successful, research indicates that 62% of attendees request a demo of a product. Furthermore, an astounding 89% of participants will visit the sponsoring vendor’s website after attending a webinar.* The takeaway is that, done right, webinars can enhance visibility, foster engagement, and lead to more sales. Read on for five best practices for making your webinar resonate with your audience.
1 – Define your goals
As with any other presentation, it is essential that you know who you’re trying to reach, and who you aren’t. Targeting the right people and determining the most beneficial way to measure your ROI is the first step to ensuring you succeed. Is your content top of funnel, bottom of funnel, or somewhere in the middle? What are you trying to accomplish with your webinar, and how does this goal fit within the larger context of your marketing efforts?
2 – Prepare content well in advance
Resist the temptation to “fly by the seat of your pants.” Preparation is the key to success. Create a presentation that engagingly tells your brand story. Webinars are the perfect setting for showcasing thought leadership, which is best accomplished through a blend of original and curated content.
- Include videos – and test
- Do multiple run-throughs
- Time yourself, both alone and with co-presenters
- Do a dry run with the webinar software to make sure presenters are comfortable using the technology
3 – Provide plenty of opportunities for feedback and engagement
Webinars are not simply a means of “talking at” your audience – they should be used as a tool for engagement between and among hosts, panel members, and participants. What better way to identify pain points, concerns, and lived experience than to ask those who have firsthand knowledge of these things? When attendees feel more like participants, they are likely to contribute invaluable insights, which helps you serve them better.
SearchEngine Journal emphasizes the importance of including engagement features in your webinar, noting that including spots for Q and A, polls, and chat, “can spark more natural interactions.”** Asking for participant feedback during the presentation can inspire audience members to make connections between and among ideas. Done right, these moments are the perfect opportunity to position your brand as a thought leader. Include a survey at the end of the presentation to gather participant feedback about the value you provided. This is also an excellent opportunity to gauge interest in future content. In return for providing feedback, you can offer participants a chance to win a prize, a special discount, or a voucher for a free coffee, among other things. Providing an incentive may increase your audience’s willingness to provide feedback.
4 – Present a clear value proposition
The importance of having a clear value proposition cannot be overstated. Why should people attend? What do they stand to gain from attending? What unique benefit can you offer them that the competition cannot?
Equally important is how the value proposition is communicated. While the method for name-dropping your brand or solution will vary, it should not come across as a hard sell. What you have to offer should feel like the next logical step, a resolution to a recurrent problem, the perfect way to advance a business vision or agenda.
5 – Begin promoting your webinar 3-4 weeks before it is scheduled to occur.
Busy professionals need plenty of notice about upcoming webinars. For this reason, you should begin to promote about 3-4 weeks before your webinar. Consider creating print and video ads, sending reminder emails, and including news of the webinar in newsletters. Encourage your representatives to discuss it with clients. Engage in SEO to ensure that the webinar and your brand are returned near the top of search results. Work to ensure that different marketing communications complement one another.
Have an idea about what you want to say, but unsure about how to transform your brand objectives into an engaging presentation with actionable insights? SAGE can help! We offer a complete turnkey webinar marketing solution.
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*27 Webinar statistics to know in 2022. 99firms. (2022, January 2). Retrieved April 13, 2022, from https://99firms.com/blog/webinar-statistics/#gref
**BigMarker. (2022, February 3). How to get more leads in 2022 using webinars. Search Engine Journal. Retrieved April 13, 2022, from https://www.searchenginejournal.com/more-leads-webinars-bigmarker/433643/