Have you ever considered holding a unique and fun business event for your target audience and customers? An event with engaging content, interactive exercises, and networking — all with the potential of improving your brand awareness, converting more leads into paying customers, and boosting revenue?
While the idea for and potential results of this event are great, you also may have thought, “... it’s impossible to host this event — our base of customers, colleagues, and members of our professional networks are spread out all over the world.”
What if I told you that you can host this event and do so live with all of these people who are critical to your business’s success included?
You just need to host your event via webinar.
What is a webinar?
A webinar is an online video presentation, seminar, lecture, or workshop delivered via the internet. Typically, webinars are shared live, or in real-time, but they can also be recorded before being shared with audience members. Whether or not a webinar is live, it must include an interactive element that allows viewers to participate, ask questions, make comments, or collaborate with the presenters and/ or hosts.
Let's review the typical anatomy of a webinar.
Elements of a Webinar
- Main event
- Host and presenter(s)
- Attendees
- Desktop computer or laptop with a camera and microphone
- Presentation (usually in the form of slides)
- Interactive element for attendees to participate in (e.g. survey, poll, or discussion)
- Webinar software (we’ll review some of these options shortly)
What is the purpose of a webinar?
Webinars provide businesses with a way to host a digital, interactive event for members of their target audience and customers, no matter their location. Webinars can be used to boost conversions, improve brand awareness, increase revenue, and establish yourself as an expert in your field.
Webinar Benefits
Webinars are an effective way of reaching many members of your target audience at once through an engaging event that doesn’t require anyone to be in the same location. You can also include a variety of presentation features in your live or pre-recorded webinar — such as drawing tools, interactive activities, slides, surveys, chat, and more — to enhance the event.
Webinars are also budget-friendly. Think about it this way: If you’re hosting an in-person event for your target audience and customers, you’ll likely have to rent out space, order food and drinks, purchase presentation equipment, and more. If you have this event catered, you might need to organize wait staff and pay for clean up, too. Meanwhile, webinars are low cost and can even be hosted for free.
Let’s look at some more advantages to webinars: They ...
- … demonstrate features of and updates to your product or service.
- … educate attendees on how your product or service meets their needs and solves their pain points.
- … instruct audience members on how to use your product or service (this may include teacher-led training sessions)..
- … establish your business as an industry authority.
- … increase conversions and boost revenue.
- … improve brand awareness among your target audience members and buyer personas.
You now have a general understanding of what a webinar is, why they’re useful, and the advantages they bring to the table. Now, let’s review how they work.
Whether or not your webinar is live, it should always be recorded. This way, you’ll have the recording for your files, future reference, and your website since webinars are often an excellent source of evergreen content. As you host more events, share your evergreen webinar content via a resource library — similar to HubSpot’s Free Webinars library — on your website. Your site visitors, loyal customers, and team members will be able to easily reference your webinars in a central location.
Whether live or pre-recorded, you’re probably wondering how to record your webinar — let’s cover that next.
Speaking of webinar software, let’s look at some of your options. Your software is how you’ll host the event, share it with attendees, analyze its performance, and more.
Webinar Software
Webinar software offers features that streamline all aspects of hosting your event. There are many webinar software options available with a range of features and pricing options. Here are four options to get you started.
1. GoToWebinar
GoToWebinar simplifies your event planning, promotion, engagement, and reporting. The software provides several webinar templates, custom registration, different presenter webcams, interactive surveys and polls, source tracking, and webinar analytics.
Note: GoToWebinar integrates with your HubSpot CRM.
Cost: GoToWebinar offers three plans starting at $89 per month.
2. ClickMeeting Webinars
ClickMeeting makes hosting and sharing your live or pre-recorded events easy no matter your webinar format (e.g. conference, group discussion, Q&A, or product demos). The software includes a feature to live stream your event via Facebook or Youtube to expand your audience.
Note: ClickMeeting Webinars integrates with your HubSpot CRM.
Cost: ClickMeeting is free for your first 30 days, and then you can choose to upgrade to one of their three paid options, which start at $25 per month.
3. Zoom
Depending on the Zoom plan you choose, you can share your webinar with over 10,000 people at once. The software offers HD video and audio, live broadcasting features, reporting, and analytics. There are also various participant engagement tools such as chat, attendee-raise-hand, and polling to ensure your webinar is interactive.
Note: Zoom integrates with your HubSpot CRM.
Cost: Zoom has a freemium option in which you can host a discussion-based webinar event where everyone can see and interact with each other. If you choose one of their paid options, which start at $14.99 per month, you can host your webinar in any format (e.g. lecture-based, single presenter, or multi-presenter).
4. EasyWebinar
EasyWebinar is a great option for anyone new to the world of webinars because the software has users work through a five-step campaign process to ensure event success. It includes customer tracking tools to learn more about who your attendees are and why your content is relevant to them. EasyWebinar integrates with WordPress and YouTube so you can expand your reach among your target audience and current customers.
Cost: There are three tiers of EasyWebinar which start at $78 per month.
How to Host a Webinar for Free
To host a webinar — and do so for free — you’ll need to combine all of the elements we’ve reviewed above. You might think about the following five steps to hosting a webinar for free as your webinar strategy.
1. Choose free webinar software.
The first step in hosting your webinar requires you to choose software that suits your specific needs. We reviewed some popular examples above, but for more options that are easier on your budget, take a look at these free webinar tools.
2. Invite your target audience to register for and attend your event.
It’s time to invite people to register for and attend your webinar. When you invite these members of your contact list and network to register, likely via email, clearly indicate the date and time of your event. This way they’ll know if they’re available or if they need to make time on their calendars to attend.
3. Send a confirmation email to anyone who’s registered to attend.
Next, confirm webinar registration is complete for each attendee who has signed up. You might do this by sending registrants to a new landing page with their confirmation details. Another option is to send a follow-up email to attendees shortly after they complete registration.
Either way, include details in your confirmation message about the equipment needed to participate in your webinar such as a laptop with stable Wi-Fi, speakers, a microphone, and a camera. You can also provide information about your presenters or the interactive element of the webinar to get attendees excited.
4. Provide a link for attendees to “Join” if the webinar is live or “Watch” if it’s pre-recorded.
One of the most important things you do pre-webinar is provide clear directions on how your attendees will join or watch the event. For example, you may include a link to Join or Watch your webinar on the confirmation landing page or in the follow-up email we mentioned above.
5. Set expectations for webinar participation.
Again, webinars must be interactive in some way. Set these expectations early on, and have your presenters reiterate them at the beginning of the event, so everyone is on the same page. If your event is live, facilitate participation and discussion throughout the event or set aside time for discussion and Q&A at the end.
If your event is pre-recorded, set a window of time after the webinar has been shared for attendees to send in questions. Then, presenters can either record or type their responses and send them back to the corresponding attendee.
6. Host the webinar, and follow up with attendees afterward.
It’s time to host your event! Explain the agenda to attendees at the beginning of the webinar so they know what to expect. (This is also a great time to reiterate those expectations for participation we mentioned above.)
Don’t forget to review all other details, like follow-up communication, any further inquiries, future webinars you’re hosting, and how attendees can learn more about your business. Feel free to email this information to your attendee contact list post-webinar so they can review it in greater detail later on.
Webinar Best Practices
Finally, let’s cover some webinar tips and best practices so your event is sure to be a success.
- Choose an intriguing, personable, and qualified presenter(s) to get your audience excited about attending and to hold their attention throughout the event.
- Determine whether the webinar is going to be live or pre-recorded based on factors such as topic, presenters, industry, and audience.
- Invite members of your target audience and your buyer personas to register (this will ensure your webinar content is shared with people it’ll be relevant and valuable to).
- Clearly set and share the event’s date, time, and other logistics so attendees can log on, view, and participate without experiencing any roadblocks.
- Stick to one major topic per webinar to avoid confusion and keep attendees engaged.
- Establish a format for the webinar (e.g. panel, FAQ, single or multi-presenter, demonstration, interview, or discussion).
- Complete a dry run (or several) before going live or recording the webinar.
- Find the right webinar software for your specific business needs.
- Allow ample time for attendee participation.
- Record and save your webinar —whether or not it’s shared live — to your webinar library.
Reach Your Target Audience With Webinars
Webinars have the power to propel you towards becoming a thought-leader and expert in your industry. They can also help you improve brand awareness, reach your target audience and buyer personas, and boost conversions. Determine which webinar software is right for your business, keep the best practices we reviewed in mind, and begin hosting your online events.
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