Whether you are using it for marketing, lead generation, education, award ceremonies, or training purposes, webinars are the go-to in the contemporary world for various reasons, such as global reach and cost-effective communication. It also qualifies you as an expert in your field, and people interested in the said field will surely look up to you and organically join your future ventures. To grow your business further and to strengthen your community, webinars are the need of the hour.
Now, while hosting a webinar, a crucial question arises: What is a webinar?
What is a webinar?
A webinar is a web-based seminar or presentation conducted over the internet, usually live, where people from different locations can connect, engage, and participate in real-time discussions and learning.
The key features of webinars usually include audio-video presentations and interactive tools such as chat, Q&A sessions, polling, and sharing slides, documents, and other multimedia content. Webniars may also vary in size, from small sessions to large-scale events with thousands of audiences.
Hosting a webinar also increases brand awareness and establishes you as an expert in your field. It also helps in creating communities, nurturing existing audiences, and generating high-quality leads without the pressure of travelling across the world and spending a large amount on advertising. You can also monetize your webinar and record it for future reference.
14 Proven Practices to Host an Outstanding Webinar
If you want to transform a webinar into an outstanding one, you have come to the right place. To make your webinar mind-blowing and hook your attendees from beginning to end, you must apply proven practices to your next webinar and be the judge yourself. Applying these practices will also improve the quality of your webinar, and hence, attendees will indeed be more likely to go through your CTA (Call to Action), and as a result, your business will flourish.
1.Define your goals: –
Having a clear goal and purpose is essential to hosting a successful webinar because it will define what outcome you expect from the webinar, whether it is for training, education, marketing purposes, or any other reason. Before hosting a webinar, always ask yourself or your team these important questions. They will help you define your goals and provide solid reasoning for why this webinar is important for you and your attendees, as both are essential parts of the webinar.
- Why are you hosting a webinar?
- What is the purpose of this webinar?
- Do you want to educate, market, or train your audience?
- What outcome do you expect from the webinar?
- What is your CTA (call to action)?
Understanding your goals and objectives is very important to hosting a successful webinar. If you know the reason for hosting a webinar, you will add more value to the content, and you and your attendees will both be satisfied with the webinar.
2. Choose a topic:
Having a specific topic is essential for a webinar. If you try to cover 4-5 topics in one webinar, your audience will get confused and leave the webinar, or worse, they may not even sign up for the webinar if they are not sure what it is about. The more specific you are, the more attendees you can bring to the webinar, as you will only be targeting people interested in that specific topic.
You also have limited time, so planning ahead, making notes, and deciding all the sub-points you want to discuss before preparing the presentation will give you clarity, and hence, you will feel more in charge of the webinar. It is also important to choose a topic that aligns with your goals and objectives and should also be of interest to your target audience. If the topic is not aligned with goals and the objective is only of interest to the target audience, your purpose will not be fulfilled, and if it only serves the purpose and goal of the webinar and has no interest for your target audience, they may never sign up for the webinar.
With a specific topic, it will become easier to target the right audience for your webinar.
3. Know your target audience
Knowing your target audience is a key factor in hosting a successful webinar. If you do not know who your audience is, you will not be able to assess their availability and determine marketing strategies for your webinar.
With the help of Google Analytics on your website, you can find out the demographics and user journey of your audience. It is also important to ask yourself some questions, like, Who is your target audience? What are they looking for, and what challenges do they face? And what is it that interests them?
After finding out the answer to these questions, you will understand the missing puzzle they need, and you can fill the gap with the webinar.
4. Select a date and time:
Choosing the right date and time can maximise the number of attendees for your webinar, and choosing the wrong one can ruin the chances of squeezing out the most benefits from the webinar.
There are a few factors to keep in mind before finalising the date and time for the webinar.
While it is important to align date and time with the availability of the target audience, if you fix a time that does not suit them, it is more likely they will miss the webinar; hence, accommodating the time with their availability is important. Also mention the time zone because the webinar has global reach and there is a chance that the audience may get confused. There are other factors to keep in mind, such as avoiding festivals and holidays to host a webinar in your target audience regions.
5. Choose a webinar platform:
A platform for webinars that suits your needs and provides you with the right tools to maximise the benefits, such as revenue generation, community building, and employee engagement, is important. The platform should provide tools to customise your webinar as per your needs and must serve its goals and purpose.
Airmeet provides you with a webinar that boosts engagement, networking, and interactivity with the host and audience, as well as within the audience. You can interact with your leads within minutes and also analyse the performance of the webinar in real-time. You also get to interact with prospects immediately on stage or in the lounge and connect 1:1 or in a small group. You can host interactive demos and training to increase your ROI (return on investment).
With the right platform, you can engage and interact with your audience better and also squeeze out the most benefit.
6. Collaborate with expertss:
You can also collaborate with speakers and experts related to your topic and field to drive more registration and attendance at your webinar.
Though not all experts are engaging speakers, it is important for you to train and prepare them before the webinar to hook the attendees till the end. You can ask them to practice; hence, conduct a demo or training, and you can act as an audience. If the speaker is not engaging, then you may start losing attendees, and that is not good for a successful webinar.
7. Custom Landing Page:
To drive registration, a landing page is a must; it is what interacts with your audience first and compels them to register and, hence, join the webinar. Therefore, a custom landing page will hook your audience at first glance and serve only as your agenda for the webinar.
Landing pages are customised to visually appeal to the audience with visuals that generate interest and build anticipation, as well as with engaging content. With information about the topic, speakers, and benefits of attending the webinar.
8. Plan your content.
Your content must align with the goals and objectives of the webinar while considering the audience’s knowledge level, interests, and needs. You must also meet their expectations of the content and address their pain points.
Keeping these points in mind, start outlining your content logically while inducing smoothness from introduction to conclusion.
You can start your webinar with a brief introduction that captures the audience’s attention. You should also mention the purpose of the webinar and what attendees can expect.
While developing the main content, you can use presentation methods like slides, live demos, case studies, or storytelling to convey your message more effectively to your audience. Also, divide your content into sub-points and keep your content clear and concise.
9. Prepare the technical setup:
Make sure to test all your equipment before the webinar, including the microphone, camera, and internet connection, and also ensure that your chosen webinar platform is configured properly before the big day. Prepare for technical setups that might go wrong, and make sure to have a backup system just in case. It is wise to not leave anything to chance.
10. Marketing your webinar:
Marketing your webinar is essential; if only your audience knows about it, then only they will register and attend the webinar. Promote the webinar on social media as well as on your website, where your audience is present. Create engaging and attractive posts and reels and highlight the benefits attendees will get once they attend. Email marketing also comes in handy in the promotion, as the audience already connected with you knows your capabilities; hence, getting them registered is comparatively easier. Send them an engaging email to register for the webinar.
You can also leverage your website by running pop-up ads to direct your audience to your landing page and encourage them to register.
11. Mobile-Friendly Webinar:
In today’s world, most people are connected with the world through their phones. Hence, your webinar must be mobile-friendly and easy to join to increase participation.
12. Practice:
In a webinar, there are no cuts and edits; once live, you have to carry on. It is smart to practice before the webinar, whether you will do a presentation or conduct a demo. You can ask a friend or colleague to test the webinar in advance to see if there are any problems.
13. Host the webinar:
You can host the webinar in a 3D virtual environment and include some gamification features, Q&A sessions, polls, and some give-away gifts or coupons for winners.
Create fun and engaging moments to hold attendees attention throughout the webinar. You can also have some interactive activities, for example, by inviting attendees on stage to share their stories.
You can also provide entertainment in short form, but it should be something your audience likes, for example, stand-up comedy or the best memes from your industry.
You can also allow your audience to find and build meaningful connections by planning breakout rooms and speed networking sessions. Also, be present in chat and engage with your audience.
After the webinar, always follow up with attendees with a follow-up email that can have a recording of the session or some other resources.
14. Analyse the webinar and improve
An important action to take after hosting webinars is measuring and analysing the success of your event through many Key Performance Indicators (KPI), such as,
- How many people registered, and how many of them attended the webinar?
- How active was the chat? And how many attendees were active communicators?
- What did the polls and survey say?
- Did you meet your goals and objectives?
If you meet with any challenges in the webinar, make sure to address them and find a solution for them.
If you apply all these 14 practices to hosting a webinar, without a doubt, your event will be a hit.
