John Allen April 6, 2021 Due to the digitalization of the marketplace and the rapid development of the Internet companies have successfully developed new ways to engage with leads. In the middle of this new digital ecosystem, webinars have risen to the occasion as great platforms for ecommerce brands.
While techniques like sending out a customer service email or two is good every now and then, these days, it’s not enough to sustain engagement. Even though webinars are really useful tools for companies looking to get in touch with prospective clients, stakeholders or employees, sometimes their potential is not truly fulfilled. Luckily, this list of 10 tips should help any business make the most out of their webinars, optimizing the many advantages that they offer.
Live or on demand? (Why not both?)
Webinars are usually associated with interactive live streaming events supported by video conferencing tools. However, there is a case to be made about the many advantages that on demand webinars offer. In reality, these two approaches are not exclusive, and they can complement each other to perfection.
Let’s start talking about what live webinars bring to the table.
- Live webinars tend to do a better job at boosting lead conversions. Due to their interactive nature, live webinars offer better engagement features. As a consequence, leads are more engaged with live sessions than with recorded videos.
- It also is important to consider that live webinars open the door to different forms of ecommerce like live commerce. This new form of online shopping mixes the traditional ideas of ecommerce with a live streaming format. If you have not heard of live commerce before maybe you should consider looking into it, because it may be a great opportunity to make the most out of one of the fastest growing streaming trends for 2021.
Now that we have looked at what the live approach can do for you. Let’s examine how on demand measures can help you make the most out of your webinars.
- Recording and storing your webinars for later use can make your content available to a broader audience. Sadly, sometimes leads are not able to attend webinars, but you can always make sure that the message finds the intended target by implementing on demand features.
- Additionally, on demand options give you the opportunity to explore different forms of communication and media, expanding your reach across different markets, platforms and channels.
Invest in live engagement tools
As it has been mentioned before, live webinars are interactive by nature. However, this won’t make a difference if the webinar host is not implementing the proper tools to engage the audience. As we all know, there is a direct correlation between engagement and conversions, but keeping attendees engaged is no easy task. Here are some features that any engaging webinar should include:
- Live chats for Q&A and AMA (Ask Me Anything) sessions. This allows attendees to feel included in the conversation and interact with prospective business partners and experts.
- Surveys and Polls. They allow you to know your attendee experience as well as gather statistics and information regarding various topics and industries. Asking things like: “Why did you join the webinar?”, for example. You could even create a chart to publicly present the results of your surveys.
- Gamified tests. That let attendees test their knowledge in a fun and interactive way.
Nurture the binge-watch culture
The popularity of entertainment and video streaming platforms like Netflix or Twitch has reshaped how we consume media. Nowadays, the “binge-watching” culture has taken over. As a result, audience members feel a strong compulsion to watch as much media as possible in one sitting.
You can leverage this new trend. Storing on demand webinars allows you to make the most out of the accessibility provided by platforms like YouTube or Vimeo. These sites allow you to gather all your content under one hub, so that leads can binge-watch all your webinars.
Additionally, you can recycle your content through different channels. One quick way to do so is breaking down the webinars into easy-to-consume videos that can be used on different social media platforms like Instagram or Twitter. Social media videos are one of the most effective ways to use video marketing to boost ecommerce sales.
According to sources like Statista, 67% of consumers interacted with brands on Instagram during 2020. Even though social media videos are a very powerful engagement tool, creating excellent video content is more than simply chopping your videos up into pieces.
Most brands looking to optimize their online video presence hire professional video editors. The idea behind this approach is to successfully create engaging content that boosts conversions and invites interactions. To do so, you should invest in the best video editing apps in order to provide audiovisual experts with the best tools.
Experiment with different forms of media
The power of video-based solutions is an undeniable truth. Webinars, for example, are mostly made possible thanks to video conferencing software. However, this doesn’t necessarily mean that other forms of media are not useful nowadays. Audio-based content like podcasts are also taking over the digital content marketplace.
Investing in on demand webinars can help you expand your brand reach into other forms of media. Recording audio from talks by experts or AMA sessions can be an easy way to format your webinars as podcasts. This is made possible thanks to VoIP phones that allow you to record calls.
However, you don’t need to spend extra cash on pricey VoIP providers like Broadvoice. Right now, the VoIP industry is very competitive, and the market offers excellent alternatives to Broadvoice cloud PBX communication.
Create cross-platform content
One of the many advantages that come with hosting online based events like webinars is the fact that they can be accessed from anywhere. As a result, many attendees tend to use their smart devices during webinars. For this reason, it is essential to invest in CTI technology.
In order to understand just how important CTI we must ask ourselves: “What is a CTI app?”. CTI stands for computer telephony integration. This technology enables telephones and computers to interact with each other and it is essentially used in call centers that rely on VoIP phones.
This is obvious for those that are aware of the nature of VoIP telephony. For wondering “What is a VoIP phone?”, just know that VoIP phones are simply phones that connect via the Internet. As you may have guessed, CTI software and VoIP devices allow webinar hosts to create online content that works across both desktop and smartphone devices. Just make sure to get the best VoIP service available in order to make the most of this technology.
Automated marketing
We have already discussed the technological aspects of webinars. Let’s talk about how to properly promote them now, Shall we? Nowadays, thanks to the implementation of cloud computing and cloud automation the marketing process has been successfully automated. This means that AI powered marketing software is trained to set weekly reminders for leads, using both social media posts and personalized emails.
The automation of these processes does not only save the costs related to the advertising process, it can also help you give your brand image a new look, promoting your company using green marketing strategies. Imagine that with every social media post or email, the bot adds a small message that reminds prospective attendees how much paper is being saved due to the digitalization of such messages. This is just one example that proves that being eco-friendly doesn’t require grand gestures.
The ever-important cybersecurity
The current popularity of videoconferencing and digital events like webinars has brought a series of unique challenges regarding security. Nowadays, especially when dealing with B2B ecosystems, video conferencing security has become more important than ever. Here is a small list of topics to have in mind:
Secure passwords to restrict access. This way you can be certain that only those that you want to attend the webinar truly turn up there.
End to end coded document sharing (especially documents that include sensitive information regarding attendees, business partners or stakeholders).
File detection that allows antivirus software to detect where documents are coming from.
Understand your audience
In order to make the most out of your webinars you should implement an attendee centric strategy. The best way to do so is tracking their behavior in order to understand patterns, pain points, preferences, etc. Remember those surveys and polls we mentioned before when talking about live engagement? Here is where they become integral to developing the best webinar possible.
Another way to create excellent attendee service and experience is implementing playback visitor sessions, this feature is included by website usage tracking that allows hosts to know their clients’ interaction with the site. Which links they click on the most, how much time they spend on specific pages, etc. Supplemented with additional links to materials that you used for screen sharing and in-webinar presentations, this could turn out to be a huge boon for your arsenal.
Implement your SEO skills
It may seem like a no-brainer, but hosting webinars requires the same SEO skills that any website or digital content needs. Boosting your SERP (Search Engine Results Page) positioning will be key to make the most out of your webinar and raise your attendance numbers. To do so, you should resort to the basic SEO strategies: keywords, descriptions, etc.
Train newcomers
Sometimes it just doesn’t matter how hard you try to host the perfect webinar or how well optimized your webinar is, you won’t be able to make the most out of your content if your leads are not used to this form of marketing or B2B interaction.
Send surveys asking leads and prospective attendees if they have ever been part of a webinar or if they have any experience with digital conferencing. If the answer is no, then you should consider sending them some free video tutorials explaining some basic concepts like how to screen share or how to send a fax from computer, in order to optimize their attendee experience.
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