A webinar is a terrific way to reach out to people and provide quality content in a very interactive way. Essentially, a webinar is a seminar done remotely over the Internet. The traditional whiteboard is replaced by screen-sharing software and the speaker can be heard via VOIP or streaming audio. A topic of interest is discussed by a resource speaker and the audience is given a chance to ask questions later on to enrich the discussion.
At the end of a successful webinar, a marketer is able to establish a deeper bond with his target market. Branding is also an aspect of marketing that benefits greatly from webinars. While there may be little to no direct effect on actual sales, the intangibles are there and conversions are likely to get a boost sooner or later if you do your webinars the right way.
So how do you put one together? Do you need to have an entire team and a suite of software to pull this off? How much investment is needed? Relax, because Cousin Andy is here to teach you how to set your first webinar up as easily and as inexpensively as possible.
Here are the steps:
- Prepare a topic two weeks in advance – While this may seem like a lot of time to some, it actually makes a lot of sense given the kind of planning, logistics, people and execution involved. Two weeks before the big day, you have to get a topic ready. The topic should be driven by popular questions or spawned by an existing problem in your niche. This gives the topic a drawing power all its own and it should make the webinar attractive to people regardless of whether they’re familiar with you or not.
- Choose the right man for the job – Make sure that the person who will conduct the discussion has lots of experience and a hefty amount of authority on the topic of the webinar. Having a fair amount of experience in doing webinars is a good thing for the speaker to have. You may also choose to have multiple speakers for a panel effect. Make sure that there’s a moderator in place so the discussion follows the schedule and the Q&A is delivered without incident.
- Select a date that works for the most number of participants – There is no single day when every member of the target audience you want is available. Go for a date and time that suits the most number of people possible. In my experience, the midweek is a good time for a short webinar. Afternoons EST work great because it’s the morning out there in the West Coast at those times. Note that this may vary from niche to niche, but this is what generally works.
- Choose your software – GoToWebinar is usually my first choice when it comes to setting up webinars. It allows screen sharing, standard phone and VOIP call-ins, presentation recording, polls and chat. The best part is that there’s a 30-day trial for this software so you can absolutely test the heck out of it before you decide to get it or not.
A great alternative would be Ryan Lee’s new Presentation Domination webinar software. It allows you to create stunning presentations like GoToWebinar, but what I love about it is that it gives you the option to record and pre-record your webinars so you can use them again for a later date. This means that you can look “live” to your audience at any given time, giving you a nice workaround to scheduling issues.
- Book the team and the venue -Make sure that you get a quiet and well-equipped place to hold the webinar in. Also, be sure to check if there are no scheduling conflicts on the people who are involved. The last thing you want is a speaker cancelling on the day before the webinar due to an important function he also agreed to.
- Create the slideshow – It’s best if you start the creation of the slides of your presentation a week before the webinar. This will give you and the speaker enough time to sync up and be creative. Also, you may want to create extra slides to show participants who have logged in early, waiting for the webinar to start. You can show humorous slides, informational ones, or even branding material if you wish.
- Create the landing page – At about the same time you create the slideshow, you’ll want to get your landing page ready. Make sure to follow my advice in landing page creation written in previous posts. Once you’re done, you can start promoting it to get registrations. Please note that some webinar software will allow you to sync the landing page with the webinar system, making things easier.
- Promote it like mad – The webinar wouldn’t be complete without the people you made it for, so go out on a limb and let people know about it. In the days leading to the webinar, post messages about it in your social media channels. Send out an email to your most relevant list. Start a thread about it in relevant forums where you’re active. You can even do some PPC if you think it’s what it takes to get people to sign up.
- Send out a reminder – A lot of people will tend to register and then forget that they booked a webinar. Send out an email a day before the webinar happens to make sure that people who signed up don’t miss it.
- Take the “stage” – If you followed these steps, you’ll have quite a crowd waiting for you on the big day. You and your speaker should dedicate ample time for a rich discussion and substantial time for a question and answer portion. Remember to treat your audience like colleagues and answer their queries with sincerity and an intention to help. Do this and your ‘cred is sure to grow.
Well, that’s my short guide on how to do your first webinar. Remember, there are many ways to build relationships and to provide value to your audience, so go out there, be creative, be personable and be successful.
Until then,
Andy
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