Creating a useful and memorable webinar needn’t be too much of a task. Once you have a solid plan for the content, this guide below aims to provide you with some vital snippets of things to remember. So, here’s what you need to know, think about and prepare.
Create a Great Headline
The headline sells the webinar, it’s that simple. Hypothetically if we created a webinar titled, ”Better content writing”, it’s not going to be nearly as engaging as one titled ”Create Compelling Content and Win the Web”. The second seems more interesting, intriguing and is likely to create a better first impression.
Provider
Choosing a provider is a must and there are plenty out there. Google+ Hangouts are often used for webinars and can be great. However, there are also a number of premium offerings out there too, that are fantastic for creating or enhancing your webinar:
Information
Create an awesome landing page on your website or your blog informing people of the webinar’s existence. This will require you to add a name, email to register and plenty of interesting information about what’s to be expected in the webinar.
It’s also a good idea to use a video here to showcase what the webinar is about as it’s more compelling and interesting. In addition, it’s also easy to distribute via other means.
Get the Word Out There
People won’t just come upon your webinar. As a marketer you need to promote your webinar and this means creating social media, email and press release campaigns around it.
Here are some ideas on how to get the word out there:
- Distribute a press release via PR Newswire, or Pitch Engine
- Include it in your newsletter (if you have one) a month before launch
- If you send out emails then make sure to send out four to remind people. Send them a month, three weeks, a week and the day before.
Social Adverts
Social media adverts are a lot less expensive than people think and can be a great way to attract an interested audience. So, why not set up a social media campaign around a fortnight before promoting your event?
Use Analytics
My advice is to use the landing page URL when getting people to sign up to your webinar. The reason being you can track your audience and gain data on what works for them and what doesn’t work for them, especially important if you hold monthly or quarterly webinars.
Blog about It
Blogging about the webinar and what people can expect from it is a great way to get the word out there organically. Create a blog post about one week before you host your webinar and then share it via the usual means. It can be a very successful way to get people talking about your offering.
It’s worth mentioning that the blog post should not be a sales pitch. It should be informative and give people and idea of what they can expect to learn. Giving them an overview like this allows them to see there is something in it for them.
Guest Promotion
If you have a guest person talking at the webinar then make sure to mention them in the blog post and encourage them to promote it and share it. In addition, if you have employee advocates, utilise their accounts and following to get create interest too.
Go Old School
Why not go completely old school and send out a mail shot to people you have on your database. Because people send mail so seldom, it can have a greater impact and so can create more potential engagement. There are plenty of ways to track offline marketing too – this post from Moz is a great one on how to do this.
Record
Record the webinar. Most people won’t have time to watch it live. However, if you record it you can post it on your blog and then send a follow up email to everyone who registered letting them know it’s on site. It’s a good idea to track the visits and downloads and some even like to turn the webinar into gated content, which allows them to grow their email marketing list.
- The aforementioned ClickWebinar, has one click recording and also provides webinar statistics.
- Media Composer 5.5 can be good for post webinar edits
- MS Excel is of course always a good option for compiling and analysing data
Hosting a webinar can provide your business with great rewards and position you as a thought leader in your field. So, what’s stopping you?
Image from transparentcorp.com
