Whether you’re a multi-national corporation or an aspiring entrepreneur, webinars can play an instrumental part in reaching your target market and growing your business. They provide a platform for you to engage with your core audience and allow you to showcase your expertise to your target market at the convenience of you and the listener. You can easily record webinars and post them online so that your audience can listen to them whenever and wherever. You can let your users help you promote your brand by encouraging them to share the webinar on their social media channels. In this post, we’ll talk about webinar best practices, and provide a comparison of the best webinar platforms online.
Webinar Best Practices:
An Enticing Webinar Title : The title of your webinar is just as important if not more important than the content itself. An enticing title will attract prospective attendees to learn more about the webinar and your services. Without a compelling title, you will lose the opportunity to entice your core audience. If you need a source for inspiration, try Richard Bayan's Words That Sell.
A hot topic in your field: Choose a topic that has staying power and will be relevant in a month's time. Look into seasonal trends within your industry to find a topic that your audience is interested in. The topic should help your audience learn a new skill, become better informed about a certain field, or improve use and understanding of a product.
For example, if you’re in the gourmet food industry, a great educational webinar in the summer would be "How to Make your own Olive Oil Gelato." If you are a yoga instructor, a great webinar topic on healthy living could be “Is Yoga Enough to Keep you Fit? How to Create a Healthy Lifestyle.” Marketing companies can capitalize on the Google Plus new release and discuss how businesses can leverage it.
Ease of Understanding v. Complexity : Because the success of your webinar hangs on your audience retaining the webinar in one sitting, the topic must find the right balance between being understood easily while being intriguing. Since your audience is investing their time in you, you want your audience to feel smarter than they were 15 minutes ago. Always include time for a Q&A session at the end to provide them the chance to have their questions answered by you or your speaker.
Don’t assume the webinar is going to market itself: Take the time to develop a plan on how you’re going to get promote the webinar to your target market. We found a great list on this post.
Webinar Platforms:
1. GoToWebinar - One of the most well-known solutions.
Features: Allow the host to create a registration page and invitation emai to send, branded with your Company logo. Some of its core features include the audio conference by phone and the computer, full desktop or specific application sharing, recording, drawing tools, chat, etc. You can also submit post webinar surveys. And GoToWebinar automatically sends out follow up emails to attendees. This platform provides support for the most attendees of the platforms we surveyed. So if you anticipate big audiences, GoToWebinar may be your option. It is compatible on PCs and Macs.
Price: All plans offer a 30-day free trial. The smallest plan allows for up to 15 attendees at $49/month. $99 per month for up to 100 participants, $399 per month for up to 500 participants, or $499 per month for up to 1,000 participants. Each plan has a corresponding annual pricing plan which comes out to be 20% cheaper.
Features: Pay as you go service plans ranging from basic services to operator assistance for each event. Capacity for thousands of attendees at no additional charge, mp3 audio file download is available for participants (at an additional cost).
Price: 12 cents per minute for standard webinar features, 18 cents per minute for one dedicated operator, or 24 cents per minute for multiple operators.
Features: Connects to your mobile and tablet. In addition, Connect helps you manage and plan your webinars. They also have great customer service.
Price: $55 per month per host for up to 25 participants (I had to call them for a price check since the price is not easy to find on their website). The annual contract is $540 which comes out to $45 per month per host.
4. MyMeeting123
Features: File Sharing. Money back guarantee within the first 14 days of use. Cancel anytime and get refunded on the unused months.
Price: $209.85 for 3 months, $419.70 for 6 months, or $755.40 for 12 months (10% off for yearly subscription). All plans host up to 100 participants (including host).
5. Intercall
Features: Integrates with MSN Messenger, Lotus, and MS Office Communicator Messenger. Free iPhone, Android, and Blackberry app.
Price: $42 per month for up to 20 participants or use the pay as you go plan at $.17 per minute. The pay as you go plan can host up to 125 participants.
6. Yugma
Features: Yugma integrates with Skype so you can invite your Skype contacts to meetings and share your screen with them. The Yugma A plan contains audio conferencing while the other plans do not.
Price: Webinar registration is $19.95 per month or $199.50 annually on top of the price of the plan that you choose. The price depends on the number of participants allowed in a webinar. Plans range from 2 participants at no charge or up to 500 participants for $159.95 per month or $1599.50 annually.
Features: Participants can share the webinar link to their peers on Facebook. The "green room" provides a private chat room for webinar staff to coordinate prior to the event.
Price: $47 per month for up to 50 lines, $97 per month for up to 100 lines, or $187 per month for up to 200 lines. Contact the sales department for a quote if you are interested in adding more than 200 lines.
Already a pro? Let us know what webinar program you use and how webinars have impacted your business. If you're a webinar vendor, feel free to leave additional comments or clarifications on your product.
Photo credit to the Missouri League for Nursing
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