Webinar Best Practices - IT Glue
Transcript of Webinar Best Practices - IT Glue
Webinar Best PracticesOvercoming post-covid industry saturation and avoiding death-by-PowerPoint.
The Team
Director, NCA Events
Events Coordinator
Housekeeping
Best Practices from the Best:
Best Practices from the Best
ContentPlanning & Promotion
LiveExecution
Follow-up& On-demand
Content Planning
● Define a problem, solutions and actionable next steps
● Compelling title + 3 - 5 key learnings/takeaways
● Bring in subject-matter experts
● Provide resources that drive leads down the funnel
Presentation /Slide deck
● Finalize the deck in advance
● Design matters
○ Keep copy short + Leverage images
● Check all slide builds, videos and links
● There is ALWAYS a typo...
Plan for Engagement
● Include polls (that help tell your story), show of hands
● Encourage use of chat and questions (at any time)
● Promote prizes for live attendance
Registration: promote takeaways or prizes
Directly related to the topic
Registration: Add Teaser Video
Include link to Request a Demo (on the same page or after registration)
Optimize page with a 30-60s video
Registration: Countdown + Repeat CTA
● Repeat CTA● Form Pre-fill● Limited Navigation
Add Urgency
Promoting the Recording/On-demand
● Overly promoting webinars are recorded can kill attendance
● Promote Recording only as a pop-up if prospects bounce without converting
Promo Roadmap
● Schedule 2 or 3 emails, starting two weeks prior to the webinar○ Last chance: Dynamic countdowns clocks
● Support with Social Promo ○ Organic + Paid
Customize Confirmation Email
● Custom Image● CTA button with join link● 'Add to calendar' feature
It’s easy to lose your audience.
● Experiment with different durations.
What drives most registration/attendance?
● Start on time!
● Keep the energy level high
Aim for Spotless, but keep it human
● Acknowledge and have fun when things
don't work as planned. Now, more than
ever, people understand tech issues happen
LiveExecution
● Planning call/ Dry-run
○ Review the content, discuss the flow, handing off-points, practice controls
● Practice Mode: Speakers online 30 minutes before scheduled start time
○ Check tech
○ Enough time to get into the zone
● Open the room early and start right on time
No Rockstar Arrival
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● Quality camera (Full HD or 4K),
at eye-level
● Consider and external mic: poor audio is extremely distracting
● Use a green screen or a neutral background.
● Have a second monitor with your
notes and controls
Video isn't optional, it’s the expectation
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Upgrade your gear
Lights, camera, action!
● Control your lighting conditions with external lights
● Avoid backlights
Optimal 3-point lighting setup
Check your video settings
● Keep your audience paying attention to what matters
● Come across as professional and reinforce your brand
Virtual Background
The Webi-nerd: talking Bandwidth
● Schedule your session for times you have predictable bandwidth
● When you host webinars, your family shuts down. Sorry!
● Always have someone watching you live, to report trouble
Splash Screen:
● Standby Music
● Relevant info (pre-requisites)
● Start time, audio options
Housekeeping
● Review any tech that will be relevant to the presentation
● Recording
● Q&A, Chat , Live Polling
● Prizes
Control Audience View
● Stop your screen share to make it personal full-screen video
● Gallery view / Highlight speaker (especially during panels)
Conversational and Engaging
Polls / Show of Hands
● Use it to prove your points● Read results out loud for the recordings ● Using the native poll as a hand-raiser
Instead of an one-way message, bring the audience in
Conversational and Engaging
Using Polls for lead qualification
Conversational and Engaging
Chat
● Encourage and acknowledge chat conversations (ice-breakers, fun comments, different perspectives)
● Add value (share resources, sources, poll results)
● Have a support person /moderator monitoring it
Conversational and Engaging
Q&A
● Encourage people to ask at any point (otherwise they forget or get disengaged) ● Allow attendees to upvote questions (and start with the most relevant questions)
A little bit of bribing...
Running Video?
● Power-Point is slow and leggy
● Apple Keynote and VLC as smoother alternatives
● Using Youtube? Careful with Ads and Browse history
● Wistia or Vimeo render better (with no ads)
Retain your audience
● Promote upcoming webinars
● Post the links in the chat
CTA Slide● Stay on that slide for Q&As, give the audience time to respond.
● Tease takeaway file and webinar specials
● Post any links in the chat
Push Redirects
● Leverage your platform redirect capabilities to push attendees to a post-webinar page
Follow-up
● Prepare follow-up tasks in advance
● Process recordings timely (within less than 24h)
● Score on-demand viewers (Wistia)
● Reiterate actionable downloadable/ takeaway file
Design Follow-up Emails
● Custom message for Attendees / No-shows
● Short copy, to the point.
● CTA front and center
● 1-paragraph recap
Design Follow-up Emails
● Dedicated nurture, resend to people who still have not watched the recording
● Chapterized clips for top performing content
Resources Page
● Leverage previous sessions, to be watched on-demand
● Recycle top-performing webinars, sending them to new leads in the future
● Nurture on-demand leads with additional resources
Performance Metrics
Monthly/ quarterly review recent webinars to identify what worked best
● Topic / Presenter
● Total Registrants/ Attendance rate
● # of leads / Cost per lead / # of MQLs
● Conversion rates
● Total # of Opportunities created
● Total # of Opportunities Won (with win-rate and $ value)
Thanks for attending!
Recording and slides available at itglue.com/webinars-playbook