In Part 1 of this topic, we discussed four ways to make your webinar audience happy. Here are a few more things to pay attention to as you plan your next webinar:
Give Attendees a Special Gift
Believe it or not, approximately 75% of the people who sign up for your webinar will not attend. But, you can boost attendance if you give those who do attend a bonus that no one else will receive. Make it something with a high perceived value… a huge discount on whatever you’ll be selling… a checklist of important steps they need to take to achieve some goal… a free 30-minute phone consultation. This is where it’s critical to know your audience and what tools & knowledge they value. Do some research ahead of time, if needed.
Some webinar hosts don’t tell attendees ahead of time what the ‘bonus’ is. They simply hype it up by telling them to stick around ’til the end of the webinar when they’ll get a special link to a bonus page containing a valuable resource. Whatever you decide to do, I can’t emphasize enough the need to keep in mind the interests of your audience!
Create an Awesome Information Page
This is not the webinar sales or sign-up page. Rather, it’s the page a person lands on AFTER signing up for the webinar. This page contains all the details of what attendees can expect… the webinar time, date, phone, video link… any pre-work that needs to be done… a teaser about the bonuses they’ll receive at the end of the webinar… a summary of the topic you’ll be covering.
Follow Up
Don’t think that just the information page is enough. It’s also important to have an auto-responder set up to immediately thank people for signing up — and the email should include ALL the same info as what’s on the information page mentioned above. Why the repetition? Not everybody will read the info page and not everybody will pay attention to the confirmation email. If you put the exact same info in front of them twice, there’s a better chance of them actually seeing it.
Send Reminders
Sometimes people don’t attend a webinar live simply because they forgot. This is where reminder emails come into play. Send out an email (with all the same details we discussed above) 24 hours and one hour prior to the webinar. I wouldn’t suggest sending too many more emails or you’ll risk annoying people. (You can also use social media to remind those who have signed up… and you might even get some additional attendees out of it!)
After the webinar is over, consider sending one final message to everybody who signed up (not just the attendees). Include a thank-you message and a link to the webinar for those who missed it.
You can work diligently to make the webinar a success, but if you don’t include these factors and the ones in my previous post, you may not have that much participation. Understanding who your audience is and what they need is your first step to ensuring that all your webinars resonate with your audience. The more your events solve problems for your audience, entertain them, and wow them, the more likely they are to come back. Good luck!
Got questions? Please share your comments below!
Cynthia works closely with emerging professional speakers as they grow from speaking as a hobby to getting paid to speak full-time. In addition to creating websites exclusively for professional speakers, she consults in the areas of online presence & credibility, public relations, and content & product creation. She is passionate about helping speakers share their messages while impacting thousands of people around the world!
