By Tom Mason, Communications Director
Webinars were the “golden child” of the pandemic. I am sure many of you, working from home, enjoyed nothing more than getting the latest updates via Zoom.
That feels like an age away now, another world that is best forgotten, but what of the webinar?
They haven’t gone away and they still prove an excellent means of reaching out to your key audiences, without the need to travel across the UK to meet with people.
Don’t get me wrong, in-person events are back with a bang and a great way of connecting with the right people, but webinars still provide a really effective way of educating your audience and securing new leads to pursue.
We are no strangers to webinars ourselves and our team regularly host webinars on a wide range of topics.
Using our own experience and the clear benefits of webinars, we also host and promote webinars from a wide range of sectors – from cutting edge tech companies through to accountants and solicitors.
However, despite their presence, we still find that there’s a degree of reluctance or scepticism about webinars as a marketing tool, with common concerns:
- “It takes too long to set up”
- “It won’t get the results we want”
- “I’m no good/nervous to be on camera”
Look I get it, not everyone is ready for stardom on the smallest of screens, but from my perspective, these things simply aren’t true, or they can be rectified really easily.
If there’s one thing you take away from this article, it should be our resounding support of webinars as an effective tool and how they’ve repeatedly been proven to work from our clients.
The evidence that webinars work for marketing
Anecdotally, I know webinar work because I’ve seen it time and again – especially when it is paired with careful nurture campaigns both before and afterwards.
However, I bet you didn’t come here for anecdotes so here are some stats to prove it to you:
- Webinars have a “61.7 per cent conversion rate.” (TwentyThree).
- “Virtual events industry is expected to reach a value of around $1.03 trillion (approx. £77.1 billion) by 2032” (Custom Market Insights).
- Live webinars are the leader in lead generation, accounting for 91.3% of leads compared to just 9.7% from on-demand options. (TwentyThree)
When done well, webinars do get results and can sit as a key piece of “hero content” in a wider marketing plan.
They drive engagement with your brand, help you to build better prospect data and they often convert prospects into clients.
How to start doing webinars
If you’re convinced that webinars could work for you and your business, you’ll want to come up with a strategy for running them successfully.
You need to answer some key questions:
- What are you going to talk about? – Come up with a plan of content you’ll cover in your sessions.
- Who’s going to deliver them? – It doesn’t have to be a partner, director or business leader – it could just be a team member that’s passionate about the subject!
- What platform are you going to use? – Zoom? Livestorm? BigMarker? Demio?
- How often will you run sessions? – Weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly?
- How are you going to market them? – Webinars are great marketing tools but only if people show up to them in the first place. Where are you going to get your signups from?
- What are you going to do afterwards? – Exclusive offers, handy guides and slides or a telemarketing campaign to connect with and convert attendees – the possibilities are endless.
Often when people come up against these questions, they won’t know the answers or the sheer level of thought behind them will scare them off.
That’s where the help of a full-service marketing agency, such as ourselves, can make a good webinar into something great.
How long should a webinar be?
Another really common question I get is how long should a webinar be?
I get it, as someone who has sat on countless webinars, you don’t want it to feel like a waste of time.
According to BigMarker, 45 minutes to an hour are the most effective lengths for webinars.
This broadly matches what I’ve noticed myself although I would add a caveat that it depends on the content and purpose of the session.
If you’re doing a quick-fire run down of the Autumn Budget for busy business owners, 45 minutes may be too long.
On the other hand, if it’s an “Ask the Expert” session on MTD, you might want to schedule a longer webinar to ensure you get through all your points.
Time is only a consideration if you aren’t delivering an engaging and insightful presentation. Those who attend need to come away with something of value.
How do I get people to attend your webinars?
This is where the marketing needs to be thought out and targeted.
If your business sells personalised rugby balls, it’s no good having a load of footballers turn up to your webinar.
For social media promo, you need to work out where your audience operates most (LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram) and develop a strategy for targeting them through that platform.
If your audience is more likely to respond to an email, maybe you need to invest in data to target the right people.
If they’re travelling on the tube, perhaps an advertisement on key platforms.
And so on, you get the picture. You need to target your promotional campaign in line with what works best.
Do webinars all feel a bit complicated?
Don’t be put off!
As I said at the start: webinars do work!
If you’re worried about one of the aspects we mentioned above but you’re still keen to try your hand at webinars, maybe it’s time to speak to an expert.
An agency (like ours) will be able to help you host one-off sessions or create a year-long webinar campaign.
We can scale the plan to your needs and handle everything from the platform management to the PowerPoint slides.
Please speak to one of our experts for help and guidance in getting your webinars off the ground!
P.S: If you want to see how we do it, sign up for one of our sessions!
