There's no doubt that webinars are highly effective when it comes to generating new leads for your business. They're also an excellent opportunity to sell your programs, services, and products.
However, hosting a webinar is not as simple as going live on the spur of the moment.
In fact, a webinar takes a lot of planning and preparation if you want to make the most out of it. You have to choose the right topic, make sure you have all the equipment, promote your webinar, engage with your audience, and the list goes on.
That's why in this article, we've gathered our best tips on how to have a successful webinar presentation. I've divided these webinar presentation tips into five categories:
- Webinar Preparation Tips
- Webinar Marketing Tips
- Webinar Presentation Tips
- Webinar Engagement Tips
- Webinar Follow-Up Tips
Let's dive in!
Webinar Preparation Tips
Let's kick off this roundup with webinar preparation tips that will help you choose the right equipment and topic for your webinar.
1. Choose Your Topic
The first step is choosing the right topic for your audience. Needless to say, the topic you choose should align with their interests as well as products, programs, or services you offer.
Whether you run a webinar to book out your services or you want to establish yourself as an authority, try to avoid solving your audience's burning problem during the webinar. The ultimate result of a webinar should be to eventually help you sell out your programs or services, so think of your webinar as teaching them why they need to solve the problem they've got and reserve the how for your programs and services. Learn how to create a webinar that sells in this tutorial:
2. Choose the Right Equipment and Platform
Once you know your topic, the next step should be choosing the right equipment and the right webinar platform. Consider investing in a quality microphone to ensure high audio quality as well as a USB webcam or better so that your audience can see you and the speakers.
You can visit your local tech store or, alternatively, consider browsing Amazon or other online stores that often have deals and promotions going on that can save you a nice amount of money.
When it comes to the webinar platform, there's no shortage of premium and free webinar platforms. We've shared our recommendation of more than 15 free and paid webinar software tools in this article:
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You can use the article as a starting point in your research. Be sure to look for a platform that has all the necessary features such as:
- social promotion
- webinar reminders and recording ability
- webinar statistics
- the ability to export a list of registered attendees
3. Mind the Time Zones
Next, keep in mind the time zones, especially if you've got an international audience. When finding a time that'll suit everybody, aim for times that are not too early or too late in the day, and be sure to record the webinar so you can send a replay to those who couldn't make it. Alternatively, consider offering your audience the ability to choose between multiple dates and times.
4. Keep Mobile Users in Mind
According to statistics, roughly 25% of webinar attendees use their mobile device to tune in to a webinar. As such, it's crucial that your chosen webinar platform supports mobile devices, especially when it comes to features such as polls and live chat.
You’ll also want to use larger font sizes and less text on your webinar slides to accommodate smaller screens and make it easier for mobile users to follow along.
5. Document Your Webinar Process
As you're getting ready for the webinar, make sure to document the process along the way. This will help you streamline the preparation process as well as everything else that goes into making a webinar.
Additionally, you will be able to identify what worked well and what needs improving so you can refine your process over time and reap the most benefits. Consider using a project management tool like Asana or Trello to keep track of every task associated with running a webinar.
6. Enlist Help
Planning, marketing, and hosting a webinar is a lot of work, not to mention following up with your audience afterward. Instead of going at it alone, consider enlisting help from your coworkers or hiring a temporary VA to help you manage all the tasks.
7. Do a Practice Run
Before the big day, consider a practice run to make sure nothing goes wrong during the actual webinar. Test your equipment, go through your slides, and if you've got speakers or experts, make sure they join in and test everything on their end as well.
Webinar Marketing Tips
Once you've got everything to create your webinar, you'll need to spend time marketing the webinar and promoting it. Here are a few tips that will help you do that.
8. Create a Landing Page
Before you start marketing and promoting your webinar, you'll need to create a landing page. Use the landing page to inform visitors what the webinar will be about and tell them when the webinar is taking place. You'll also want to insert a sign-up form so that you can collect their email addresses and follow up with them after the webinar. Review this article for more details on creating a landing page:
9. Promote on Social Media
Once your landing page has been created, start promoting your webinar on social media. Link to the landing page in your social media bio and share relevant details about the webinar on your social media accounts. If you've got a marketing budget, consider investing in paid ads to promote your webinar on networks like Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest to reach an even bigger audience.
10. Write a Blog Post
Don’t forget to write a blog post on your blog and announce the upcoming webinar. Alternatively, consider guest posting on a popular blog in your niche and offering valuable advice to their audience before linking to your webinar landing page in your byline.
11. Email Your List
You should also email your list, no matter the size. Your email list consists of your warmest audience and biggest fans who've already made a purchase or established a relationship with you. As such, they're more likely to engage with you during the webinar and to make another purchase.
12. Create a Webinar Hashtag
Consider creating a webinar hashtag and inviting your followers to sign up and then share the webinar landing page with their audience through a branded hashtag. This will help you get your webinar in front of more people, which can increase the number of signups and attendees.
Webinar Presentation Tips
During a webinar, you'll want to make sure your slide deck helps your audience understand the key takeaways from the webinar as well as helping you keep them interested. Keep the following webinar presentation tips in mind:
13. Use a Slide Deck Template
If you're not design-savvy or don't have time to create a slide deck from scratch, consider using a PowerPoint template as a webinar presentation template. Nowadays, you'll find plenty of templates on marketplaces such as Envato Elements.
These PowerPoint templates have been designed to accommodate almost every industry and can be easily customized with your colors, content, and fonts. A webinar presentation template will save you time as well, considering it already comes with all the necessary slides and presentation elements.
14. Follow Brand Guidelines
A webinar is a great chance to introduce first-time visitors to your brand. Follow your brand guidelines closely when working with your chosen slide deck and incorporate your brand color, consistent fonts, and a logo in the corner of each slide.
15. Start on Time
Nobody likes it when another party is running late, and the same holds true for webinars. Don’t make your audience wait, especially since your webinar might be attended by international visitors. As mentioned earlier, keep in mind the time zones and show up on time.
16. Keep Slides Shorter
Another tip that'll help you host a successful webinar presentation is to keep slides shorter. Putting too much text on a single slide makes it hard to read on smaller screens, not to mention you run the risk of boring your audience and losing their interest while they wait for you to finish speaking.
You can also use images, photos, graphs, and other visual elements to make up for the lack of text and to create a more compelling presentation.
Webinar Engagement Tips
An engaged audience is crucial if you want to make sure they stay until the end and listen to your main pitch. Below, you'll find tips that focus on boosting audience engagement during a webinar.
17. Ask Questions During the Webinar
Asking your audience questions during the webinar gives them a chance to give you feedback and to engage with you through live chat. Ask them for their opinion on the topic and how they handle situations related to the topic of your webinar, encourage them to share their experiences, and more.
18. Make Use of Polls
Another way to get your audience to interact with you is to make use of polls and let the audience vote on certain ideas or during particular slides. This will give you even more insight into their demographics, which you can use later on in your marketing.
19. Have a Chat Moderator
Going through your webinar presentation and engaging with your audience in live chat at the same time can be a recipe for disaster. You run the risk of missing important questions or breezing through your slides in an effort to maintain the conversation. Consider asking a team member or a coworker to be a moderator in the chat. Not only can they engage the audience, but they can also share links you mention and point the audience to the right pages on your site.
20. Consider a Guest Speaker
If this is your first time running a webinar, consider having a guest speaker to help you break the ice and take some pressure off you. This is beneficial for your audience because you're giving them access to an expert, and for your speaker because they get the benefit of interacting with your audience.
Webinar Follow-Up Tips
Lastly, once the webinar is over, make sure to follow up with your audience to continue nurturing the relationship you've started.
21. Survey the Audience
Now that the webinar is over, send out a survey to the audience and ask them to share their experience. You can include questions that'll help you evaluate what went well and what could've been done better, or you can simply ask them to share their honest opinion in a few sentences. Make sure to make the survey anonymous as users tend to be more honest that way. You can use a tool like Survey Monkey to create an anonymous survey.
22. Create a Poll That Allows Them to Vote on the Next Webinar Topic
Consider creating a poll about the topic of your next webinar and inviting your audience to vote. By doing so, you'll allow them to feel a part of your webinar creation process as well as understanding what topics interest them the most.
23. Email the Replay
Make sure to email the replay or the recording of the webinar to anyone who registered but didn’t attend. This will give them a chance to view it as well as a chance to register or purchase your program.
24. Review the Analytics
Lastly, make sure to review the analytics provided by your webinar platform as well as the analytics from your landing page or any ad campaigns. This will allow you to tweak and test your setup and delivery, measure the engagement and conversion rate, and improve any future webinars.
Use These Webinar Presentation Tips to Host a Great Webinar
Hosting a webinar is an involved task that can lead to amazing results when done properly. With the tips in this article and the rest of our webinar series, you'll be well on your way towards planning, preparing, and hosting a successful webinar presentation for your business.
