How to market your webinar
{artwork by Andy Westface via here}
{Guest post from Gemma Falconer}
It’s a fresh new year, full of potential and promise. It’s a time to look back on everything you did in 2014 and search for improvements to make 2015 your year to shine. With the benefit of hindsight, you can evaluate what did or didn’t work within your company last year, and change your tactics accordingly.
When done right, webinars are a great way to spread information and promote brand awareness. In fact, back in August 2011, HubSpot achieved the Guinness World Record for Largest Online Marketing Seminar with 10,899 participants. An enviable number, to say the least. If you’ve ever hosted a webinar before, you’re already familiar with that nagging fear: what if no one tunes in? What if you’ve spent weeks (perhaps even months) planning your presentation and there’s no one to see it? Here are a few tips and tricks to make sure that your next webinar gets the attention and attendance it deserves.
1. Creativity above all
Original content will always triumph over irrelevant or redundant ideas. If your topic isn’t fresh, you won’t get a great turn-out, no matter how killer your marketing strategy. You need something that’s general enough to gather a large following yet specific enough to be of use to your attendees.
One way to create a special, intriguing webinar is to partner up – reach out to a brand you’re interested in or who is perhaps doing something similar, and join forces. Not only will this increase your possible audience, it will be an opportunity to make truly unique content.
2. Nail your email marketing
The bulk of your webinar prep work will be simply getting the word out there. Make sure that your emails stand out visually and entice the reader into action. Email out invitations and reminders on Tuesdays, Wednesdays or Thursdays as Mondays and Fridays are usually spent catching up or hustling to finish a project last-minute, meaning a greater chance that your email will go unread.
3. Be social!
As important as email marketing is to your webinar, you shouldn’t be only relying on that one tactic to gather an audience: you need to create a social media presence. A great way to generate buzz around your event on Facebook, Twitter and Google+ is to create its own hashtag and regularly post about it, especially as the date draws nearer. You can even host a giveaway or a competition (with one of your services/products as the prize) to get people really involved.
4. Less is more
If you make the sign-up process lengthy or confusing, many people will be turned off and chances are you will lose many potential attendees. So simplify everything for them: clearly lay out the webinar details (date, time, time zone, whether it will be live only, on-demand, or both, how to join on the day, etc.), spell out your objectives and limit the number of form fields attendees have to fill out.
5. Build your reputation
Don’t let the relationships you build with attendees go cold – you don’t want negative sentiment to affect any future webinars you might want to hold. Send a follow-up email as a thank you, and always be on the constant look-out for ways to improve your technique!
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Author’s Bio:
Gemma Falconer is a member of the Demand Generation team at Citrix and GoToMeeting, a cloud computing company that enables mobile workstyles. She has been using collaboration tools/video conferencing/online meetings for the past 6 years and splits her working time between the office and home. Having experienced the flexibility and various advantages of using such technology, Gemma would love for employers to seriously consider offering collaboration tools and flexible working for their employees so they too can truly benefit. Gemma is a mother, keen volleyball player and writer. Find her on Twitter on LinkedIn.
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{Disclaimer : tractorgirl worked in collaboration with GoToMeeting to provide this post. I hope you find it helpful!}