How to create a webinar that engages and transforms people blog
The best webinars catch your audiences' attention quickly offer valuable advice and provide an expertly produced experience. The challenge for any marketer is to do all that quickly and efficiently, with the assurance that you can produce results.
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So in this guide, we'll demystify how to create an online webinar from the initial ideation, promotion, rehearsal, and then going live all the way to the logistics afterward and the best techniques.
The following tips will help you along the way to ensure you're focused on creating compelling story and content that will captivate the audience. You also need to ensure that you can bring your most ambitious event vision to life.
Let's take a dive!
What you'll learn
The key to the success of a webinar is good information
At the end of the day, the most important thing to an effective webinar lies in the content. The tools you use for video should create the content.
Make sure you invest your time and energy in deciding on a subject, select relevant and compelling speakers and then choose the right platform to present it all. There is so much competition to keep your audience's attention It's crucial to provide the most valuable event for the amount of period of time.
How to create a webinar in 2021 (step-by-step guide)
The stakes can feel high when designing a webinar at an extremely competitive market! There's a lot of details to manage, creative options selections to make, and even the right speakers, but it's all worthwhile once your webinar is live.
If you're feeling a bit anxious, don't be concerned! It's okay to accept uncertainty by following the following steps. We've broken them down into four main stages of webinar production.
- Planning
- Promotion & production
- Go live
- Post-production
Each stage will require different people for different duties. No matter how large or small, complicated or straightforward your concept will be to launch it is recommended to reserve the production timeframe between 4 to 8 weeks.
This 4-8 week window will allow you plenty of time to organize, find speakers, practice your production and then go live with assurance and professionalism of sound system to make an impact!
Stage of planning
1. Begin with the goals you want to achieve.
It is crucial to collaborate with your team to identify the goals of your webcast or other event. It will enable you to know the impact you wish to make and the way you'd like to gauge the performance of your webinar.
It can also include important performance indicators such as:
- The total number of registrations
- Attendance of live participants or conversion of registered attendees to attendees
- Number of targeted prospects or clients who register
- Closed-ended deals that you've won are due to the webinar
Pro Tip: Once you have established your objectives and objectives, you should translate it into a brief or project plan.
2. Assign roles to your team.
Depending on the size of the event, you might want to consider assigning roles to your team members. For example, designates the following "roles" that play a significant role to different aspects of your webinar's production
promotions: It is in charge of the marketing plan for a webinar. It includes emails, social promotions, onsite marketing, as well as other methods for attracting your viewers to sign-up.
Programming content:This role is responsible in determining topics and speakers, the messaging creation, and design of webinar material.
Operation: This function is responsible for building forms, landing pages, creating videos on demand and also managing the technical operations among webinar tools and marketing tools and CRM tools , to ensure that data is correct.
3. Host a kickoff meeting with internal stakeholders.
The kickoff gathering brings all stakeholders together to align on goals, decide on your ideal audience to brainstorm, come up with ideas for speakers, and assign jobs and tasks. It can also be the ideal place to start the planning process for your promotion (more details below).
In relation to the quantity of stakeholders, you may require a separate discussion with the production team to outline the scope of the production as well as a meeting with your design team to establish the visual elements of your webcast. Design elements can include slides, artwork, landing page design, as well as social media promotions.
Promotion & Production Stage
4. Promote your webinar.
For the best results, ensure at least 3 weeks of promotional time prior to making your webinar live.
Pro Tip Think about these channels to make your event more visible:
- Organic and Paid-for social
- Product-based advertising
- Onsite promotions
5. Begin speaker outreach.
After a well-defined content programming outline has been created, it's time to source the talent you need!
Speakers are the key element to making the subject and information to life. These could include team members as well as in-house experts or external speakers including industry professionals, customers, or other professional speakers who can talk to the subject in question.
Pro tip:Spend time researching other online events and webinars related to your industry or topic to find out who else in the world is speaking about the subject. This can be a good way to see how speakers may act live during your webinar.
Once you've identified any potential external speakers, locate their contact info and then begin the outreach.
Whatever method you choose to contact speakers, remember to set the expectations for your outreach. This can be done by providing important information such as:
- The expected time commitment for presenters to be part of the webcast (ex. 1 or 2 meetings, and the go-live date)
- What do they need to perform for the live show?
It is our goal to make it easy and unfussy!
Do you need help with the live stream of the content of your webinar?
Find out everything you need to know about how to go live with our live streaming master class series.
6. Call to kickoff or speaker for the board.
Congratulations! Once you've confirmed your speaker for the webinar, you should be sure to inquire about any important media that will aid in facilitating introductions of speakers and promotions. It could include:
- Speaker headshots
- Exact titles
- Release forms or contracts
- Sizzle reels
Speaker kickoff is an opportunity to allow your speakers to meet, establish expectations, and present the outline of your webinar.
7. Prepare your material and create a run of show.
When you are getting closer to your date for the event You'll need to decide on the details of your event. Content might include:
- Plan or agenda
- Notes on welcome or scripts
- Videos
- Images or graphs
Create visuals like presentation charts, decks, videos, speakers, or engagement tools like polls and live Q&A ahead of the event, so that you can have a clear idea of your production.
Pro Tip:If you can, make a plan to prepare all your content and upload it to your virtual event platform beforehand.
8. Do a full-length practice.
Rehearsals can be a wonderful opportunity to connect with the speakers, resolve technical problems, and go through both topics and content.
For the best results attempt to set aside one time with all participants during the webcast to complete the course of the content and to answer any technical questions concerning frame, audio, or concerns from the speakers. This will aid in the prevention of technical issues like internet disruptions.
9. Go live!
The time has come! It is recommended to have all your speakers on the stage for about half an hour prior to starting live. This will assist in troubleshooting any last minute tech issues and reduce stage jitters.
Post-production
10. Send your follow-up messages.
Following your event, make certain to send follow-up messages to your attendees thanking them for attending. If you have registered a person however, they did not go to the webinar, make sure to send an additional follow-up note encouraging them to check out the on-demand video
If you're a member of the sales team, provide some details about next steps/follow-ups, so that you are able to provide a seamless transition between sales and marketing.
Make sure to give an acknowledgement note to every speaker!
11. Prepare your on-demand content.
Be sure to save your webinar's content! When the live session is over you can use an editing software to cut the video and then upload it for a piece of evergreen material.
Make sure to provide a link of the on-demand video to the webinar's registrants and participants. Also consider gating your on-demand video content using a lead form, so you can maximize your hard job.
12. Optimize for the future.
Review your webinar's core data like the number of registrants and live attendees, as well as questions and polls for a deeper understanding of your webinar participation. Consider sending out an after-event survey to see the ways to do more effectively next time!
How can you make a webcast with
In this article we've covered the most important considerations in creating an effective webinar. The specific instructions for the different platforms for webinars may differ. There may be a need for information about how to make use of your preferred webinar platform.
Design an event
If you're an Premium or Enterprise subscriber, you may create a webinar by heading over to the video manager Click the new video dropdown and select Make the webinar.
You will be taken to the management of your webinar page in which you will be able to identify the webinar, include a description, and plan the time and date for when it will begin your live stream.
Make your registration form
For the purpose of turning potential attendees to leads, you'll need to design the registration form. On the webinar management page you can click on the registration button to the right of the preview player.
Create specific forms with fields such as email address, the first and last names the role of the company, any other data you wish to collect from participants of your webinar.
Plan your content
The name of the game is to keep your guests active throughout the entire occasion! Make sure you remove any unnecessary content or activities. Create content that is simple, actionable and relevant to issues or learnings your audience wants to be investing in.
Pro tip:Add an intro slate for webinars and agenda prior to the beginning of your event so your audience knows what they can expect. Make sure you schedule time at the close of the live event to go through questions and answers..
You can create a timeline made up of multiple scenes
After you've got the presentations, video decks pictures, graphic, and audio, add your materials to your webinar to create an outline of the timeline or show. To upload your content, head to the webpage for webinar management and click control the productionand stream. For information on how you can include and change scenes in your stream, check out our tutorial.
Pro tip: You can manipulate each scene to make the ideal timeline for production. You should practice your script before you start to ensure that it flows naturally and is captivating.
Invite your guests to speak.
If you're using multiple speakers, you'll need to develop unique speaker links for each of your guests. It makes it easier for everyone to participate in your event easily and on time.
Add speakers to your timeline by clicking Add to Scene.
Pro Tip: Add graphic elements for example the lower thirds for each of your speakers so it's easy to recognize who's who at the program.
Rehearse your webinar content
After your event's content is added to the event timeline and your speakers have been onboarded, it's time to test Test, test, try!
Set aside time for technical review and rehearsal so that speakers are familiar with your webinar tools and content before going live. In the broadcaster view, you can browse your scenes by clicking each scene individually and then clicking "Send to stream.
It is possible to see on the top left hand side how the event is streamed live at your event, to ensure you, the speakers, and any production crew members can get a feel of how the event will take place.
Go live!
After you've completed all of the preparations. Now comes now the exciting part! Set up your webinar's scenes or slides, make sure you have the water bottle in the fridge ensure that everybody is prepared to start.
For live streaming, click"green" Begin the live eventon the upper right-hand corner to start sharing with your audience.
While you are going through your webcast, choose any sequence and select Send to streamto live stream each stage of your show.
Cut your video to be available on demand
Thank you for a great event! When you've completed your webinar with a click of "End" Make sure to modify and trim the content to the final format. After you end your event you'll be able to select Manage webinar then make sure to mark the event "Complete," and trim the content, or you can end the modal ,allowing you to open the contents of the webinar up again.
It is important to forward the information the attendees of your webinar and participants within 24 hours.
Three important webinar statistics
Quality and the content of speakers are important in determining the success of the registration process for events.
You can probably relate to the fact that the year 2020 was the year of virtual experiences. From virtual happy hours, marathon summits and even one or two awkward meals with the family, we've all had the experience of coming together digitally.
While the demand is still high for events online, quality over quantity matters. 64 percentage and 63% the participants in our survey say the quality of speakers as well as the relevance of the content make them join events.
The majority of participants will switch off an event early because of technical problems or boredom.
Inviting people to attend your event is just half that battle. Do all the work up front to mitigate any technical hiccups that could cause a delay in your event's attendance since over half (59%) of participants in surveys are likely to drop off a live event due to technical problems.
Events online are here to stay!
With no shadow of a doubt, virtual events have had a long-lasting impression on the industry of events. Your knowledge of video can come in handy for years to come.
The majority (72%) of those who participated said that they plan to attend as many, if not more, online events than they are currently attending when in-person events return.
Wrap around
It's true that there's plenty of planning, brainstorming and preparation required to launch the webinar. The benefits of a webinar are nearly endless. Additionally, having the video replay accessible on demand ensures that your webinar can continue making an effort to boost your visibility and allow you to generate even more leads well in the near future. And the most important thing? the more you try it, the easier it becomes.
If you're planning your next event, remember to follow the following 4 tips:
- Make sure you are focusing on your viewers. Who they are and what kind of questions they ask as well as their everyday routines might look like should guide your production plan for webinars.
- Pick the best technology. End-to-end solutions offer the greatest flexibility, however ensure you select the one that is most suitable for your business and your target audience.
- Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse!
- Conversions can be a lengthy race. The work doesn't stop once the webinar is finished. You can use email marketing as well as other marketing campaigns to get leads when the iron's burning.
Originally composed by Jessica Wei on June 8, 2021. Updated by Julie Bergstein on December 9 2021.