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How to plan and create captivating webinars, drive registration and attendance, and ensure your webinar program is a success
Let's face it, generating high-quality leads isn't always a walk in the park. That's why B2B marketers turn to webinars as their go-to format for boosting their lead generation strategy. Not only are webinars versatile and engaging, but studies show they offer impressive success rates - 53% of marketers say they generate the most high-quality leads than any other form of content.
Here's why:
Clearly, webinars attract, warm, and convert leads across every stage of the customer journey. But you may still be unsure of how to get started and get the most out of your webinar program.
We know that creating, hosting, and analyzing your webinar can initially feel intimidating, so we've compiled these best practices. From start to finish, we've got you covered!
These days, it's not enough to hold a webinar and hope for the best. To ensure that all your webinars are successful, it's important to set some goals for yourself ahead of time and measure them against webinar benchmarks. But how do you measure success? From ensuring you can get people registered for your event to tracking how engaged attendees are during and after, here are the standards and statistics, every marketer should know and strive for.
Check out the comprehensive list of webinar benchmarks here.
The key to a successful webinar is planning. Check out these best practices to capture your audience's attention—and hook them from the moment you step on the virtual stage. Here's everything you need to know about planning your webinar, from developing awesome content to driving engagement during the event itself. Let's dive in!
Two months from your ideal launch date is the best time to kick off your content planning and strategy session. The first thing discussed during your meeting should be what type of webinar you want to host. If you're scratching your head and wondering what your options are, here are 12 types of webinars you can host at every stage of the customer journey.
Some of the best content comes from listening to your audience. Narrowing down your audience's pain points and needs is the first step to creating great webinar content. Understand what they're hungry to learn and what problems they're trying to solve.
If you're unsure what their problems are, conduct small-scale targeted research through polls and surveys by putting your email lists and social channels to good use. (Pro tip: Try LinkedIn's polling feature to gauge your audience's interests quickly.) You can even narrow your inquiries with event registrants—or ask your audience about a finer point live during the event!
Working from a broad topic to a narrow, audience-centered hook is often helpful. For instance, you might start with "Webinar Best Practices" and narrow it down to "Double Your Webinar Conversion Rate!" That is, as long as you can deliver on that promise. ;)
Typical broad topics include:
You don't want to grab any old speaker for your webinar. You need someone who can engage an audience and provide insights into their industry so they'll be interested in what you have to say!
Research shows that people form impressions about a speaker's competence in as little as 30 seconds. This means in less than a minute; attendees will decide whether your speaker is trustworthy and judge them based on their body language and vocal attributes.
Look at these traits before deciding on a potential guest:
While we all want to cultivate partnerships with like-minded brands to nab incredible webinar speakers, don't discount your team's expertise. Sometimes relevance and depth are better than an instantly recognizable name—especially if you have a topic bound to draw in registrants. (Remember the importance of credibility?)
Nurture your webinar leads by offering supporting content to engage with attendees during and after the event. Content could include downloadable assets (like guides) and the next event's invitations sent through email, social channels, or directly within the webinar itself.
Webinars are all about your audience, what they want to learn and how you can help. So make sure the copy in any email outreach or announcement reflects them.
Remember to target the job titles, companies, or prospects who will benefit most from your content. Keep in mind the more you can personalize your invites with information you already know about them, the better your conversation rate will be.
Nearly 60% of webinar registrations come from email campaigns, so it's important to get it right. At a minimum, you'll need to send the following:
Tracking your campaign progress is a key part of successfully running a webinar. Understand if you're hitting your registration goals, and keep in mind that 54% of all webinar attendees sign up a week before you go live, so remember that last-minute push!
If your numbers are lower than you'd like, shake it up! Tweak your messaging or change your promotional channels. Small changes, like reducing fields on the registration form or asking a brand partner to conduct outreach, can make a big difference in webinar attendance.
Need more tips on webinar registration? Check out our article, "How to Boost Registrations and Attendance To Your Webinars," for expert ideas.
Ensure your guest speakers are prepped, ready, and comfortable in your virtual green room. The more thoroughly speakers understand the run-of-show, the more relaxed and engaging they'll be during your presentation.
Planning a webinar? Download our Free Webinar Planning Template so you don’t miss a thing on your to-do list!
A question that gets asked often is, "How do I increase registrations to my webinar and get people to show up?"
Here are five tips to boost your webinar's registration.
One key element often overlooked is the webinar registration form. It's the gateway to your virtual event, so show it some love. So what makes an optimized registration form?
On average, up to 57% of webinar registrations come from email. It's a given that you'll add call-to-action buttons to email invites and social posts, but here are several other areas to add CTAs:
Make sure to take stock of all your digital assets and think of innovative ways to get your message out.
If you consistently host webinars and other virtual events, it's important to have a designated events page where visitors can find all upcoming webinars and on-demand videos. Like Welcome's event page, yours can serve as a repository for all your future planned events and enable you to capture new signups that may not already be in your marketing database. Better yet, by adding your past events as gated on-demand videos to the events page, you can continue to increase viewership long after the webinar wraps.
If you want to ensure your webinar has a good turnout, it's critical that you keep promoting in the lead-up. While two weeks is standard practice to begin pre-event promotion, a whopping 29% of people register on the same day as their event. So keep spreading the word across all your marketing channels; fingers crossed, they'll quickly fill up with eager participants!
Want to take your promotion efforts twofold? Partnering up with like-minded brands will bring you even closer to success. Co-hosting a webinar is the perfect way for both businesses involved - plus, having twice as many people promoting it can boost those registrant numbers. Just ensure that expectations are managed and agreed upon— like who will get which pieces of the registrant list and emails, if a recording is shared in both channels, and when you send out those social media posts. It's best to avoid having surprises pop up to get the most out of each other's time and effort!
Half the battle is getting people to sign up for your webinar; now, you need them to show up! Here are five tips to boost your webinar attendance.
When you're planning a webinar, timing is everything. Aim to host your webinars mid-week and avoid Mondays and Fridays. Thursday reigns supreme as the most popular day for attending virtual events (26%), followed by Tuesdays (23%) and Wednesdays (21%). And when should your event start? Mid-morning seems to be preferred by 28% of viewers, with 27% preferring mid-afternoon – so aim for those time slots between Tuesday and Thursday!
You've worked hard to get people signed up for your upcoming webinar - and you don't want it to become a distant memory! Establish an email sequence that subtly reminds attendees of what's coming & why it matters. Don't overwhelm them with too many messages, or you might tempt them to hit unsubscribe; three reminders should do the trick.
Even when the curtain drops on your live event, remember those audience members who prefer to consume content at their own pace. People tend to be more engaged and interested in recordings they can watch whenever they like - so seize the opportunity. Not only will you increase headcount overall, but around 30% of signups come from people watching the recorded version. In other words, if you make it available, people will attend.
Try taking some cues from the event world and start gifting to drive attendance. Like you would use swag for trade shows and industry event booths, gifts can also be integrated into virtual events, as evidenced by a 60% attendance rate Lessonly achieved when they sent Starbucks gift cards for a virtual coffee chat.
Even though giveaways add to your bottom line, sending eGifts can be one of the most impactful things you can do to boost attendance.
It's more than just having the best webinar platform - it takes great content to draw people back in. If you want future visitors, prioritize actionable and educational content that provides valuable insights instead of turning your event into a big sales pitch! Up to 40% of return visitors have been reported by those who offer real value through their presentations – so give them what they need with tips, tricks & best practices galore.
How do you make your webinar or virtual event stand out? Check out our list of innovative engagement ideas – guaranteed to have your attendees interacting, energized, and engaged!
Set the stage for a successful webinar by kicking off in high gear. Think about it like previews in a movie theatre - wouldn't everyone rather sit down and watch something fun than wait around? Build excitement with virtual games, pre-recorded hype videos, or even pub quizzes on your chosen topic – all designed to get things rolling right away!
Your speaker is key to making your webinar captivating. Of course, they need to offer valuable insights about their trade - but that can only go so far. How they deliver these facts is equally as crucial: body language, tone of voice, and facial expressions must all play into their performance for people to fully engage. Plus, let us not forget those delightful stories of personal journeys sprinkled throughout the presentation; nothing quite warms hearts like an accompanying narrative!
Instead of presenting run-of-the-mill slides, punch up your presentation with graphic overlays. Forget PowerPoint! Branded graphics are your perfect companion for introducing a new wow factor into virtual events. With overlays, you can keep your presentation content minimal yet super effective while keeping everyone's attention focused on YOU - not endless slides they have to read through (zzzzz).
Pro Tip: Don't have a graphic designer? Don't worry. With a bevy of engagement features and minimal design knowledge required, anyone on your team can create an unforgettable branded event with Agenda Builder and Stage Kit! Cut down on overwhelm by ditching slides crammed full of text in favor of concise speeches that deliver all the info - no more zoning out for attendees!
Foster a dynamic dialogue by inviting attendees on stage for Q&A. Instead of answering questions in the traditional one-directional manner, make it more personal with an interactive Q&A session. Get rid of the feeling that attendees are just being talked at by inviting audience members on stage to ask their burning questions face-to-face. Show them you genuinely care about what they take away from the event. After all, connection is key when trying to engage participants!
Keep your audience from running off with their attention spans by switching up the format throughout your webinar. You can include exciting visuals such as videos or polls and get everyone involved through engaging activities like breakout rooms or an on-stage Q&A session. With this much variety at hand, you'll be holding onto the click of interest for hours rather than minutes!
As a best practice, avoid speaking for longer than 15 minutes without changing the format slightly.
Keep attendees engaged with captivating content that isn't heavy-handed on the sales pitch - let their problems drive you towards highlighting how your product or service provides the best solution instead of pushing it down their throats. Use CTA overlays or the Chat Box to sprinkle in some free resources.
Many companies invest in creating a seemingly endless stream of content — often to little avail. But fret not! Quality will always beat quantity: instead of pushing more and more articles into the interwebs, repurpose your existing events materials; this way, you're guaranteed high-quality output without stretching resources too thin. Here are some creative solutions so that every team—big or small—can make it work.
With webinars being a virtual goldmine for rich, power-packed social media content - from video clips to infographics and insights, it's an amazing opportunity to give your brand marketing & outreach efforts the edge.
Welcome is doing this by creating powerful mini-videos with great visuals that increase our events' engagement and keep all our channels synced up.
If your internal teams need help populating your social media calendar or aligning content strategies, try repurposing content from virtual events to get everyone on the same page.
Leverage your webinar transcript to turn all that knowledge and insight into blog content — this boosts ROI and brings organic traffic and leads back into the fold!
Creating a blog post will help "own" your topic online and establish greater trust with readers while creating more lead generation opportunities (think: signup forms!).
Owning an impactful topic, delivering thought leadership pieces, plus automated lead generation? It's like hitting three birds with one stone!
Don't just stick to video content when it comes to your virtual event - audio recordings can also become valuable assets! Turn them into a full podcast episode or short sound clips, and you'll have a low-cost way of engaging with people through sound. Not only that, but you get the chance for even more creative storytelling opportunities too – who said podcasts don't need visuals?!
30% of event registrants prefer to watch webinar content after the live event. For a content marketer, this is an exciting equation. You can support these needs with an on-demand video library of all your event content.
Not only can you improve your SEO with a landing page for each video, but landing pages with embedded forms or strong CTAs can also help your sales team capture more leads.
It's time to expand your reach! Already an expert on the topic of your webinar? It's pitch-perfect for you to explore additional outlets and become a thought leader. Try pitching relevant opinion pages or industry blogs so that more readers can benefit from your expertise. The potential upside is immense - increased brand awareness, and solidified status as a thought-leader extraordinaire.
With some additional research and content strategy elbow grease, you could create:
Not sure what to write about for your next blog post or your next topic for the upcoming webinar? Let event analytics and audience questions lead you in a new direction. Look at poll responses to understand what's top-of-mind with your viewers, and use that data to create new content or future webinars. On the flip side, look through those same analytics - watching where people are tuning out during live events or video replays. Take this information back in time and make tweaks, so everyone stays intrigued until (and even after) all eyes have left the screen!
Your webinar was a hit - the chat was fire, and your Live Q&A session was fun and lively! So what do you do next to convert those viewers into motivated buyers? We have some tried-and-true tips for turning qualified leads into sales that enable success across teams.
To keep your buyers on the journey, you need to inspire them to act. Drive quality leads straight into sales by enchanting them with engaging webinar content and captivating CTAs. Your virtual event shouldn't just be informative; make sure it moves prospects along in that all-important sales funnel.
And a great CTA might achieve both goals!
Take advantage of the momentum and positive engagement by launching a post-event survey within Welcome. Conducting surveys before attendees leave the webinar, gives you valuable insight from your prospects about their buying intent—without having to wait for responses. Use that data to shape a winning strategy for sales success down the line.
Don't risk attendees skipping over an email in their inbox one week later. Pose your most important questions as attendees head out the door, then integrate your survey responses into your customer relationship management (CRM) software to make demo and sales calls that much easier.
Your after-event outreach should be armed with more than just a thank you email—to give prospects an extra nudge towards conversion, include sales enabling assets too. From product feature breakdowns to checklists and templates, having marketing materials on hand can help start conversations between leads and your sales team for easier engagement down the line. Don't forget to share which files are being accessed so your sales team is in the loop and has an easy conversation starter with the prospect.
Give your sales team the perfect head start with integrations that capture attendee engagement, such as Q&A questions, polls they respond to, any assets they downloaded during the event, if they filled out a demo form, and other sales indicators. Your reps won't need fly-by introductions when hopping into calls; they'll be able to pick up a conversation right where your lead left off.
Not all of your attendees are necessarily ready to take the plunge and book that product demo or commit to buying. To keep them interested until they're ready for more, provide helpful tips & tricks, engaging educational content, customer reviews, and case studies.
With an integrated CRM you'll have extensive insights into what drives engagement among attendees, so use those details to send more targeted content in your nurture campaign.
Whether you send free assets or encourage leads to sign up for additional webinars, don't discount the power of a nurture campaign to build trust and confidence in your brand—and set your sales team up for future success.
If measuring webinar ROI is challenging for your team, you're not alone. 64% of B2B marketers say their ability to demonstrate the value of their content marketing efforts is only average—or worse. You've put in a ton of hard work and dedication to ensure your webinars are well-attended, but it can still be challenging to prove their ROI without a solid foundation for analysis. By monitoring the right metrics, you'll have enough data evidence to show just how valuable these events are. From measuring lead quality, and attributing sales back to your efforts - getting those real returns won't seem like so much smoke and mirrors.
Here are the four strategies you should implement to demonstrate the ROI of your webinars and virtual events:
Identifying the channels that effectively bring in registrants for webinars is crucial to ensuring your marketing dollars are well-spent. UTM tracking codes are snippets of code in URLs that track which channel was the most effective in reaching—and converting—webinar registrants. With a bit of tracking-code sleuthing, you can find out exactly where your money was put best and plan accordingly. Make sure no URLs slip through the cracks so these cleverly crafted snippets do their job right!
Hosting a webinar comes with budget considerations, and no matter what size operation you're running, it's important to ensure every dollar is accounted for. Expenses can include:
Advertising costs, like paid ads or media.
Production costs also add up quickly. Here are a few to consider:
Thankfully, Welcome can consolidate production costs. With in-platform tools for designing, editing, and hosting virtual events, we offer B2B marketers one way to save $$$ —and boost their ROI for every event.
One of the benefits of holding webinars is generating qualified leads. As soon as a lead registers for your event, you receive key details, including where they work or their role at a specific company. Depending on your webinar content, you'll also know where they are in their customer journey.
Additional metrics help to determine the overall quality of the leads generated from each webinar. These metrics include:
The more qualified leads you hand over to the sales team, the more valuable your event content is.
You can see exactly how your event impacted the deal cycle with proper tracking.
Through the Welcome/Salesforce integration, you can see how your attendees are moving through the funnel post-event. To do this, track the following
With data like this, you'll never scramble to prove webinar ROI again!
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