How to Create A Webinar from Scratch in 10 Steps

Over the past 12 years, our team at Convince & Convert has created, hosted, and promoted hundreds (maybe even thousands) of webinars and virtual conferences. Done right, they are an incredible way to?generate leads?and connect with your audience.

Although the hybrid work life has come back in recent months, webinar attendance and production continue to surge.

Since webinars are so important for B2B marketers today (and even some B2C marketers), we’ve put together the following tips to help you create a webinar from scratch.

1. Choose Your Team

A webinar usually has three prime players.

• The Organizer:?The organizer or the facilitator is the key individual responsible for developing content for the webinar. They are also responsible for finding a suitable speaker and promoting the event. They are in charge of registrations and communicating with the participants at the beginning and end of the webinar.
• The Presenter(s):?The Presenters or the Subject Matter Experts should focus on developing and delivering the webinar presentation. They look after webinar programming and troubleshooting, event registration, and other details to help them deliver an engaging presentation.
• Assistant(s):?Assistants help in answering queries that the Presenter and the Facilitator don’t have much time for. They help by responding to technical queries.

2. Decide On the Webinar Format

The next step is to decide on the format of your webinar.

• Single Speaker:?As the name suggests, this involves a single speaker communicating with the attendees. The speaker will also demonstrate the contents of the webinar and answer all queries raised by the attendees.
• Interview Format:?This involves a speaker acting as an interviewer and asking a set of predetermined questions to the Subject Matter Expert(s). This type of webinar can be very engaging, with the attendees watching the SMEs answer questions.
• Moderated Panel Discussion:?Like a panel discussion, a panel webinar has several speakers who talk over a predetermined topic. A moderator will need to facilitate this type of webinar.
• Q&A:?Similar to the interview format, this type of webinar also allows the speaker to answer questions, but this time, the questions directly come from the audience. We recommend that you collect the questions beforehand. This will ensure that you stay on schedule and vet the questions coming from the audience.

3. Plan Visuals for Your Webinar and Get Your Presenters Camera-Ready

Being a web-based seminar, webinars largely rely on audio and visual materials to demonstrate their contents.?

In fact, the best webinars should?feel more similar to the face-to-face experience, so you should require presenters to have their cameras on while presenting. Adding in slides that highlight some important talking points through the webinar will help too. But keep in mind that slides filled with text will not do the trick. Keep the slides simple.

4. Select a Webinar Platform

Here at Convince & Convert, we are big fans of Zoom. But we’ve used many solutions in the past, including?GoToWebinar,?BigMarker,?Adobe Connect,?WebEx,?ClickMeeting,?and more.?

Here are a few questions you should ask yourself when selecting a webinar platform to invest in:

1. What are the objectives of your webinar?
2. How user-friendly is the product?
3. How much does it cost?

5. Set Up the Right Equipment and Space

You’ll need a quiet place to conduct your webinar. Consider a conference room or any other place which will be free from background noise and interruptions.

Selecting the right equipment is also crucial for your webinar. Consider landlines and headset microphones, as they are less likely to cut off while you engage with your audience.

6. Publicize and Promote Your Webinar

In order to make sure your webinar gets?maximum participation, it’s crucial that you promote it as much as possible beforehand. Here are some ways you can promote it:

• Start by creating a landing page that introduces the webinar topic, the speaker(s), features the date and time, and a call-to-action for people to sign up to attend the event.
• Use social media sites like Instagram and Twitter to spread the word. Create a dedicated and original hashtag to publicize the event. This hashtag will benefit you at the time of the event, as you will be using it to interact with the attendees.
• Send multiple reminders emails showcasing the countdown to your event.?45 percent?of marketers say that emails are the most effective at driving registrations.
• On the day of the event, make sure to send emails with the direct link to your webinar.

7. Pick the Right Date and Time

You should keep in mind that not all your audience members will be from the same location. The webinar should be hosted on a specific date and time that will allow the maximum number of attendees to be present. If your target audience is in New York, and you are located in Los Angeles, starting a webinar at 3:00 p.m. Pacific Time may not be a good choice, as it will be late for the attendees living in New York.

The best time to conduct your webinar depends on the target demographic, but a poll conducted by?ON24?suggests that?the best days to host your webinars are Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

8. Choose a Topic of Interest

If your topic does not interest your potential audience, it is going to be really difficult for you to lure them into attending your webinar. Since webinars are usually an hour-long, you can either choose to vaguely talk about many topics or speak about a single topic and dive deep into it.

We recommend that you get very specific when selecting a topic for your webinar. For example, instead of simply talking about digital marketing in general, you could talk about digital marketing trends, budgeting for digital marketing, etc.

9. Keep Practicing

Start doing dry runs?which will help everyone involved with the webinar get a picture of its entirety. Check all equipment to ensure they are working properly. A final dry run two to three days before the live webinar will ensure the following:

• Confirm if everyone is well-versed with the webinar software technology and the contents of the webinar.
• Finalize presentation slides to prevent last-minute changes.
• Choose the communication methods that suits best with the team.
• Assign individuals activities that need to be monitored during the webinar such as polls, Q&As, group chats, etc.
• Reviewing the final registration based on details such as names of attendees, their respective industries, etc. The host should be fully aware of such information.

10. Follow Up with the Attendees

Some marketers fail to follow up with attendees at their webinars. This can be a grave mistake, as you’re missing out on an opportunity to continue engaging your audience.

Send them an email thanking them along with a survey asking them to share their feedback and rate their experience, plus a call to action for future webinars. Make sure to send a follow-up email along with a recording of the webinar to the people who signed up for the webinar but were unable to attend it.?Following up will go a long way in encouraging the audience to attend future webinar events and even?be involved with your company.