Webinars Almost Always Work

One thing if you are a first-time founder in SaaS that may seem as boring as you can imagine is webinars.

You yourself never go to them. And they seem like something you do, well, later. When you are bigger.

But I’d challenge that thinking with one simple rule: if even 2 qualified prospects and/or 2 existing customers come to a webinar, that’s great. Because think of webinars as scaleable ways to interact, as a human being, with groups. Email is fine and all, eBooks have their place, but there is no human interaction there. No Q&A. And no chance to get to know the humans behind an application. 1-on-1 chats are also great, but not only can you only do so many, and sometimes prospects don’t want a 1-on-1. Sometimes they want a more passive experience, where they can consume a demo and a discussion without having to answer a bunch of qualifying questions upfront.

I’ll take it a step further: do a webinar every week. If you don't do one every week, every single week, it won't really happen often enough. And you won't really get the benefits. Worst case, just cancel it if no one shows up. And I will bet you if you have any decent pipeline, and any decent prospect list, every week at least someone good shows up.

If you do one every week, you'll get better, and the benefits will compound. And you really don't need to add a new team member, or change much of everything, to get the ball rolling here.

You can alternate the format every week, but doing one every week will force you to do it and level things up:

• Some can be product demos. Do these every week. It can’t hurt.
• Some can be for your existing customers. A new feature update, for example.
• Some can be from industry experts. These are always popular. More popular than you might think.

Come up with a cadence, and see how it goes. Force marketing and sales and product to sign up to do their fair share of them (maybe this is all 1 or 2 people in the early days).

Worst case, you get a boost. Another chance for a prospect to drop in before they buy.  Another shot at retaining your customers, boosting your NPS, and hearing their concerns. Another chance to get your brand and value prop out there.

And upcoming webinars are a great thing to add to both your sales and marketing drip campaigns. Don’t break up with a prospect. Instead, invite them to something that adds value. That’s a fair reason to reach out again. And they may just come. Instead of Mute-ing you.

It’s one hour a week, plus a web form and an invite to your list, to do a decent webinar. Think about it that way and it’s pretty much always worth it.