Webinars that Wow 13 strategies to engage your audience

I hope you attended some great online webinars in the last year. Events where the content was salient, the speakers were engaging, the technology worked well and there was relevant interaction with the attendees. At the end, you felt it was worth your time to attend. I suspect you have also attended some ineffective online events that were not well delivered, and you tuned out, or were bored and began multi-tasking during the event. Or worse, left.

 While the news is promising for expanded availability for vaccines, the reality is many of us will be attending and conducting online events for the foreseeable future. Effective online events require a thoughtful process to be impactful. After attending, planning and delivering many webinars I want to share strategies to assist creating webinars that wow the audience.

 First a plan for content and logistics.  

1.     Plan relevant content

Who is the intended audience? What is relevant to them? What do they want to learn about? Help them understand “what is in it for me (WIFM), THE key message to get prospects and customers to commit to attend your online event.  

2.     Shorter is better

Stick to your key messages or themes. Organize your presentation with time for questions and comments while finishing in under an hour. Plan to deliver your webinar in 45 - 50 minutes. Give the attendees back five to 10 minutes. In the busy pace of today’s business, they’ll remember your key message, was relevant and they had a few minutes of time added to their schedule.

3.     Bring in the Pros

Successful online events often use a facilitator or moderator. Don’t go it alone. A facilitator serves several purposes; handling introductions, logistics, the chat and having the ability to smoothing out technology issues. This ensures the main speaker can focus on the content and delivery. A facilitator can also become part of your back-up plan if technology challenges occur during the event. Your event will be more successful with proper facilitation.

4.     Leverage multi-channel promotion

Plan great content and then plan effective communications to promote your event. Develop the process for communication before, during and after the event. Define a hook for your event invitation that demonstrates relevancy to your audience. A multi-channel communication approach is best. Use a webinar platform that integrates email invites and event reminders. You will need to send more than one email invite. Create social media posts with links to the event registration page. Utilize your network to share posts to expand your potential audience.

5.  Have a back-up plan

Wi-Fi sometimes fails and technology glitches happen. Make sure someone else can share their screen and has a copy of the slides. And can assist if the primary presenter has technology issues.

With a strategy for your event content, now it’s time to get to work and develop your tactics to deliver your content and engage your audience throughout your event.

 6.    Deploy your communications plan

With your planned email invites and social media posts, test all your communications and proof your copy so it is clear and concise. Never underestimate the power of a personal invite for your event. If there are select people you want to attend, call them, and let them know why the webinar is going to be relevant for them. We are all experiencing information, and email overload. Personal invitations drive attendance. And your personal invite will make your customer feel special.

 7.    Practice makes perfect.

Yes, it’s still true. Great events don’t just happen. The speakers practice. They test the technology, audio, lighting, and screen sharing. They know the content. Schedule and plan a dry run using all the tools for the live event. If there are three  or more speakers, consider dry-run rehearsals to button up the transitions between speakers.

 8.    Your Voice is your tool

Even great content is unappealing if delivered in a monotone, boring way. Practice your delivery to vary your pitch, volume and tone.  Practice modulating your voice. Variety in delivery keeps the audience tuned in. Two voices are better than one. Whether you use a facilitator or co-presenter. Having two speakers makes a more lively and engaging presentation. Be your authentic self. Don’t try to imitate how someone else speaks or presents. If you use humor, you as the speaker need to be the butt of the joke.

 9. Smile for the Camera

Many of us have adjusted to being more comfortable in video meetings. In the last year I have coached many presenters for their first webinars. Smile and learn to love your webcam. Look at your camera, not the video feed. Place a small, printed picture of the face of someone you love next to your camera to remind yourself to look at the camera. If you use multiple monitors, position your camera so you can focus on it and not the other monitors while presenting.  Use a light that shines on your face.

 10.  Can you hear me now?

Sound is the most important element to engaging the audience. If the sound is not crisp and clear you’ll lose the audience, quickly. If your built-in microphone does not sound great invest in a wired microphone.

 11. Pictures say more than words

Great slides support your message providing visual reference and memory hooks for the audience. Good design practices use more images, less text. Have only 1 or 2 ideas on any slide. Readable fonts on small screens are 20-point size or larger. Great design effectively uses color and graphics to engage.

 12. Engage your audience

How to deliver the Wow?  Start on time. Not 2 or 3 minutes late. Be punctual and respect your audience with a prompt start. Engage the audience with polls, chat, and questions at the start and throughout. Having a facilitator to support technology and audience participation makes audience engagement much easier for the presenter. 

 For the question-and-answer segment, prepare three questions to ask in case the audience is initially quiet. Without questions, it seems like your content was not of interest or informative. The facilitator or a colleague can ask the questions. As the presenter jump in and pose a question from the ones you have prepared. Typically, the audience will engage after the first question is asked.

 13. Follow-up with relevant information

After the event, send one message to those that attended including the recording replay link and additional links to relevant content. Use the registration data to send a slightly different message to those who registered but were unable to attend. And consider sending the recording link and other relevant content to some contacts who did not register for your webinar but fit your profile for highly desirable contacts. Those who could benefit from the content. Send them a personalized email with the link and additional resources.

 Great online events take thoughtful planning to execute and deliver. Great webinars inform, persuade and educate participants to take action. While one on one in-person meetings are most impactful, consider how you can host webinars to support your sales, marketing and customer communications. Would you like further ideas to run a successful webinar or online event? Please email me to arrange a phone call.

This article was originally published on Printing Impressions in two parts.