I know - most everyone who takes the time to read this blog will be experts at hosting webinars. I wasn't an expert before we hosted our first webinar, and I'm not an expert now that we've got one under our belt, but I've learned a few valuable lessons which I've tried to boil down into 10 . Here they are:
1. Content is King
I know that we hear this about everything dealing with new technology, but by providing usable, industry relevant content we had great attendance and "buzz" about the event. We matched an academic who wrote a research article on a specific subject with three industry experts who explained and contested the findings.
2. Speakers Matter
It takes a unique speaker to interact with an audience and other participants he/she can't see. We picked a few speakers that were veterans at this process, and they helped the person with the least experience.
3. Moderators Matter
Having a strong moderator who was able to keep the dialogue moving along while gently keeping any one speaker from taking over the event was key. In our case, having a moderator who was in contact with the speakers leading up to the webinar was a benefit to the entire program.
4. Pick a Good Technology Vendor
Having solid technology reduces stress and worry. We used GoToMeeting.Com's webinar service (cleverly named "GoToWebinar"). When I was looking, I specifically wanted ease of use, automation of registration and reminders, ability to collect attendee information, ability to customize our promotional pages, and the ability to capture the event for rebroadcast. I'm sure there are numerous other quality vendors out there that provide the same things.
5. Take Time to Practice
Like anything else, being good at something requires practice. In our case, staff practiced with the presentation technology, the speakers reviewed all of the slides and who would cover what, and the moderator walked the speakers through talking points - all days before the program. When we logged on for the presentation, everyone was ready.
6. Plan for the Unexpected
We didn't have anything unexpected happen, but get some redundancy in place in case it does. We had two administrators logged into the meeting, each with a set of slides they could quickly access if the main went down. We also had two ways to connect to the internet ready as well as battery backups on the computers. Some things you can't plan for, but having some common sense plans in place will raise your comfort level.
7. Think of the Attendee
Put yourself in the attendee's chair. Do you want to look at the same slide for 10 minutes while someone is talking? Probably not. Vary things...we added pictures and bio slides for speakers when we knew there would be more talking so the attendees would have something to look at and (gasp) read if they were not really interested in the point. Make sure that your speakers use a phone that is clearly audible (traditionally this would NOT be a cell phone, and would not be a local line on speakerphone mode). Be sure to have some form of interaction. Our numbers did not allow for attendees to ask questions over the phone, but we did encourage attendees to type in questions and send them to us (using either the meeting software or standard e-mail). The more you can get an attendee engaged, the more they will come away feeling they received value in attending.
8. Start and End On Time
I don't know about you, but I like people and organizations that are timely. Your attendee's time is valuable, and they have given you some of it during their workday. Use it wisely.
9. Capture the Registrant Information
We had made assumptions about our audience, and who they would be, and were fairly surprised to see the wide range of attendees that the program attracted. Given the nature of our topic (a very technical study of insurance class action resolution) we attracted some people and companies that were not on our radar - but they are now. We followed up with a survey and links to the material presented. We also followed up with all non-members and presented them the benefits of being members of our organization.
10. Capture the Webinar
If your goal is to build the knowledge base of your membership and have the ability to offer various educational information on-demand, capturing your webinar for re-broadcast is a must. Be sure that you understand how your vendor captures your webinar, and what your abilities to edit it will be.
Well, that's some of the big stuff I've learned and I've only hosted one of these things. I imagine there are many ideas that I've missed, so please feel free to add any suggestions in the comments section.
If anyone is interested, here is the technical information about our first webinar:
Name: "D&O Insurance and the Outcome of Timing of Securities Class Action Resolution: What the New Data Shows"
Price: Free
Number of Speakers: 5
Running Time: One Hour
Number Registered: 671
Number Attended Live: 394
Non-Members: 176
I can't wait to do our next one!
3 comments:
Scott -- So glad your first Webinar experience was such a good one! Your list here will certainly help others.
I'm wondering -- did your staff conduct the event (including moderation and phones), or did you hire an organization to "produce" the event?
Also -- did each of your speakers provide a brief slide presentation followed by Q&A, or did you have more of a free-flowing conversation? If it was the latter, could you descibe how that was conducted?
It's a challenge for most Webinar organizers to break out of the "lecture" format, and am interested if you were able to do that and how.
Thanks very much!
Hi Ellen. We conducted the event using GoToMyWebinar powered by Cisco (which included the audio option). We did purchase a month long subscription for $499 since we had a large number of attendees and wouldn't fall under the "free" category.
We set our session up with a moderator to keep the session moving forward, one person "leading" the session (in this case a professor who had completed some industry research), and three others adding to the conversation from different and sometimes differing viewpoints, which made for free flowing conversation. All of the participants were volunteers, and the technical support was our staff.
To make it conversational, we didn't go into it cold - we had a call where the speakers reviewed the slides we were going to present with the moderator, talked about the key points they wanted to address, and then when we ran it live they did a good job.
By keeping to one set of slides, and not individual slides, and having others know who was going to be addressing which ahead of time, it flowed fairly well.
Thank you,
-Scott
Scott -- thank you for sharing the list. We have been presenting webinars using Adobe Connect Pro for a few months and I would echo many of your items on the list. We have found that audience engagement is key -- keeping their attention and participation. We have made use of the features of Adobe Connect Pro for this, but I am curious what you have done to engage the audience?
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