How to turn viewers into customers
Although many businesses are trying to pivot back to pre-pandemic operations, one change likely to stick around is our increased move to webinars. It’s just plain convenient to keep this model — why bother physically going to a presentation when you can get the same thing broadcast directly to you anywhere?
Yet the quick standardization of webinars hasn’t come without drawbacks. Most significantly, the average professional now gets so many webinar invites that they’re likely overwhelmed by them. What’s more, they’ve probably been bored senseless by the sessions they’ve previously attended, making them skeptical about sticking around for another full broadcast.
This puts salespeople in a tricky position: in the age of webinars, how do you ensure your webinars get seen?
The answer is to make your own webinars stand out from the crowd. In a market full of dull, unprofessional webinars, you need to broadcast presentations that claim the spotlight with a polished gleam and shine.
With these five simple tips, you’ll have the perfect foundation to do exactly that.
1. Create a professional broadcast setup
Be honest: how many times have you tuned into a talked-up webinar, only to discover a salesperson wearing a sweatshirt, sitting at their kitchen counter?
Setups like that leave a bad impression on viewers, to say the least. Yes, the point of a webinar is greater convenience, but that doesn’t mean the presenter should be putting in minimal effort. Even though the event is hosted virtually, it demands the same amount of commitment to quality you’d put into an in-person presentation.
This starts with what’s on screen during your webinar. You, the presenter, need to be dressed professionally, in keeping with the professional tone of the presentation itself. Likewise, your surroundings should look presentable — think a smart, tidy office, or an organized study.
Imagine a filmmaker is going to shoot a documentary in your home: choose the room that you’d most like them to film, then set it up to be as respectable and clean as possible.
Remember, with a format as visual as a webinar, it’s crucial that you’re giving your audience something sharp to look at.
2. Invest in high-end hardware
At the same time, a professional setup won’t do you much good if you can’t show it off in full detail. In fact, low video or audio quality is an easy way to instantly lose standing with your audience.
To give your viewers a great webinar experience, it is absolutely crucial that you come through clearly both on the screen and over the speakers. The best way to make that happen is to use high-quality hardware: mainly, a powerful, high-fidelity mic and an HD webcam.
Yes, it’s tempting to just use the devices built into your laptop. But the reality is, a bit of extra investment will pay off big time in terms of presentation.
(On a related note, if your selected presenting room happens to be in a wifi dead zone in your home, consider investing in a wifi booster to preserve the signal. After all, the only thing worse than your audience getting a low-quality webinar is them getting a frozen webinar.)
3. Block out distractions
Even when a webinar is going well, all it takes to sour the audience’s mood is an unwanted disruption. Your viewers tuned in to watch a professional tell them new information — not to see your cat block the webcam.
As such, part of your webinar preparations should be to keep any and all distractions out of your webinar space. That means keeping pets out of the room, letting family or roommates know not to disturb you and keeping any and all electronics nearby silent (yes, that includes putting your phone on mute).
Also, note that distractions can be virtual as well as physical. If you’re including an electronic presentation in your webinar, consider muting all alerts on your computer during the session. That way, your screenshared display won’t also include chat messages or email notifications.
4. Get familiar with your software
No matter what webinar platform you’re using, it’s vital that you have a good grasp on how to use it before you start your first broadcast. However convincing of a presentation you might give, if the first few minutes of your webinar involve you bumbling through the software’s controls and options, your viewers will probably go elsewhere.
That means it’s imperative that you don’t grant the audience that peek behind the digital curtain. Well in advance of your webinar date, get familiar with the solution’s settings, and understand how to both prepare for your broadcast and make any necessary adjustments on the fly.
If this requires you to watch tutorials or how-to videos, block out that time and watch them. If it will take you reaching out to your IT department, then send that request ASAP. There’s really no overstating the fact that technical difficulties send a bad message to webinar attendees, so maximizing their interest will entail minimizing the confusion on your end about how the webinar system works.
5. Upgrade your platform
All that being said, not all webinar platforms are necessarily created equal. Some are built for professional, high-quality sessions — others are made more for glorified video call sessions. Impressing your audience on a sub-par system isn’t easy, and frankly, using one means you’re giving yourself an unnecessary handicap.
So to really put yourself and your company in the spotlight, consider using a webinar solution built for professional, sales-oriented broadcasts: a tool that maintains a steady connection, supports high-quality audio and video, automatically keeps you in focus and provides easy interaction with your audience.
All these components and more come together in WizyWebinar, Wildix’s cutting-edge tool for creating and broadcasting webinars. You can find more info on it here.
Thinking about your own webinars
All this isn’t to say that creating a webinar will be a surefire hit so long as you follow these tips, of course. There’s also marketing your session well, reaching out to in-target leads, not to mention writing and delivering the presentation effectively (all of which are topics in their own right).
Still, with fundamental adjustments like these, you’ll gain easy improvements over nearly any webinar you do actually give, building a solid foundation to launch crucial online presentations ahead of the crowd and make that much more of an impact with your leads.
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