Let’s delve into webinars for small business.
I want to break down for you:
- The benefits of hosting webinars
- Which types of business should host webinars
- The steps you need to host a webinar
Why webinars?
The purpose of a webinar is to build your business by sharing what you know with your customers. You can allow for interaction and student participation or wait till the end of your seminar to take questions. Your webinar could include practical information, explain a theory in detail or be a free preview of the services you offer.
The benefits are many:
- Increased engagement with customers
- Potential for new customer relationships
- Strengthened reputation as an expert in what you do
- Partnership opportunities
- Added revenue (if you charge for your webinars)
- Cost effective (no expensive meeting room or studio hire fees)
- Potential future distribution (record your webinar and play it again, or upload the contents into an e-book)
Which types of businesses should host webinars?
Off the top of my head, here are just a few of the businesses that can host webinars and the topics they can teach:
Real Estate Agent presents ‘Downsizing made easy’
Residential Builder presents ‘Practical steps for planning your home renovation’
Organic Skincare products presents ‘Managing sensitive skin’
Accounting Firm presents ‘Setting up your finances as a sole trader’
Craft Brewery presents ‘How to homebrew like a boss’
Do you see where I’m headed? Webinars tie in with content marketing as a way to present your skills to an audience. You’re sharing information and you can either charge for it or use it as a lead generation tool. Your customers will not only be informed, they feel like they have gotten to know you. That’s a huge incentive to take the next step and engage your professional services or refer your business to a friend.
How to host a webinar
Once you have planned, prepared and practised your presentation, your next step is to set up your webinar.
There are plenty of hosting options to choose from, including:
You will also need to create a nice, clear landing page on your website that sells the benefits of your webinar and gives your audience a straightforward option to register as an attendee.
From there, the challenge is to find and register attendees. Craft a mini-marketing strategy for your webinar. Start by emailing your existing customer database to let them know of your upcoming webinar. Create some targeted Facebook, Google or LinkedIn ads to drive more signups. Write a blog or shoot a short video for your website. If your audience is local, consider distributing postcards or brochures to nearby cafes.
Once you have your attendees, be aware that many won’t show up, especially if your webinar is free. So make sure you are recording your seminar so that you can re-broadcast or send it to them later.
From there – the rest is up to you! Remember to be clear and concise and to allow time for user interaction.
Good luck!
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