Working from home has become the new normal due to the COVID-19 pandemic. With so many businesses switching to a virtual work environment, companies are searching for ways to connect and communicate with clients and prospects.
When executed and leveraged correctly, webinars are a highly effective and cost-efficient way to promote thought leadership and support lead generation. And because a lot of planning goes into a successful webinar, it’s important to get the most out of your webinar content by integrating it into your marketing communications program.
Here are nine ways to maximize your webinar content:
Pre-webinar
- Incorporate a lead generation strategy – An InsideSales.com study reports that 73% of marketing and sales leaders say webinars are one of the most effective ways to generate quality leads. Consider using a lead generation platform such as HubSpot that will help you to create landing pages to gather information and track attendees for ongoing lead nurturing.
- Develop email blasts – According to GoToWebinar, more than half of webinar registrations come from email campaigns, which is why it’s critical to develop a strong email strategy with benefits of attending, links and a strong call to action.
- Promote on social media – Promote your webinar on your social channels, the earlier the better. Social media posts help to drive webinar registrations and provide timely content for your channels.
- Distribute a press release – Write and distribute a press release about your upcoming webinar. It provides you with new content for your website, can attract the attention of potential attendees and is an ideal channel for informing the media about the event so they can share it with their audience.
Post-webinar
- Host the webinar on your website – Create a webinar archive section on your website for anyone who missed the event. This will drive traffic back to your website and provide a permanent place for the webinar to reside.
- Continue to post on social media – Even after your webinar is over, you can still promote it on your social channels and link back to your webinar archive on your website.
- Repurpose the content – Why recreate the wheel when you’ve put in a lot of work into creating your webinar? There are several ways to repurpose the content. You can turn your webinar into a blog post, e-book, thought leadership article or infographic. Get creative with it! And the good news is that you can promote the repurposed content on your website and social channels.
- Develop email blasts – Send an email to people on your list that did not attend the webinar with a link. Include the blog, infographic or e-book you created. For those that did attend, consider sending them a short survey. Also include any materials you created to accompany the webinar.
- Follow up – It’s amazing how many teams neglect to follow through with the folks who attended the webinar. Make sure to give the list to your business development team to integrate into any lead generation programs you have for ongoing lead nurturing.
Successful webinars can be at the center of a strong marketing communications and lead generation campaign. The trick is look beyond the day of the webinar and maximize your planning and content. If you’re interested in developing a webinar within a marketing communications program for your organization but don’t know where to start, email us at info@clearpointagency.com and we can work with you to create a tailored plan to meet your business needs.
This blog was written by Clearpoint Agency Account Executive, Nikki Sachman