5 Ways to Engage Your Webinar Audience
Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes
Keeping an audience engaged during any type of presentation is often a daunting challenge and webinars are no different in this respect. In fact, due to their remote nature they come with their own set of unique challenges that must be overcome in order for the audience to be truly engaged in the content being delivered.
Webinars are distinct from traditional face-to-face presentations in that the participants are present in a wholly voluntary capacity and, due to the online aspect of a webinar, they can very easily leave at any given time without causing a fuss.
This online aspect also presents an extra complication to engagement in the first place as the absence of face-to-face interaction makes it easier for listeners to become distracted or multitask on other jobs whilst listening.
The challenge therefore is to create a webinar that is equally as engaging as a face-to-face interaction, but still accounts for the flexibility that audiences find so attractive about the webinar proposition.
It can be a bit overwhelming but fear not! Marcus Evans Webinars are here to present our top 5 tips on how you can create a compelling webinar that will keep your audience engaged and coming back for more!
1. Flexibility
Flexibility is one of the key draws of a webinar. Each listener will have their own motivation for participating and, as much as it might hurt to consider, they’re not necessarily going to be interested in every item on your meticulously planned agenda. While one person may be there for your product pitch, another may only have tuned in for the Q&As and this is just how it is.
In addition, the majority of webinar participants will be multitasking with other tasks whilst they listen to your content.
Very rarely will you have their absolute undivided attention and this is fine, you just need to consider it in your approach.
One thing that you can do is empower your audience by outlining a clear topic agenda at the start. State how long you’ll likely be spending on each topic and try to stick to it.
This will be appreciated by your audience and they’ll be more likely to attend your next webinar in the knowledge that your webinars cater to their fluid listening style, rather than holding back information and forcing them to listen to the whole thing.
2. Interactivity
We often advise our clients that one of the big selling points of webinars is the ease of interactivity for participants and this can come in a variety of forms.
The most obvious method to foster audience interaction is with a live Q&As section, this is certainly effective however there are additional ways by which you can also keep your audience involved throughout the session.
For example, try putting quick ‘yes or no’ questions out to your listeners as you go along. The participants will be able to type back instantly and you can then incorporate the answers in to the conversation that is taking place. This helps to engender a sense of community and reinforces the ‘live discussion’ element that is often used to persuade professionals to tune in to webinars.
3. Debate
Be honest with yourself, if you had to listen to yourself speak on a topic for 90 consecutive minutes could you honestly say that you would stay awake for the entire duration?
In a context where your audience is likely to be working on other things whilst they listen to your content you need to work extra hard to ensure that your webinar is varied enough to keep your listener on their toes and keep them engaged.
The best way to do this is to structure your webinar around a group panel discussion.
Having anywhere between 3 and 5 speakers will produce enough variety (and hopefully a bit of lively debate) that the discussion should never become stale and uninteresting.
4. Value
It sounds obvious but the most important things usually are. The promise of value is what will draw your audience in and they’ll be expecting the webinar to deliver.
If a listener begins to feel as though the webinar is not delivering on the value promise on which they signed up, or that they have fallen for the webinar equivalent of click bait, then they will switch off.
Prevent this by ensuring that each item on your webinar agenda always ties back to the original value promise made in the webinar title and constantly reiterate to your listener the value that they are getting from being present.
5. Generosity
The vast majority of businesses who choose to produce a webinar do so for commercial reasons, to sell a product. And that’s OK. But it’s important to treat your audience as people and not just as sales leads.
On this subject we’re going to quote from one of the leading voices in webinars. Mike Agron is a Webinar Demand Generation Expert with a true passion for the platform and Mike argues that webinar producers can best win over their audiences by utilizing a “giving to get” approach rather than expecting to “get a sales lead, then give”.
Focus on winning over your listeners by supplying them with high quality content that’s of value to them, especially if you’re conducting your first webinar. That way, those listeners will be more inclined to hear your sales pitch having already formed a good impression of your business as being fundamentally well-natured and generous, as opposed to being solely focused on sales.
We hope that this entry in our #WebinarWeek series has helped you gain a better understanding of what makes a successful webinar.
If you’re looking for more insight into the exciting world of webinars, then you’re already in the right place, at marcus evans Webinars.
Thomas Bannister
Intern
Marcus Evans
101 Finsbury Pavement,
London, EC2A 1RS
