7 Ways to Increase Leads with Webinars
In today’s competitive business world, several digital marketing trends are being implemented to generate new leads. However, many of them have a lengthy process and require constant follow up with cold leads, leading to low conversion rates and substantial waste of time and resources. That’s why webinars have emerged as one of the most popular lead generation methods in the digital marketing industry.
Webinars are great for generating demand and nurturing leads without seeming pushy or intrusive. Since you are providing the audience with valuable information, webinars can at the very least, help you create brand awareness and establish brand recognition. But since the main motive revolves around lead conversion, it’s important to deploy tested methods for increased conversion rates. Read on to find out some of the sure-fire ways to increase leads with webinars.
1. Increase Your Attendance Rate
When planning to host a webinar, it’s important to have a sizable attendance rate. A 2016 report by ON24- world’s leading webinar marketing platform revealed that the attendee conversion rate is quite high at 35-45%, as opposed to standard registration conversion rates. But often, registered participants may back out at the last minute with an excuse or just lose interest.
To ensure maximum attendance, incentivize the leads with enticing offers at the end of your webinar such as a free e-book or discounts that the registrants just can’t say no to. Apply content marketing and SEM techniques such as Google AdWords to target people who are already looking for solutions that you can provide to them. Write a compelling title for your webinar with the SEO keywords that you wish to rank for.
2. Find Your Target Audience
Despite having a sizeable attendance rate, your webinar will not be fruitful if you cannot generate leads. For generating valuable leads, it is important to market your webinar to the right audience. Create a buyer persona map that covers the personal characteristics, pain points, and desired outcome of your target audience about the products or services that you plan to promote in the webinar. You can gather this information by conducting pre-webinar surveys to find out the needs of your existing customers, email subscribers, or social media followers.
3. Create an Impactful Webinar
While webinars are a great way of drawing attention to your business, you shouldn’t host one just for the sake of it. To increase leads with webinars, make sure you deliver the right content. Dive into a topic that offers actionable takeaways to your audience. Use vibrant visual aids such as eye-grabbing graphics, short informational videos, and engaging charts to make your webinar appealing. Another way to keep the attendees engaged is through pop-up questions at the end of every few slides. Reserve some time at the end of your webinar for an interactive Q&A session. You can even use specialized software to create customized polls, learn more about your audience and gauge your performance and relevance of content in real-time.
4. Create an Impactful Webinar Landing Page
An informational landing page can increase the number of registrations and attendees, and, subsequently, leads and conversion rates. Ask yourself the 5Ws and check whether your landing page answers all these questions. Start with ‘Who:’ make sure that you include all the information about your experience and achievements. If you are co-hosting or partnering with different speakers, include a dedicated section about their expertise and accolades. Next, check if your page answers the ‘What’ question: explain the topic with crisp bullet points that are easy to grasp for your audience.
Move on to ‘When:’ mention the right date and time and include a calendar button to ensure they do not miss out on your webinar. Next, mention ‘Where’ they can access the webinar post-registration. A simple ‘check inbox for login details’ goes a long way. Lastly, discuss with the audience ‘Why’ the webinar is a must-attend event. Refrain from pitching your product until the end of your webinar and attach testimonials from past attendees about their experience to leverage social proof.
5. Promote Your Webinar
While your webinars may get frequent visits from your existing customers, substantial lead generation is possible only by catering to a new audience. Implement creative social media optimization techniques to reach out to a much bigger audience. Post frequent updates on your social media accounts to inform your followers about the webinar. Use attention-grabbing images and appropriate hashtags to spread the word. Promote your landing page through sponsored updates and LinkedIn ads to effectively segment the target audience based on company size, skills, demographics, etc.
Be mindful of the timing of webinar promotion. A 2017 study by ON24 revealed that while 25% of registrations occur on the day of the webinar, a generous 23% take place more than 2 weeks before the event. Moreover, the study stated that Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursday s are the best days of the week for promotional emails.
6. Run Test Webinars for Optimum Results
Whether you are a seasoned webinar host or it’s your first time, it’s important to practice the presentation as many times as possible. Fumbling through words, muttering mindless phrases, and experiencing technical glitches can potentially drive leads away. Even the leading webinar presenters agree that successful webinars are the result of endless practice and extensive research. Running a test webinar improves speech, boosts confidence, and increases the quality of content. It also helps eliminate any technical issues and prepares you to maintain a calm demeanor in the event of a mix-up.
7. Re-Target Your Leads
Webinars have emerged as a vital marketing trend for many businesses but require time, effort, money, and resources to turn them into a success. However, success of a webinar is not just determined by the attendance rate but also by the number of leads generated. That’s why post-webinar follow up is one of the crucial steps in improving sales. Distinguish potential leads from regular attendees based on their personal responses, interest, readiness, and engagement.
Create targeted email campaigns for the leads to yield high conversion rates. In today’s age, people prefer to consume content at their own time and pace. Offering an on-demand and replay option is another great way of not only enticing more people to register for the event but also reminds potential leads about your products every time they go through it.
By providing you with the ultimate opportunity for engaging with a new audience and building trust, webinars have emerged as one of the most powerful methods to increase leads. And while these tactical approaches are a great start for increasing leads with webinars, there are many more components that go into successful lead generation through webinars. Always remember to test new approaches before the main event, track your metrics, figure out what works for your business, and pour in the additional components along the way. Constantly seek feedback from your attendees and through trial-and-error, you will be able to fully optimize your webinar for lead generation and conversion.
Sofia Wilton is a journalist by profession but writes short stories in her spare time. She also writes blogs for Lake B2B related to current affairs. As a passionate writer, she devotes all her free time to writing.
