Tag: virtualsummit

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E32: How Long Should My Webinar Be? (Long enough!?)

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Welcome to episode thirty-two of  “Zooming to Webinar Success!”

Hey, I’m Grant: My clients call me The Webinar Guy.

Today we’re going to talk about one of my most asked questions “How Long Should my Webinar Be? (As Robert Southey author of Goldilocks might’ve said “Just Right!”)”

As you already know (I HOPE you know by now!!), you can always catch up on the first thirty-one episodes hered on TheWebinarGuy.com- just hit the links to the right, or use the search bar!

Okay, maybe not every day, but almost every day, I get some version of the question, “How long should my webinar be?”

I’m sure you’ll not be surprised by my answer. “Long enough”! But as usual, let’s back up a bit.

Another thing I tell clients nearly every day is, “Begin with the end in mind”, made famous by Dr. Stephen Covey.

I can’t overemphasize how important planning is. It’s really the point of this entire series! And it follows that this single issue is a constant. Every week I get a message, “Are you available to host or moderate a webinar…(wait for it)… tomorrow?

Oh sure!

When you begin with the end in mind, you know WHY you’re having your webinar or virtual meeting! Back in episode twenty-seven, I asked you to consider WIIFM, or what’s in it for me, or more accurately for your audience (them). So that is one great goal, what IS in it for your audience?

But what is it YOU want out of it. The reasons that TheWebinarGuy’s clients have virtual summits, virtual meetings, hybrid events are as varied as the businesses they operate.

In episode four I talked about finding the purpose of your webinar. Then in five, the Overall strategy on what you’re trying to accomplish. So go listen to those think about the answers.

When an audience is being asked to absorb new information, you need to allow the information time to trickle in. We’ve all heard the “learning from a fire-hose” or similar statement. Try that in a webinar and you’ll lose your audience.

Generally speaking, my sweet spot is under twenty minutes. Why? That’s a great time length, where it’s long enough to impart the information, leave some time for Q&A and not leave everyone tired, bored or no longer on your webinar!

If you’ve been in sales, there’s a constant in how you think of prospects and sales. You may have heard the phrase, 10-6-4-1. You have to get ten prospects, talk to six, four will be interested and you’ll close one.

How did that information jump in here? Stay with me for a minute…

Like a Realtor would say, “location, location, location” we here at TheWebinarGuy.com say “Planning, planning & planning!”

We love to be on your team from the time you first think about doing a webinar!! Yes, I’m the webcast and podcast sponsor, TheWebinarGuy.com! (Yeah, that’s me). When you decide to plan your first webinar or you’re looking to plan a larger, or multi-dimensional virtual summit, and think you need assistance, we have many resources and would love to help you! Hit me at WebinarPro@TheWebinarGuy.com, or visit our website (TheWebinarGuy.com) and use contact form! We’d love to work with you! Thanks for listening to my commercial!

Back to the sales rule 10-6-4-1. Look it up on the internet and you’ll see different numbers, but they are all relevant to the point.

If you need ten sales from your webinar, you’ll need to fill one hundred seats. One mistake, in my experience, is when people try to have a webinar and try to get two hundred in their virtual sales meeting to get twenty sales right then.

That might work. And then they pack every single thing into that first webinar, then they are disappointed that the audience thins out early and the remaining thirty people don’t buy. Most often, they’ve been overwhelmed!

Here’s a solution; Plan that webinar to be the first part of the funnel. Get one hundred or two hundred in your webinar or virtual summit! But plan to give “Just Enough” information to your audience to get the right number to the next webinar. In other words, every virtual seminar is a break down to the next.

Why blow all your time and energy on an audience that isn’t going to buy. Here’s an example. We do a TON of bit coin, binance, and DeFi webinars for clients.

They’ll do fifteen minutes on what bit-coin is, and how it relates to ten minutes on how secure block-chain technology is. Then seven minutes on their platform and how great it is. We’re now over thirty minutes. And I sit and watch the participant list drop one by one. And they’ve not gotten to their CTA!

And God-forbid you have a boring speaker that drones on and on and those numbers drop like a rock!

What could they do? Start with a statement by your webinar moderator from TheWebinarGuy.com that this webinar is a bit advanced and for those that understand bit-coin, block chain and are ready for a better platform! (read: Manage expectations).

First touch on both what bit-coin is, then touch on block-chain, maybe two to three minutes tops. Mention another webinar you’ll be having later that is more in-depth on those things. Get those people in THAT webinar.

Now work on how your platform works and the benefits of using it. You can do a lot in the next five to seven minutes. Then do your Q&A. Five minutes tops. Then do your CTA. We’re around fifteen minutes and I assure you you’ll have better numbers. Make sense?

Your CTA IS a sign up offer (why not!?!), but now get those really interested into that next harder sales push webinar with some great offer. Say 5% sign up bonus for those that sign up now for the next webinar.

If you’re planning a sixty-minute webinar, or even anything over thirty-minutes- you better have five things:

  1. Be an interesting speaker with Great Content
  2. Solid webinar design and
  3. Tight planning agenda run by professionals
  4. Concise, meaningful Q&A
  5. An interesting, well-crafted CTA

So what have we defined? A sort of sales funnel where we’ll try to peel off attendees that would be better served in a different webinar. Next, we’ll have planned content for the “real” audience and either close them with a call to action then, or, have a deeper, more detailed content webinar soon after.

This is related to sales, but it works for nearly everything. Need VoiceOver training? How about my webinar on that? But I’ll first make sure what phase of your career you’re at, “This webinar is for those that…”, then the call to action might be a three lesson course.

Selling a beauty regimen? Trying to solve racism, or hunger in your neighborhood? Helping people in some way?

Hope this helps you plan!!

This series is for smaller organizations and solopreneurs that may not be tech savvy, don’t know all the steps, or don’t WANT to know all the steps.

Over the series, I’m going to lead you through the significant decisions and capabilities you’ll need to “Zoom to Webinar Success!” If you have a subject you’d like me to cover, please subscribe, then drop me a note or comment.

As always, if you need help now, don’t hesitate to reach out at WebinarPro@TheWebinarGuy.com

Thank you for watching! Would love to hear your questions and comments! Don’t forget to tell a friend or two!

And if you’re listening to the Podcast audio, thanks for listening!

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E30: Staffing a Big Webinar or Virtual Summit

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Welcome to an anniversary episode of sorts- Episode Thirty of “Zooming to Webinar Success!”

Hey, I’m Grant: My clients call me The Webinar Guy. And a special shoutout to Jane Wing at JaneWing.com for our new podcast introduction!

Today we’re going to talk about “Planning your Big Webinar or Virtual Summit- Part two”

We’ll talk about the pieces parts you’ll need! Stay tuned…

In the last episode (twenty-nine) I started talking about producing larger webinars and how that might be defined. If you missed it, head to TheWebinarGuy.com and look for episode twenty-nine..

As I mentioned in that episode, here at TheWebinarGuy.com we’re often involved in large virtual events. These events can be “large” in different ways. What are those ways? It’s all about numbers. The number of speakers planned, the number of days it will span, the number of staff required to take care of myriad details and of course, the number of dollars you’ll spend to do any of that. ALL the numbers are related, btw.

I talked about overusing the word “multi” as I hit those numbers above, Multi-everything!

And I said that the webinar or virtual summit, or virtual event- whatever you want to call it, will be constrained by two significant factors. Audience and Budget.

Okay enough going back over the last episode, let’s move on, but first.

—-

Before we dig in too far a word from our webcast and podcast sponsor, TheWebinarGuy.com! (Yeah, that’s me). When you decide to approach your first big webinar or you want to plan a large, multi-dimensional virtual summit, and think you need assistance, we have many resources and would love to help you! Hit me at WebinarPro@TheWebinarGuy.com, or visit our website (TheWebinarGuy.com) and use contact form! We’d love to work with you! Thanks for listening to my commercial!

—-

So, define “Big” already, Grant!

Alrighty. Again, I define a BIG webinar or virtual event when it just flat can’t get done by you alone and likely not by two people. Can they be done, yikes, yes but not if you like to sleep!

What you might need; First take a real, honest, frank evaluation of what you can actually do on your own. Know what your gifts and capabilities are and make an honest assessment of whether that serves your virtual summit or event.

Now fill that in with those that can do other things around your gifts.

Let’s start at the beginning with marketing the event. Here we go…

Web designer/web master to post events. Will they need to integrate with platforms like EventBrite to post or zoom to create the event?

Social media posting: There’s a specialist in every field, and this is no different. You may need someone with knowledge of each platform for best practice and keyword usage and more. How often will they post. Are they paid ads? Is the budget made for that? Can that person or persons interact well with your speakers or their staff to market them into your event?

Script writing/editing: Maybe you’ve got a script and you just need someone to look at it for clarity, maybe it needs written from scratch. I get many scripts to record for clients that you can tell were written by the person that is the subject expert, so it’s really detailed and then at the same time, it steps right over the points the audience really needs to know!

Slide Deck creation/editing: Repeat the paragraph from above on script writing. I’ve gotten slide decks where the “expert” just flat skipped an important slide or two.

But the other problem with inexperienced slide deck creators is using all the cute bells and whistles that will ruin a professional presentation. We spend a lot of time normalizing animations, removing animations that aren’t needed and more. And we end up adding graphics that better explain processes or expressing the appropriate emotion for that point the speaker is making.

Back to Speakers: Who else is going to speak? Who will interact and help to manage them, their notes, their slides and as mentioned, possibly work with their staff?

Event coordination: Who is going to track all this and manage all these people?

Tech Coordinator:  Who is responsible for set completion? If a simple virtual event, you may just use your room (see episode seventeen) what do you need to do to be ready? What about sound (mic, etc) and your speakers and camera (just go hit episodes fifteen through eighteen!). Oh yeah, make sure your computer is ready as well as your internet connection too.

Software: Do you have someone to check your computer and KNOW that all your software is working and will play nice on presentation day. By the way, a word of caution on “updating your software because the publisher said it was a new version that can run faster and jump higher. Just last month we had to roll back three of our packages to the point where they would play nice. I’ll just say it will be a while before I upgrade stuff that’s working.

Do you need programs like: OBS, WhatsApp, Skype, Discord, zoom or another platform installed and working?

WhatsApp, Skype and Discord are great for off platform communication for your team. Get everyone in a group!

Moderator(s): Depending on size, you may need one or two folks to monitor chat and the Q&A box, assign breakout rooms, setup and show polls, remove trollers (episode twenty-three, twenty-four and twenty-six).

Host: Usually one host is sufficient, but if you’re doing sections, you may want a different host for each section. Maybe you’re doing a session for say Spanish speaking attendees and having a host that speaks whatever language or that looks like them, might matter!

Finally: POST Webinar: Who all from the list above is needed for follow-up, sending thank you notes, follow-up social posts and other web related activities? You just had a great webinar, don’t let the energy die now!!!

It IS a LOT to consider, and I think I hit most of it! So what is a BIG webinar? I think I was on a team of eight recently- that I knew of!

But with the help of TheWebinarTeam at TheWebinarGuy.com, we’re ready to jump in where YOU need us!

—– —–

This series is for smaller organizations and solopreneurs that may not be tech savvy, don’t know all the steps, or don’t WANT to know all the steps.

Over the series, I’m going to lead you through the significant decisions and capabilities you’ll need to “Zoom to Webinar Success!” If you have a subject you’d like me to cover, please subscribe, then drop me a note or comment.

As always, if you need help now, don’t hesitate to reach out at WebinarPro@TheWebinarGuy.com

Thank you for watching! Would love to hear your questions and comments! Don’t forget to tell a friend or two!

And if you’re listening to the Podcast audio, thanks for listening!

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E29: Planning a big webinar or virtual summit

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Welcome to episode twenty-nine of “Zooming to Webinar Success!”

Hey, I’m Grant: My clients call me The Webinar Guy.

Today we’re going to talk about “Planning your Big Webinar or Virtual Summit”.

We’ll talk about some of the pitfalls and advantages! Stay tuned…

In the last episode (twenty-eight) I talked a bit more about promoting webinars and virtual meetings. If you missed it, head to TheWebinarGuy.com and look for episode twenty- eight.

Here at TheWebinarGuy.com we’re often involved in large virtual events. These events can be “large” in different ways. What are those ways? And how does this play into your planning and budget? Stay tuned because in this episode, twenty-nine, we’ll discuss some of the many ways that larger virtual summits and multi-day, multi-presenter, multi-EVERYTHING is different than “just doing” a simpler webinar.

Let’s start with defining what a “Large” virtual event looks like. Maybe an “official” definition from the web is in order:
“Webinars provide attendees with a single session to attend, while virtual events offer flexibility in single or multi-session agendas that take place at different times or days” Okay, that helps, but…

Another definition suggests that the answer to virtual events is that they are multi-dimensional.

Where webinars go big on a single topic for whatever period of time, Virtual events can be just a few sessions on multiple subjects that are usually related in some way, to multi-day events with myriad speakers from all over the world, drawing a multi-national audience.

Sorry, I feel like I’m overusing “multi” but there just isn’t another word that works!

Okay back at it. So what DOES large mean? Add complexity and it gets “large” in every sense of the word from number of attendees to speakers to well, everything you can think of.

I’m going to suggest that the webinar or virtual summit, or virtual event- whatever you want to call it, is going to be constrained by two significant factors. Audience and Budget.

First, I’ve talked in multiple episodes about promotion and snagging audience and getting attendees to your virtual event. This is the first factor. It may be or seem obvious, but your ability to define your audience, market to them, get them to register and the million dollar part: Get them to attend- That is a huge challenge! (And then make them want to stick around!!)

The second part that I’ve really not gotten into in this series is defining your budget. Well, this is really the first factor, quite frankly. Because if you have enough budget, you can get audience!

—-AD START—

But before we dig in too far on that little gem, the budget, a word from our webcast and podcast sponsor, TheWebinarGuy.com! (Yeah, that’s me). When you decide to approach your first big webinar or you want to plan a large, multi-dimensional virtual summit, and think you need assistance, we have many resources and would love to help you! Hit me at WebinarPro@TheWebinarGuy.com, or visit our website (TheWebinarGuy.com) and use contact form! We’d love to work with you! Thanks for listening to my commercial!

—-AD END—

Okay, the 900# gorilla in the room: BUDGET. A standard conversation we often have with new or potential clients goes like this:

THEM: “How much does it cost for you to produce a webinar?”

TWG: “Here’s our standard list of fifteen questions we always ask to get started. One of the first is; Do you have a budget?”

THEM: “Yes, but…”

I can tell you that this conversation goes back and forth until there is an understanding that there is no “one size fits all” webinar or virtual meeting/event. And to help you, we really need a realistic budget. It saves our team AND the client both time and resources.

So my first advise here is: Get you or your current team serious about how much you can or will spend.

That said, a simpler, one day event could cost well, what all do you need done?

Marketing? Planning? List buying? And on and on. Again our simple “starter questionnaire” is around fifteen questions and our planning sheet has more than eighty things we consider when planning an event!

Some things to consider; is your event going to only be in your native tongue? Do you need moderators in other languages for that specific audience?

We were involved recently with a two-day multi-national event that started in India with speakers and moderators working in Hindi, then it flowed to Africa, Europe (switching to English), then into the Americas. Do you need interpreters? And more.

Are you doing social postings? Are awards involved? Breakout rooms? Casual networking rooms? Do you need someone to manage each breakout room? Will presenters help? How will you handle it when a speaker doesn’t show, or has connection issues?

How will you introduce speakers? Will you use a host? An introduction video (cartooned intros are fun!)?

What will you do to keep the event fun, interesting and keep people from becoming fatigued during a five hour event?

Do you have systems in place already to assist with any of this, or does it all need produced for you?

How will you measure ROI? What will you do as follow up with speakers and attendees? What marketing data do you expect back and how will you use it?
Will you be paying speakers or are they speaking pro-bono for some exposure? How will you handle that?

What polls will you plan to capture marketing data?

How are you going to present or push your brand? How far can your stray from your brand story, and serve the webinar topic. OR… How far can you push the webinar topics and speakers and stay on point with your brand?

Just like going out to dinner, or virtually any purchase you make, adding complexity, creating videos, hiring a band to play, and all that I’ve mentioned to this point adds to your budget.

These things also add to audience experience and their want to stay around.

The bottom line, and I’ve mentioned this often in previous episodes: Focus on what you and your attendees want from a virtual event!

  • What do you want to achieve with your event? What “End result” are you looking for? (Episodes four and five).
  • And what do your attendees hope to gain? Have you thought of that (Look for the WIIFM episode twenty-seven).

I’ve often mentioned the webinar planning sheet we use (that you can request on our website: TheWebinarGuy.com) that grows almost daily as we add things that we take for granted, that you shouldn’t.

Best of luck in planning your “Large” event!

—– —–

This series is for smaller organizations and solopreneurs that may not be tech savvy, don’t know all the steps, or don’t WANT to know all the steps.

Over the series, I’m going to lead you through the significant decisions and capabilities you’ll need to “Zoom to Webinar Success!” If you have a subject you’d like me to cover, please subscribe, then drop me a note or comment.

As always, if you need help now, don’t hesitate to reach out at WebinarPro@TheWebinarGuy.com

Thank you for watching! Would love to hear your questions and comments! Don’t forget to tell a friend or two! And if you’re listening to the Podcast audio, thanks for listening!

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E20: Series Recap & Creating Your Slide Deck

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This is Grant: My clients call me The Webinar Guy.

For the last few episodes, I’ve been covering many things to consider as you think about doing Webinars. Mainly your Recording environment- specifically web cams, lighting, and the “set” or space you record in.

So, what’s next? I’ve said here before that maybe other than the decision to hold a webinar, there are many decisions that need to be made and for many, the order really doesn’t matter. You need to do them all!

Since this is episode 20, I want to do a quick recap. If you’ve been following along and have heard previous episodes, you can jump to around the three minute mark, but if you’re new, here’s a recap of what you’ve missed:

E1 was an intro to the series
E2: The real basics to consider such as a CRM or Customer Relationship Management tool as you build your webinar kingdom.
E3 More on audience management and the considerations as you use that CRM, audience tracking and so on.
E4: Finding the purpose of your webinar. Not the actual subject, but what you want people to do when they’ve attended.
E5: Strategy on overall what you’re trying to accomplish- strategically setting up your webinar, webinar series, or virtual summits for success
E6: Was about considering the frequency and cadence
E7: I discussed taking your list of followers and strategy on getting them to the webinar
E8: Having fewer sign ups than you’d like and thoughts about cancelling your event.
E9: Sales funnels P1
E10: Interviewed Special Guest Deborah Gardner.
E11: Looking more at Sales Funnels
E12: Standing in your confidence!
E13: More on marketing and promotion
E14: Even more on marketing and promotion: A lack of preparation.
E15: Planning and the Webinar Guy Checklist- First bit on equipment: Cameras
E16: Sound and your environment
E17: Set Design
E18: Lighting your set, especially if you wear glasses.
E19: How you’ll present: as in solo, with a slide deck, etc.

E20: Today I’m going to chat about another consideration for webinars; Using PowerPoint, Prezio, or other type of slide deck to back up your presentation.

But first a word from our sponsor, which at this point is me… if you need help creating a great presentation or training on how to use a slide deck in a webinar, training on slide deck creation or need a deck created, or coaching on live stage craft, please hit TheWebinarGuy.com and use our contact page. We can help you!

Okay, thanks for allowing my short commercial!

This will be a two part episode, btw to stay in a shorter format. So part one:

Your first consideration is choosing the software you’ll use to create your slides; again such as Prezi, Google Slides, Canva, Keynote, Microsoft PowerPoint, (which of course might be considered the 900# gorilla in the room.

It matters not which you use. But rule number one is remembering that a presentation is only EVER there to support the speaker, not BE the presentation.

Rule number two is that you should be on-screen with your presentation- many folks use a small feature window. We can help you with that too. But switching to ONLY slides takes the personal touch out of it. Trust me, stay on screen!

Rule three: Use “cute” animations, GIF images and such to a minimum.

Rule four: Limit the number of animations, GIF images and such.

Hopefully you get the point being made. So often, we get slide decks to evaluate, or to recreate a slide deck for a client and you can tell the professional level of whoever created it. They’ve tried (or so it seems) to use every single animation available. This zooms in, that one Wipes, then a Pinwheel and more.

Folks, this is NOT professional. A bit of tough love: If you as a presenter need a “cute” slide deck to support you, you need presentation coaching/training . I’d love to help you with that, but if you can’t pass the “Cute stuff” test, know you’ll lose audience.

In that same vein, many presentations love to use GIF animations. I’d love to say “don’t”, but at least find ones that animate for a moment then stop. When you use motion on the screen, it draws the eye. If that GIF is one that is going to repeat forever, learn how to take it off the screen, have it exit or disappear. It’s really distraction and is unprofessional.

Enough on that? I HOPE so!!

This subject is going to be a two parts to keep the content where I want to time-wise, so I’ll wrap up here. Hit the next episode, 21 for the wrap!

This series is for smaller organizations and solopreneurs that may not be tech savvy, don’t know all the steps, or don’t WANT to know all the steps.

Over the series, I’m going to lead you through the significant decisions and capabilities you’ll need to “Zoom to Webinar Success!”

As always, if you need help now, don’t hesitate to reach out!

Thank you for watching! Would love to hear your questions and comments!

And if you’re listening to the Podcast audio, thanks for listening! Tell a friend!

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E18: Set Lighting Challenges

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This is the last part about the space you record your sessions or zoom meeting virtual meetings or virtual summit. I also cover the challenges with lighting for those that wear eye-glasses.

Set lighting challenges

This is Grant: The Webinar Guy.

For the last few episodes, I’ve been covering several things surrounding your webinar recording environment- specifically web cams or cameras and mics. Then I talked about really thinking about the brand you’re putting forward in that “look” you’re broadcasting.

And I promised to cover lighting soon.

Well, here we are. Finally. I’m going look at lighting a bit differently than you might expect.

As mentioned previously, there’s plenty of video tutorials on lighting you can find. As with everything on the ol’ interwebs, some are better than others. But I had a unique challenge. Well, at least unique to those of us that wear glasses.

The first time it occurred to me that I was going to have a challenge was a long while back when I was on a live zoom meeting or virtual training I was watching. The trainer had done everything correctly on lighting. The back lighting was great. A couple focus lights were aimed to eliminate dead spots in the room. And they’d used a ring light to light there face well.

Ring-light

If you’re not familiar with ring lights, its exactly like it sounds. It’s a round lamp and on most setups you can put your camera in the middle, so you’ve got (mostly) perfect lighting.

Like I said, their lighting was nearly perfect. Except one thing. They’d not considered how ring lights would act on their eyeglasses.

What happens with glasses and ring lights is that the ring lights put a fairly large white dot on the glasses. And the wearer cannot see that dot (unless they look in their feed).

So the whole time this presenter talked, every, single, move of her head was accompanied by that little dot dancing all over her glasses.

Talk about distracting!

Many people wear glasses! So how do I beat it? With almost ZERO direct light. Everything is off angle as opposed to straight on (see ring light!).

I’m also told a polarizing filter on your camera lens can help eliminate that. My results varied.

Let’s wrap up lighting. I really didn’t intend for this to be THE ANSWER to your lighting issues, I wanted to call attention to it. I see no point in redoing training and instruction that’s already out there.

But many presenters don’t consider not only how they look, but the room around them.

A couple tips, if you’re using a “natural Setting” (no green screen), watch for dark “dead” spots in the room where a little fill would help.

On the other hand, glare can be a problem. Think about sun movement. If your virtual meeting is only 20 minutes, likely not a big deal. However, if you’re running an all-day virtual summit or a webinar of any length, pay attention in the days ahead to see how your space is affected by sun travel. You might be surprised. Also is planning for one type lighting (say overcast) and you get another (yeah, the sun came out).

Most possibly, a green-screen setup can be better as you pretty much set it up and forget it. It can also help eliminate the variables in a naturally lit space. And the same goes for a dedicated recording space using a “natural” set.

But that glasses thing. Again, just pay attention to this and you’ll be fine! One last trick I learned. I have four monitors in my studio. Yeah, four. It’s GREAT for screen and software management, but yikes! If you have windows open on your desktop, use white backgrounds on a WORD script, that also will drive you nuts with glasses. TOOO much light to reflect. So I have a black desktop I switch to before recording and I use a blacked out Microsoft word setup to read scripts. It helps!

Oh, by the way, it took two different camera set ups and more lighting changes than I care to try to recount and the black screen/close windows you don’t need open trick to get my glasses and lighting “right”. Best luck!

This series is for smaller organizations and solopreneurs that may not be tech savvy, don’t know all the steps, or don’t WANT to know all the steps.

Over the series, I’m going to lead you through the significant decisions and capabilities you’ll need to “Zoom to Webinar Success!”

As always, if you need help now, don’t hesitate to reach out!

Thank you for watching!