meaning of webinar presentation

We use essential cookies to make Venngage work. By clicking “Accept All Cookies”, you agree to the storing of cookies on your device to enhance site navigation, analyze site usage, and assist in our marketing efforts.

Manage Cookies

Cookies and similar technologies collect certain information about how you’re using our website. Some of them are essential, and without them you wouldn’t be able to use Venngage. But others are optional, and you get to choose whether we use them or not.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

These cookies are always on, as they’re essential for making Venngage work, and making it safe. Without these cookies, services you’ve asked for can’t be provided.

Show cookie providers

• Google Login

Functionality Cookies

These cookies help us provide enhanced functionality and personalisation, and remember your settings. They may be set by us or by third party providers.

Performance Cookies

These cookies help us analyze how many people are using Venngage, where they come from and how they're using it. If you opt out of these cookies, we can’t get feedback to make Venngage better for you and all our users.

• Google Analytics

Targeting Cookies

These cookies are set by our advertising partners to track your activity and show you relevant Venngage ads on other sites as you browse the internet.

• Google Tag Manager
• Infographics
• Daily Infographics
• Popular Templates
• Accessibility
• Graphic Design
• Graphs and Charts
• Data Visualization
• Human Resources
• Beginner Guides

Blog Beginner Guides What Is a Webinar & How Does It Work? [Beginner’s Guide With 10+ Presentation Templates]

What Is a Webinar & How Does It Work? [Beginner’s Guide With 10+ Presentation Templates]

Written by: Aditya Sheth Apr 08, 2021

With a global pandemic taking the world by storm and forcing people to work from home, webinars have seen a resurgence in popularity and usage across the globe.

In the last decade (especially in the last few months) webinars have become a staple for educating students and potential customers, lead generation for your business, and captivating large online audiences.

If you’re new to webinars, you’re probably asking yourself…

• What is a webinar?

How does a webinar work?

• Why are webinars so effective?

What are the different types of webinars?

• How do I create and host a webinar?

In this guide, I’ll give you a crash course on what is a webinar, how you can create a webinar and showcase plenty of presentation examples to answer all your webinar-related questions!

Let’s dive right in.

What is a webinar? Webinar definition:

According to  Merriam-Webster , a webinar (or web seminar) is “a live online educational presentation during which participating viewers can submit questions and comments.”

You might be wondering, “well, what is a seminar?” Seminar definition: “a meeting for giving and discussing information.”

Webinars are events, video presentations, workshops, seminars, training sessions, or classroom lectures hosted and delivered online using webinar software .

What makes webinars effective is that they’re a two-way form of communication where the attendees and presenters give, receive and share information with each other, in real time.

Webinar vs. Webcast

A webinar is not a webcast. Webcasts are pre-recorded sessions that broadcast online (on TV or YouTube). Webinars are live sessions allowing real-time interactivity between the presenter and attendees.

For example, our growth by content live webinar teaches business owners how to use content marketing to drive business growth without a massive budget:

If you’re new to webinars, a great way to familiarize yourself is to attend other webinars (like the one above) and take notes.

Hosting webinars has plenty of uses and benefits, but before we dive into creating a webinar it’s important to understand how and why webinars work in the first place.

Webinars allow presenters to share documents of all kinds including but not limited to voice notes, videos, presentations and other documents, etc with their attendees.

Webinars have plenty of uses (often business-related) but the most important and biggest use for webinars is to educate and engage an audience).

Your audience could be anyone from new or existing customers, industry peers or even the students in your classroom.

This means webinars are useful in any industry where communicating with your audience is a key factor in your personal or professional success.

Webinars can also help you with all of the following: 

• Educate your audience about your business.
• Build authority in your industry or niche.
• Demonstrate your product to customers. 
• Onboard new customers to your product. 
• Training both new and existing employees. 
• Generating leads for your business. 

In the marketing world, the main use for webinars is lead generation.

For example, our “ Infographic Design 101 ” webinar is aimed at helping our current customers visualize their ideas and attracting potential customers to sign up for Venngage:

If you’re new to webinars or want to learn how to visualize your ideas, I highly recommend checking out this webinar.

Another way marketers use online webinars is to build authority, credibility and thought leadership in their industry.

Drift ’s approach to thought-leadership webinars is a prime example:

Drift leverages webinars for multiple purposes ranging from educating new and current customers, establishing thought leadership, and collaborating with other SaaS companies.

This helps Drift position themselves as a subject matter expert in the SaaS industry.

Another example is  R&D tax credit software  Boast.AI.

Boast Events  produces two webinars per week in their community, branded Traction, bringing founders and leaders from some of the fastest-growing companies to share actionable, tactical advice on business growth.

If you’re creating a marketing plan and your goal is consistently generating high-quality leads for your business, webinars should be a crucial piece of your strategy.

Webinars are also used extensively in eLearning. As an educator, your ability to reach more students expands dramatically. Right from the comfort of your home.

Students don’t need to travel and with the current crisis that’s forced everyone to stay home, online webinars can be the most important learning tool in a teacher’s arsenal.

Here’s an example of how HBR approaches educational webinars:

After reading this guide in its entirety, you’ll have a better understanding of how to replicate their approach to webinars for your own institution or classroom.

Why are webinars effective?

What makes webinars effective (compared to physical events or workshops) is that with webinars, you don’t need to rent out a physical location or deal with complex logistics that arise from hosting in-person events. 

In fact, in 2020, the number of organizations planning a virtual event has doubled .

With a plethora of webinar pros (vs physical events), rich-feature sets, support for multiple content types, the possibilities are essentially endless.

Advantages of webinars

Since webinars are online events , they’re convenient for both presenter and attendee as you can host and attend webinars right from the comfort of your office (or home.) 

Whether it’s presenting to a small group or a group of 100+ attendees, webinars work in both these scenarios.

Webinars can be pre-recorded and played at any time for participants. This makes them easier to set up, repurpose, and budget-friendly compared to in-person events.

Offline events have their own merits, but with live webinars you don’t need to spend time agonizing over venue rentals, food, beverages or making sure your presentation equipment works. 

People have used webinars creatively for education, marketing, sales, branding, human resources, user onboarding, etc. So when it comes to what you can do with webinars: the sky’s the limit.

A lot of webinar tools come with interactive whiteboards, surveys and polls, live-chat features which make them far more personalized, engaging and interactive for your audience.

These are just some of the reasons why webinars have been exploding in popularity in recent times. 

Webinar formats

Webinars come with tons of customizable features as well as support various content formats such as:

• Live video: the most common type of webinar. Live webinars tend to garner the most engagement.
• Pre-recorded: most webinars are live, but you can always record a live webinar and future participants can register for them as they please. Most Ideal for evergreen topics.
• Text: Most webinars tools come equipped with text chat features. Ask and answer your audiences’ questions, in real time.
• Whiteboard: used to draw out and explain important concepts.
• Surveys and polls: want to keep your audience engaged? Use surveys and polls to get attendees to answer questions and organize it all in one place.

But the most common way to conduct webinars is by creating and presenting a slide deck presentation .

Here’s an example of a webinar presentation you can edit and customize right now:

Once you learn how to make a great webinar presentation, you can always kick things up a notch by experimenting with different webinar tools as well as whiteboards, polls, surveys, etc.

Venngage has a fair amount of experience when it comes to participating and hosting webinars for marketing, lead generation, and joint collaborations.

But that’s not their only use. Here are just some ways you can harness the power of webinars:

Webinars for marketing, lead generation and partnerships

When it comes to lead generation, there’s a lot you can do: 

• Creating in-depth industry white papers , 
• Publishing case studies to promote your product, and 
• Designing ebooks and offering them up as lead magnets.

But, the greatest bang for your marketing buck can come from hosting webinars due to the high-quality leads they help generate.

Companies like Drift , ConvertKit , G2 , etc have successfully leveraged webinars to scale their lead generation and in turn, increase revenue.  You just need to learn some essential webinar statistics if you’re planning to create one. If webinars worked for them, they can work for you too. 

For example, G2 hosts webinars regularly with the goal of generating leads for their software:

G2 covers a wide variety of topics in their webinars. Not only that, joint webinars are the perfect way to team up with other companies and subject matter experts in your industry. 

Conducting joint webinars allows you to:

• Partnering with other companies gives you access to their audience. They could even be potential customers who would otherwise be oblivious about you. 
• Collaborating with other companies adds credibility and authority to your content establishing you as a thought leader in your industry. 

At Venngage, we use webinars to educate our audience and lead generation becomes a natural by-product of this goal:

With this webinar our goal was simple: helping businesses navigate the pandemic by outlining how they can grow using content marketing (like we have).

With physical event cancellations and the world being forced to work from home, companies are slowly transitioning from hosting physical events to events hosted virtually (with webinars).

For example, Wishpond opted for a virtual event to make it easier for participants and attendees to partake (even from home):

Pro Tip: If you provide massive value to your audience in your webinars, chances are you won’t even need to promote your product. Help your audience with their struggles, and they’ll not only become a customer but also a raving fan.

Webinars for education

Webinars have exploded in popularity in the last few years as a powerful learning tool, not only for marketers but also for schools and universities.

For educators, webinars are the best way to reach and engage students. No classroom required. For students, they get to learn from the comfort of their own homes.

Due to the pandemic, colleges and universities have transitioned to distanced learning. So webinars as a learning tool have surged in popularity.

My alma mater, Seneca uses educational webinars for all occasions—from educating potential students to onboarding new students and also hosting virtual open houses:

If you’re a college or university trying to onboard incoming students for the new semester, webinars are an absolute no-brainer. Here’s an onboarding webinar template you can use:

I f you’re a professor looking to experiment with webinars as a learning device, you can use this webinar presentation template for your next online class:

Pro Tip: Want to make your webinar even more engaging? Invite external educators and subject matter experts to collaborate with you on your next webinar.

Webinars for product demos

Companies have started adopting webinars for product demos to strategically sell their products and build a deeper relationship with prospective customers.

But when is the ideal time to start using webinars for product demos? The answer: Now!

Today’s buyers are digitally savvy and comparing competing products to make the best buying decision. Sending over a business proposal and hoping for the best isn’t going to cut it anymore.

A product demo webinar is an opportunity for you to showcase real case studies of your current customers, how they’ve used your product successfully, and how your prospect can achieve the same results.

OroCommerce, the B2B eCommerce platform  does a great job with product demo webinars . Every time they release a major product update they hold product demos going over the benefits of every new feature.

When presenting a live webinar that targets your audience’s pain points , strategically tie in your product into your presentation and how it helps your attendees solve their burning problems. 

Here’s an example of a product demo webinar presentation you can use to demo your products or services:

Pro Tip: Product demo webinars also helps you gather critical customer feedback . If you’re a startup, start conducting regular webinars to gather crucial feedback to make your product better.

Webinars for employee training

Webinar tools can double as meeting software and training tools for training both new and existing employees.

This is especially useful if you’re communicating with a remote team . Or even a team that’s too big to sit in one room together.

You can start by including webinars in your onboarding materials or conduct a webinar-esque orientation where you outline your company’s expectations, vision, mission and address questions your new hires might have.

They can also be used to showcase your company’s culture and how it will matter to your new recruits. 

Related : How to Create a Successful Employee Training and Development Program

Webinars are the perfect tool for educating your employees on niche but important topics like productivity, workplace diversity, safety, employee engagement, etc.

Want your next company-wide webinar to cover the topic of workplace accessibility? Here’s a presentation you can use for your next webinar:

Webinars for user onboarding and retention

Webinars have been among the most popular marketing  trends among SaaS businesses .

If you’re a digital storefront or Software as a Service (SaaS) company like us, you know how important customer onboarding and retention is for the bottom line of your business.

You may already have onboarding flows in your product, but it’s never a bad idea to explain to your new customers how your product works by inviting them to a user onboarding webinar. Also, utilizing a user onboarding software can help create a seamless user journey.

With your user onboarding webinar, make sure you cover the most important aspects of your products, keep the learning curve as low as possible and invite users to ask questions while you’re presenting.

Saas company Drift takes the cake with their ingenious use of webinars (especially the third one) to onboard new customers:

Once you sign up for Drift, they send you an email with a webinar-style video tutorial on how to get started with Drift. Genius.

Pro Tip: It’s 5x more expensive to acquire new customers than to retain an existing one. Use tools like onboarding emails, push notifications, webinars, etc. to retain your new customers so they stick around, upgrade to your paid plans and spread the word about you.

How to create and host a successful webinar

There are plenty of free, paid as well as ad-supported webinar tools available in the market. And most of these webinar hosting tools come with similar features.

Picking a webinar tool that’s right for you comes down to your business goals, budget as well as what you value in a webinar tool.

Here are some webinar tools to help you get started:

• Zoom (freemium): The most well-known online meeting tool also doubles as a webinar tool. Starts with a free plan and offers paid business plans with robust features.
• WebinarJam (paid): Starts at 499$/year and includes features such as live chat and automated recordings.
• WebinarNinja (paid): Starts at 39$/month for upto 100 attendees. It also comes with a free 14-day trial so you can take them for a test drive.
• SendPulse Webinar Tool : Host webinars, create, market, and sell online courses. Free plan for 10 webinar participants. The paid plan starts at $21 per month.
• ON24 (free trial): Comes with powerful attendee, reporting and marketing features. Integrates with plenty of other tools, but every integration is priced.
• Zoho Meetings (paid): Starts at 15$ for 25 attendees. You can also host up to 250 attendees for just 63$/month.

Want to dig deeper? Our friends at G2 have reviewed every popular webinar tool to help you make the right buying decision for your specific needs.

Create your own webinar in five steps:

Once you’ve spent the time on picking the right webinar hosting tool, now onto better things: creating your first webinar!

Creating your first webinar can be overwhelming but I’ll outline the exact steps you need to follow to make your first webinar a roaring success. Here they are:

1. Identifying the goal of your webinar

Webinars have many uses and by extension, webinars also help you accomplish different goals.

Start by asking yourself, “What’s my goal with this webinar?” Is it:

• Generating more leads for your sales team?
• Educating your students studying from home?
• Selling an idea or concept to potential customers?

Once you’ve identified the goal of your webinar, think about what your key performance indicators ( KPIs ) will be to determine the success of your webinar. 

After determining your goals and KPIs, make sure everything you do: creating your webinar content, promoting it, etc ties back to this goal.

If the goal of your webinar is to teach potential clients motivation 101, your best bet would be a purely educational and non-salesy presentation:

Pro Tip: Above all else, put your audience first. What are their pain points? What kind of content do they care about? If you tailor your webinar to your audience’s needs and pain points, success is imminent.

2. Attend other webinars

The best way to plan, create, and host a webinar successfully is to scope out the competition.

Look at your industry and start researching companies that are successfully using webinars to educate or sell to their audience.

What can you do differently or do better? Can you better interact with your audience? Can you ask better questions? Can you improve the content of your webinar?

Be curious and take notes whenever you can.

Once you attend a few webinars, you’ll have a general understanding of which webinars are hits and which are misses. All that’s left is to emulate webinars that were a roaring success.

To start, check out our webinar on driving business growth with the help of content marketing:

3. Plan and outline your content

In this step, you’ll start putting together your webinar outline and lay down the groundwork i,e. Invite your attendees, plan your event logistics, and decide on a webinar promotion strategy.

Creating an outline for your webinar content is easy if you already have a goal in mind.

For example, if the goal is to educate new users on how to create an infographic using Venngage, here’s what an outline might look like:

• Introduction
• What is an infographic?
• Use cases for an infographic
• How to make an infographic?
• How companies use infographics

A webinar outline can help you stay focused on the topics your audience cares about (based on research) and prevent you from getting side-tracked. 

The best part? You will eventually end up with a webinar presentation like this:

Pro Tip: Like any presentation, you need to rehearse for your webinar. This is even more important if you’re presenting to a large crowd online many of which could be potential customers. First impressions are everything, as they say.

4. Design your webinar presentation slides

Once you’ve identified the contents of your webinar, time to start designing the actual webinar presentation!

To start off, hop onto Venngage and pick a presentation template you like. We’ve got 100s of templates for all occasions and types ranging from professional to quirky:

Starting from a blank presentation is hard. Trust me, I’ve tried. 

So pick a presentation template you like, you can customize it to your heart’s content anyway.

Start playing around with the template, editing various elements like fonts, headers as well as the presentation layout .

If you’re on our business plan, you can use MyBrand Kit to automagically import your brand guidelines (logos, colors, and fonts) into your designs:

Need a helping hand? Bring on your team to edit your presentations and bring your webinar to life! Turn on real-time team collaboration (a business plan feature):

Once you’ve put all the final touches, export or download your presentation:

The real kicker? Venngage’s presentation maker can export your presentation in a .pptx format for importing within Powerpoint. Pretty cool right?

If you’re a fan of keeping it simple, you can present your webinar from right within Venngage using our presenter view feature.

And that’s it — once you’ve made an engaging presentation , prepared your speaking notes, and tested your webinar you’re officially ready to present your webinar to a live audience! 

Pro Tip: Don’t forget to collect feedback from your audience after the webinar! A tool like Paperform can help you survey attendees and improve your future webinars.

5. Marketing (or Promoting) your webinar

You’ve front-loaded the most important work: planning your webinar, setting up webinar tools, goal setting, competitor research, etc.

But unless you promote your virtual event , nobody will know how valuable it will be for them. So the final piece of the puzzle is webinar marketing.

Webinar marketing isn’t complicated, all you have to do is create event posters , social media visuals as well as event timelines informing attendees about the agenda of the event.

Here’s an example of a virtual event poster template you can edit (paid plan only) right now:

If you’re a business that engages in email marketing and has an existing email list, leverage it.

 If not, use email marketing software like Brevo or Hubspot to build your email list and automate your email marketing campaigns.

We promote all our webinars to our customers through our email newsletter and I recommend you do the same. 

Here’s a webinar invitation newsletter template you can send out to your email list:

Promoting your webinars on different social media networks is the lowest hanging fruit you should go after.

Head over to our templates page and you’ll find a huge collection of eye-catching designs for every social network (all sized to the right dimensions).

Need to promote your next non-profit webinar on Instagram? But don’t want to use boring stock images? We’ve got you covered:

Creating, customizing, and sharing promo materials for your next webinar is easy and intuitive with Venngage.

With access to 1000+ professional templates, an ever-growing collection of icons and illustrations (all of which are free), features like Brand Kit and real-time team collaboration :

Looking for a one-stop shop to design event posters , banners , social media graphics , email newsletters , and much more? Sign up for Venngage today!

Now you know the basics of everything from what’s a webinar, how to make a webinar, and the webinar conferencing software you will need to host a webinar. 

If you’re ready to start creating webinars that educate and captivate your audience regardless of industry or profession, make sure you keep the following webinar hosting best practices in mind:

• Pick the right webinar tool. This comes down to your budget, goals as well as features you want in your webinar hosting software.
• Identify your goal. What are you trying to achieve with your webinar? What content does your audience care about? What are their pain points? Clarity on your goals is crucial above anything else.
• Snoop on your competitors. How are your companies leveraging webinars? Take notes and think about what you can do differently or better with your webinars.
• Promote your webinar. You’ve worked days, weeks (or even months) to create an awesome webinar. Let the world know about it! 

This article is also available in Portuguese: O que é um webinar e como ele funciona? [guia para iniciantes]

Did you enjoy this in-depth guide on webinars? What was your favorite tip? What are you struggling with? Drop them in the comments below, and let’s talk about it! 

Check out some of our other popular design and how-to guides:

How to Make an Infographic in 5 Steps (Guide)

How to Write a Business Pro posal [Examples & Templates]

20+ Amazing eBook Templates + Design Tips [Beginner Guide]

Discover popular designs

Infographic maker

Brochure maker

White paper online

Newsletter creator

Flyer maker

Timeline maker

Letterhead maker

Mind map maker

Ebook maker

What is a webinar?

Definition: A webinar is a live event held online with a purpose to teach or inform virtual audience members about a topic.

More specifically, a webinar is a real-time presentation with audio, video, and/or multimedia components. It’s a popular format for information sharing across various industries and fields from B2B marketing sessions to classroom lectures.

In the context of businesses that support employees, customers, and partners across multiple locations and time zones, webinars can connect everyone at one time, in one place. Since they’re virtual, they can efficiently scale to thousands of concurrent attendees, helping organizations reduce travel and venue costs while broadening their opportunities in areas such as sales.

Webinar vs. virtual meeting

Often people wonder what is a webinar, and how is it different from a video conference? While similar to video conferencing , a webinar's purpose is usually instructional or educational in a one-to-many format.

While webinars and video conferences can be highly interactive, video conferencing usually describes regular meetings, discussions, or brainstorms.

Video conferencing is what you might attend with your colleagues multiple times each day, whereas a webinar is a unique event you may have signed up for months before it happens.

How does a webinar work?

There are three main steps any webinar participant will need to complete before they can view the session. The organization hosting the webinar can manage these details within their webinar software:

1. Receiving the webinar invitation

Holding a webinar begins with creating and sending an invitation to the intended audience, typically through email. A webinar solution can enable automated email management, with customizable HTML and text templates for invitations as well as for confirmations, reminders, and follow-ups. Email isn't the only channel to promote a webinar, however. Social media updates and blog posts are also common methods for raising awareness of either an upcoming webinar or the existence of a recorded webinar.

2. Registering for the webinar

Once someone accepts the invitation in their inbox or clicks on a link elsewhere, they're taken to a webinar-specific landing page where they can enter key details like email address and phone number, as well as credit card or PayPal information if the webinar is monetized. This collected participant information is often used to score and track leads. Overall, the webinar landing page is pivotal. It should have a compelling headline and concise copy that communicates the webinar's value, duration, and some background on the webinar presenter(s).

3. Joining the webinar

When it's time for a webinar to begin, attendees click or tap on a link to view the proceedings within a webinar software client. Modern solutions make it easy for attendees to join and participate in webinars from any desktop or mobile device, as long as they have an adequate internet connection.

Ideally, the webinar experience will be seamless on any device. Attendees should be able to hear the presenter's audio clearly, view any live streaming video, see any shared content such as annotated documents or slide decks, and take advantage of features such as polling, live chat, and threaded question-and-answer functionality.

How these three steps are handled is crucial because webinar attendance rates hover in the range of 40% to 50% of those invited. In other words, the design of an email invite or the interface of the webinar software itself can be the difference between someone joining and getting something out of the webinar or not showing up and not benefiting from it.

Guide: Best Practices for Your Webinar

Discover useful tips for hosting great webinars, from preparation to execution to follow-up.

What is a webinar platform?

A webinar platform is the kind of technology that is used to host virtual events. Webex Webinars is built to reach and engage global audiences of any size, and our production services team offers step-by-step guidance from start to finish if that’s something you want or need.

Types of webinar presentations

Webinar formats come in all shapes and sizes. A presenter can choose from many possible types of webinars that are suitable to a wide variety of use cases. Here are a few possibilities:

1. Panel discussions

Moderated conversations between panelists, especially ones with different perspectives on the same issues, are good for sustaining audience interest while also giving them useful information. Plus, they work well with interactive webinar features such as real-time polling to gauge viewers’ reactions.

2. SME interviews

An interview can be useful for a nurture campaign, as the subject matter expert being interviewed can provide deep insights about a particular product, service, or market. Audience polling can help reveal where participants are in their journeys, so that interview questions can be further refined.

3. Multi-presenter presentations

A webinar doesn’t have to be a lecture from one person. Multiple presenters can take turns, sharing unique perspectives along with different types of content. This highly engaging arrangement could take the form of someone explaining the high-level benefits of a product, and then their co-presenter diving into its technical details.

Webinar best practices

An effective webinar presentation goes beyond a static slide deck. To drive a truly interactive experience that increases audience engagement, there are many techniques that can be used.

Keep your webinar audience engaged by having:

• Multiple live streaming video feeds of the presenters and panelists.
• Rich content and screen sharing, including multimedia.
• Live Q&A to track and answer incoming questions from the audience.
• Interactive polling to monitor interest and attention.
• Private or public chatting and messaging with panelists or attendees during the event.

In addition, webinar best practices include the ability to support:

• Thousands of participants in video or audio-only sessions.
• Integrated audio connection options for attendees, including via VoIP, global teleconference, or broadcast.
• One click recording.
• Automated registrant approval and filtering.
• CRM integration.
• Follow-up analysis.
• Secure data encryption.
• Audience participation across any platform or device.

What happens after a webinar ends?

Much of the value of a webinar is in its real-time, interactive nature or – if it’s recorded – in the informative and easy-to-follow structure of its contents. At the same time, it’s useful as part of a long-term nurture and content marketing campaign.

An end-to-end solution such as Webex Webinars makes it easy to analyze attendance statistics, send participants to a post-webinar landing page, and integrate data into CRMs and marketing automation systems. A recording of the webinar session itself can also be promoted across multiple channels to support customers at different points in the sales funnel.

Webinars provide distinctive advantages over in-person events and meetings, thanks to their high versatility, affordable costs, and extensive scalability.

Live and on-demand webinars from Webex.

Watch recent Webex webinars on topics ranging from Customer Experience to the future of Hybrid Work.

More commonly asked questions

Does a webinar have to be live.

While many webinars begin as a live event and are held only once, they can also be recorded for later viewing and distribution.

For example, a company could link to a webinar recording’s registration page in its blog posts, email campaigns, and social media updates as part of a concerted content marketing initiative. In this way, webinars are more than just a valuable source of information for attendees – they’re also a forum in which organizations can reliably reach and convert customers and generate revenue. Many companies monetize webinars at registration.

Numerous possibilities exist within the webinar format. They range from an organization using a recorded session to build its email list after a product launch to simply holding a one-time event such as an internal all-hands meeting. Whether live or recorded, webinars are helpful for multiple parts of the sales funnel as they can effectively sustain audience attention.

Does your face show if you are watching a webinar?

If you are an audience member, in most cases your face will automatically be set to not show—and you will most likely be muted as well. But it doesn’t hurt to double-check at the start of the presentation. Many webinar formats will utilize live question submission to allow audience members to participate in place of live video. On the other hand, presenter videos will be turned on and, in some cases, like with Webex Webinars, may overlay deck slides or presentations if desired.

What are hybrid webinars?

Hybrid work is becoming the new norm for many businesses across the world, so it makes sense that events will also straddle both in-person and virtual settings. Webex’s integration with Socio allows for hybrid events to cater to both kinds of audiences in a seamless and sophisticated way.

What do you need to watch and conduct a webinar?

You can easily watch a webinar on your computer or smartphone. If you are looking to host a webinar, you don’t need much else, but you could equip yourself with a noise-canceling headset or an advanced webcam so that you present at your best.

• Webex Suite
• Video Messaging
• Whiteboarding
• Cloud Contact Center
• Room Devices
• Desk Devices
• Digital Whiteboards
• Room Accessories
• Hybrid Work
• Remote Work
• Interoperability
• Return to the office
• Frontline Workers
• Sustainability
• Help Center
• Webex Community
• Product Essentials
• Watch Webinars
• Accessibility
• Webex Customer Advocacy Program
• Contact Support
• Contact Sales
• Webex Merch Store

© Cisco and/or its affiliates. All Rights Reserved.

• Terms & Conditions
• Privacy Statement

Unlock the power of AI! Join our live talk show for expert tips and must-know strategies.

Components for best webinar experience, capabilities, teams & industries.

Broaden Market Impact with Immersive Events

Strengthen Bonds, Boost Engagement

Grow your business with tailored events

Adapt your GTM to evolving buyer behaviors with Event-led Growth. Centralize your strategy around events to foster genuine connections and drive growth.

Discover how top brands create engaging, branded events. Browse our select examples and spark ideas for your next standout event.

Discover how Airmeet’s tailored solutions can accelerate your business growth. Get a quick walkthrough and learn how to leverage event-led growth for success.

Cracking the Webinar Code:

Guide to hosting and creating incredible webinars in 2023.

(15 min read)

Webinars have changed a lot over the years, both in intent and presentation. And they are being used for a wide range of purposes, from training to marketing. Webinars are a powerful tool for brands — it’s a way to instantly connect with your customers — and meet them at the journey stage they’re at.

This guide will give you everything you need to plan and execute your best webinars yet. We’ll cover:

What is a webinar?

How do webinars work.

• Webinar use cases
• Types of webinars
• The most successful webinar formats
• How to make webinars work in 2023
• Webinar trends
• Webinar examples
• How to create and host a webinar, step by step
• Best webinar tips
• Compelling webinar ideas
• Top webinar platforms

Now that you know what’s in store, let’s get started! 

Webinars (web seminars) are easily accessible live, interactive events that can be used as a workshop, presentations, lectures or Q&A, or demonstrations. The goal is to build a relationship through sharing knowledge and answering any questions your audience may have.

In short, webinars work by offering an engaging platform for speakers to deliver their message to a wide audience online. Attendees can interact with the presenter by submitting questions, participating in polls, and using other interactive tools, making webinars a collaborative and dynamic event – making them an effective tool to reach a target audience, spread your message, and build fruitful relationships with your audience. 

As the demand for engagement is increasing, attendees are seeking webinars to be more interactive, entertaining, and high in value. For example, attendees may seek opportunities to connect with other attendees in more than one way and expect the content to be actionable, replete with high-value knowledge that helps them solve their problems.

What are the different use cases for a webinar?

Webinars are used for engagement, online training, community building, and business growth. It’s a way to nurture leads with targeted content that meets them where they’re at in the funnel. Some of the top use cases include:

Lead generation

Webinars let brands demonstrate their expertise while interacting with attendees. By sharing content that’s valuable and shows that you’re a thought leader, you are able to generate leads. But it’s important that you’re offering content that meets the customers’ needs. To do that, make sure that you:

• Have your ideal audience in mind. Use personas to understand that audience better.
• Create content that speaks to the audience/potential customers and shows that you understand their pain points.
• Give evidence of your unique solution.
• Follow up post-webinar to continue to nurture your leads.

Brand building

Build brand awareness and gain advocates using webinars. Leverage webinars for brand building by:

• Being authentic.
• Creating content using your mission, values, and brand voice.
• Branding with your visuals and graphics.
• Choosing webinar topics that resonate with customers and attendees. 
• Encouraging attendees to spread the word and giving them ideas of how they can.

Product demos

Make your webinar product demo more interesting with storytelling. This approach feels more personalized, especially if it reflects the pain points or needs of your audience. More importantly, it’s effective. Research suggests that people retain nearly 70% of a message when wrapped in a story compared to 5 to 10% of the facts in a typical sales pitch.

Give your product demo a narrative by:

• Delivering a simple and clear message.
• Talking about real circumstances and experiences.
• Having a clear story arc (beginning, middle, and end).
• Including emotion and adding an element of surprise.
• Making your customer feel like the main character.

Virtual workshops and training

Webinars are an excellent format for virtual training and virtual workshops. It also gives you the power to attract more people from across the globe — and even give others a way to view the content even if they can’t attend the live webinar. Successful webinar training and workshops have well-planned content designed to meet the audience’s needs and help them gain new knowledge and skills.

Customer onboarding, engagement, and retention

Use webinars to onboard, engage, and retain customers. You might do this by:

• Walking them through how to use or maintain your product.
• Hosting a troubleshooting Q&A.
• Presenting use cases and inspiring ways to use your product.

Webinars for HR

Webinars can be used for several HR purposes. For example, recruiting, hiring, workshops, or training about compliance topics.

What are three different types of webinars?

There are several ways to host a webinar. Three common types include:

Automated webinars are scheduled pre-recorded webinars. The webinar is created beforehand, and you’ll promote its day and time. It’s simulated to act like a live event but without the host.

A pre-scheduled event with a host and attendees. The content can be more flexible since you’re able to pivot topics during a live webinar.

On-demand webinars are pre-recorded and people are able to play them anytime with the click of a button.

What are the most successful webinar formats?

Webinars come in a variety of formats. The key is understanding your audience and choosing a format that engages them. It’s also about incorporating opportunities to connect and build trust in your brand. Some of the most successful webinar formats are:

Presentation

This format covers a broad spectrum of webinar ideas. For example, a presentation might be sharing thought leadership ideas or talking about industry trends. In essence, pick a specific, audience-centric webinar topic and build content around it. You want to inform, persuade, motivate, and inspire people.

Interview or talk-show style

Choose a dynamic expert in your industry to interview. Think of it as talk-show style. Your audience is there to be engaged by your interaction with the expert. Have a poignant set of questions, and allow the audience to chat, comment, react, or take polls throughout.  The interview topics should feel meaningful and authentic.

Panel discussion

A panel discussion can be a lively, informative event when done right. Your audience and what they want should come first. From there, create a group of excellent panelists who will inform without sounding like a sales pitch. The host can moderate, but your panelists should have the experience to navigate a discussion and make clear and valid points.

Q&A session

Give attendees the chance to find out everything they want to know about your brand and products. A Q&A webinar is wonderfully customer-centric and allows you to showcase your expertise. You can easily engage the audience, go more in-depth and elaborate on certain topics, and let you gather feedback on the spot.

Workshop or training

Think of a virtual workshop as a way to master a topic or skill remotely. When done as a webinar workshop, you’ll choose a skill based on your audience’s challenges or needs, and provide them with the solution. You can share files, offer chat, and other ways to interact or ask questions.

Product demonstration

Create your demo content with the intent to offer highly actionable insights. Your audience should walk away knowing what they can do with your product and be excited to try it. A compelling story makes product demos more engaging. And ensure it’s about the audience — not the sales pitch!

Customers love proof. And they want to hear how something was successful as a solution. Case studies are designed to do both of these things. During a case study webinar, provide strong stats and proof of ROI, along with the real-life scenario in which your product succeeded in.

Are webinars working in 2023? Yes - but there’s a catch!

Webinars are increasingly becoming a part of the marketing and retention strategy of brands. According to CMI (Content Marketing Institute), 61% of B2B businesses use webinars and webcasts as content marketing tactics, and over 70% of businesses believe it’s the best way to generate high-quality leads.

However, there’s a catch: webinars need to be done in a modern, fresh, and interactive way. Historically, webinars were one-way, tedious PowerPoint presentations. The new way is audience-centric, with more meaningful and engaging content.

Old way vs. new way

Webinar Trends: How to do a webinar the right way in 2023

Brands that want to host successful webinars need to up their game for their future webinars. The competition is producing personalized, attention-grabbing events that target audiences where they’re at in the buyers’ journey. To elevate your online event, and host an effective webinar, utilize the following webinar trends:

Adopt the Attendee First Mindset

To do a webinar that brings results, your attendees’ goals and motivations should be front and center in your strategies. People know the value of their time and are more careful about how they invest it. Your webinar must be something that provides an excellent return on that investment. 

Here’s how to get into your target audience’s mind:

Ask the what, why, and how: Put yourself in the attendees’ shoes by asking: 

• What will they get out of the event?
• Why will they sit (and stay) in this virtual room? 
• How can we make it enticing and valuable to spend time with us — especially if they have to ask for time off or give up something else that’s important to them?

Move hearts before moving your product

Attendees are looking for better experiences that resonate with them on a deeper level. They’re not just there for information, they want to be inspired. This often happens through connection, being able to relate or empathize, and authenticity. It’s about stirring emotions.

Use the HAAAM framework to help you move hearts. The HAAAM framework describes the 5 emotions attendees want to feel:

• Adventurous
• Accepted 

To do effective webinars, your content should produce these feelings. Virtual event attendees will be drawn to your live event by seeing a list of content that reflects how they feel. For example, instead of describing your content as “see how our product works,” use a story. Something like, “see how Mary’s life changed, and how yours can too.”

You need to promise potential customers more than what they could read in a book or learn in a course.

Use webinars across your customer journey

Webinars can be used at any point in a customer’s journey: From thought leadership and strategy discussions to weekly live demos, webinars are dynamic. Using them can help move prospects down the funnel from the first touchpoint in a customer’s journey to the purchase — and beyond.

Webinars have the potential to generate high-quality leads. They remain a great tool to identify sales-ready leads. When someone registers for your webinar, it provides a pathway to reach out and collect data that a sales team can use to create personalized outreach down the line.

Host more interactive webinars

People don’t want to be passive observers anymore; they want to participate and be actively involved. They’re seeking live interactions with real people and industry experts. They want a chance to feel heard and seen — and get answers to their most pressing questions from an industry leader.

Make your webinar hyper-targeted

Aligning the webinar experience, format, and content with your audience brings better results. You can tailor the experience according to the stage of the customer journey, demographic, industry, location, and even budget. 

Small, hyper-targeted webinars can also keep the momentum going after the main event. And drive people further down the funnel.

A step-by-step look at how to create and host a webinar

With the right strategies and tools, your next webinar will be a standout event that has the potential to connect you with high-quality leads. Here’s a step-by-step look at how to create and host your next webinar:

Map out your webinar goals and outcomes

It’s difficult to measure the success of your webinar — or even create it — without a clear goal and outcome in mind. What is your intent with this webinar? How do you want to serve your audience? How will you do it? And what do you hope comes from engaging with your targeted audience? 

Define your KPIs, and determine what topic, webinar format, and platform will help you reach your goals.

Fine-tune your topic to your audience

Use customer personas, or create some, to get to know your audience better. It should let you target where they’re at in the buyer’s journey and what type of webinar content works best for them. 

While creating a webinar plan, ask questions like: What are their pain points? What value are they looking for? How much time do they have? What incentives will entice them to attend your webinar? 

The more information you have, the more fine-tuned your webinar will be.

Pick a webinar format that’s best for you and your audience

Approach your webinar format from two sides: What works best for your content and your audience? Decide what features you’ll need, what supports off-site experts, how much you want your audience to interact, and how. 

By better understanding the formats, you’ll naturally gravitate to the one that best fits your webinar.

Select a webinar technology

Your webinar platform should fit within your budget while providing the features you need. Look at how much support you’ll get, as well as the maximum number of webinar attendees. If possible, take a webinar software for a test drive to see if it’s user-friendly.

Finalize a time and date

What’s an optimal date and time for attendees, your experts/host, and your team? Another thing to consider is if the topic is pertinent to your timing. For example, if you’re hosting a webinar about maximizing sales on Black Friday, are you doing it in a time frame that fits?

Reach out to speakers and partners

Get any speakers or partners on board at least 3-6 weeks before the event. This optimizes promotion efforts and lets you fine-tune your content even further.

Build an audience for your webinar with a promotion

Promote your webinar through several channels, but primarily the ones that fit your audience. You may:

• Use your brand partners to help you with your webinar promotion strategy on their social channels.
• Promote through social channels.
• Create a webinar event page or a webinar landing page on your site if you host them regularly.
• Write a blog post about your webinar.
• Use emails and SMS marketing.

Prepare your content and platform

On the day of your webinar, make sure your platform and content are set to go. If you have any files to share, ensure that they’re on hand. Double-check the link and test the technology you’ll be using.

Have fun, be authentic, connect, and make sure to follow up with attendees and guest experts post-event.

7 Webinar tips to create and deliver better webinar presentations

There are several clear do’s and don’ts in the webinar world. Here are seven things you should (or shouldn’t) do to deliver a better webinar presentation.

DON’T talk at people, converse

Have you ever ended up in a one-sided conversation where it’s all about the other person? It’s not fun or engaging. As a brand, you have the opportunity to interact with webinar attendees. So talk with them, not at them!

DO create a killer webinar deck

Use GIFs, prompts, and other appealing visuals to enthrall and keep the audience interested. Be deliberate in your visuals, and design them for optimal impact.

DO show energy and passion

A host that clearly loves talking with their audience is much better at capturing their attention. If your presentation is dull and bland, it’s unlikely to keep people entertained and invested in what you have to say.

DON’T forget to test your equipment and files beforehand.

Attendees come with certain expectations, and your content needs to solve their problems effectively.

DO include anecdotes and personal stories

People want to relate directly to your content, and stories and personal anecdotes are a great way to help them do that. By sharing real-life experiences, you’re saying, “Hey, we’ve been there. We understand your pain.”

DON’T be late

The worst thing you can do is keep someone waiting. They’ve set aside valuable time so honor that by being there when you say you will.

Webinar ideas to create fun and engaging moments

Fun serves a variety of purposes. It elevates your mood, makes you more receptive, and helps connect you with others: In other words, it’s engaging. If your webinar lacks pizzazz or entertainment of any kind, it loses memorability. 

Here are some ways to bring a bit of flair into your webinar and keep attendees engaged throughout.

Kick-off with icebreakers

Get to know your audience and let them get to know you. You can:

• Ask where in the world they are.
• Find out people’s first jobs.

Gamify your webinar 

Get the competitive juices flowing with some social media challenges or trivia and quizzes. You can even offer prizes to make it even more exciting. Other gamification options are webinar contests and using leaderboards to keep score. 

The more creative you are, the better. But make sure the fun and games fit the audience. 

Create can’t-miss live moments

Anything that’s unique and of high value will be a can’t-miss moment. This can include things like:

• Critique sessions by experts
• Competitions and gamified challenges

Have some interactive activities during your webinar

Interactive activities can help the audience network and allow you to get to know them better. Try:

• A scavenger hunt
• A round of Guess Who?
• Live polling
• Idea brainstorming sessions in breakouts or chats

Be present in the chat and engage

Chat is a great place to let people know you’re there and want to hear from them. Respond to queries, comment, and ask questions. Offer insightful thoughts when it adds to the conversation.

Provide entertainment

Entertainment can give attendees a breather or be a great way to start your webinar. It doesn’t have to be long, but should be something your audience will appreciate. Consider:

• A short standup comedy session
• One or two songs from a musical act

Allow the audience to find and build meaningful connections

Networking adds value, especially in B2B communities. To enhance the value of your webinar, promote networking sessions.

• Plan breakouts rooms and speed networking sessions
• Keep the lounge open pre- and post-event
• Enable LinkedIn profile sharing
• Invite notable industry experts
• Virtual photo booths
• Social walls
• Content hubs

5 Webinar examples to learn from

Sometimes, the best way to get webinar ideas and form strategies is through successful real-world examples. Here are 5 examples that set the bar high for effective webinars:

• HotJar UX Ecommerce Lightning Talks – HotJar created a series of lightning-fast talks, creating webinars that packed a ton of actionable information into brief talks with experts. Each expert had a short amount of time, to sum up, a topic/solution in a way that distilled the information down to the most valuable content. The result was potent insights that attendees could use to overcome pain points. And it didn’t eat up a lot of time to get the information.
• Drift in Action Monthly Live Demos – Drift targets both people who want to learn more about how the product works and help those who have it use it better with their Drift in Action monthly webinars. They offer insights about Drift, who it’s for, and how businesses can leverage their platform for optimal ROI. This type of valuable content presented by a subject matter expert boosts both sales and retention. 
• G2 Product Town Hall – The G2 Product Town Hall gave attendees the opportunity to “learn about G2’s latest products, roadmaps, launches, and features.” It also included a live Q&A that gave the audience access to their product and marketing teams to find out information that was important to them.
• Airmeet Power Hour – Airmeet’s Power Hour is all about packing 60 minutes with user experiences (customers tell their success stories), expert tips, and industry insights. The goal is for webinar attendees to walk away with the tools to boost the power of their events. Airmeet uses its own features to optimize networking opportunities, making the webinar even more valuable for the audience.
• Universum World’s Most Attractive Employer – Universum hosts numerous webinars throughout the year. They cover employer branding and best practices. One of the highest attended was “The World’s Most Attractive Employer.” It featured results from in-depth surveys and gave valuable insights into talent preferences and market evolutions.

What to do after hosting a webinar?

What you do after a webinar can be just as impactful as the webinar itself. It should start with a thank you to anyone who had a hand in your successful online event. Send an email or thank you card via mail, but also give them a shoutout online.

Follow up with your attendees as well. Ask them to post their experience or participate in a survey. Send out follow-up emails with an overview and any resources they may like. Find out what kind of webinar they’d attend in the future and what topics they want more of. Keep the engagement going, especially if it’s well-received.

Analyze success

Another action to take after hosting webinars is to measure and analyze the success of your event through a variety of KPIs. For example,

• How many people signed up and how many attended?
• How active was the chat?
• How many people contributed to the conversation?
• How many people joined networking groups? 
• How many people posted social feedback?
• What did the polls and surveys say?
• Did you meet your goals and objectives?

If you find challenges, make sure to find ways to address them moving forward.

Best Webinar platforms for 2023 (Free and Paid) 

Your webinar platform adds or detracts from your success. Choose one that best fits your needs, budget, and audience and helps you avoid any technical difficulties. Here are five of the best webinar platforms for 2023.

Loaded with features, Airmeet offers it all. Use powerful tools that let you gamify, create networking opportunities, and brand and customize your webinar experience. Track important data while providing a memorable experience. With Airmeet, it’s easy to create webinars that go beyond traditional. You’ll find thoughtful elements designed to truly make your webinar audience-centric and successful. 

#2 GoToWebinar

GoToWebinar is a great webinar tool that offers several features, like a custom registration page, event management, webinar templates, video sharing, surveys, audience management, and more. It works both on mobile devices and a computer.

Demio works to create a streamlined webinar experience that lets you captivate attendees, track engagement, and gather data insights. You’ll also have features to provide resources and let your audience interact during chats and Q&As.

No, Zoom isn’t simply meeting software. It is a webinar hosting platform too. Zoom promotes itself as simple, secure, and reliable and allows you to connect a large number of people on multiple device types. Additional features include webinar branding, recordings, and seamless integrations.

Webex offers a scalable webinar platform that lets brands easily direct the show. Add interaction, branding, and integrations, and make your webinar accessible. With Webex, you can host up to 100,000 attendees with real-time translations in 100+ languages.

Most of the top webinar platforms give you the power to host unforgettable webinars. The key is to find a user-friendly fit that offers you the level of support you need. Explore each platform and find the one that gives you the edge. And while free online webinars are great, it’s also worthwhile to invest in platforms that take you from good to great.

Host an unforgettable webinar with Airmeet for free 

Airmeet wants to show you how we’re different. For free. Sign up and use our platform to create and host a dynamic webinar with up to 500 attendees. You’ll be able to try our fun and engaging features and gain deep insights and data on every attendee. Go ahead…try Airmeet . You have nothing to lose!

What’s the purpose of a webinar?

A webinar is a marketing tool that lets brands connect more quickly with customers at any point in the funnel. Webinars are known for generating high-quality leads when done well.

What’s in a webinar?

Webinars are presentations that cover a variety of topics and purposes using a multitude of formats. From panel discussions and product demos to Q&As, use webinars to create rich content that solves customer challenges and offers value.

Make your webinars 10X better with just 10 simple questions

Get in touch

Join our community, refer and earn, security & compliance, responsible disclosure, event experience cloud, integrations, accessibility, vcs & accelerators, communities, airmeet managed events, events for marketers, use cases by industry, association, event agency, premium webinars, conferences, hybrid events, learning & development, leadership conferences, workshops & trainings, sales kickoff, product launches, employer branding, webinar resources, thought leadership, l&d / townhall / internal use case, success stories, event tooltkit, airmeet vs zoom, airmeet vs gotowebinar, virtual events vocabulary (a to z), [email protected], 24×7 support lounge, knowledge base, event checklist, mobile apps, read reviews, security & compliance, what’s new, it & saas, vcs & accelerators, startup program, cookie policy, annual report 2023-2024, © 2024 airmeet inc. or its affiliates, all rights reserved., connect with us on.

Incredible Companies Use Airmeet

Most loved Virtual Events Platform

TEAMS & INDUSTRIES

Ready to get started?

What is a webinar your definitive guide to how webinars work.

• 24 Nov 2022

Ah, webinars. Almost all of us can say we’ve attended at least one (or a hundred) of them. But if you’ve found your way to this article, you’re probably thinking about flipping the switch on webinars and hosting one of your own.

Great choice.

Webinars are a tried-and-true tactic that drives results for many companies. If you do it right, a webinar can help you connect with your current and potential customers in a way that adds real value to their lives.

This comprehensive guide shows you everything you need to know about designing, promoting, and hosting webinars of your own. You’ll learn:

• What a webinar is.
• When you should use them.
• How to design, promote, and host webinars.
• The best webinar software.

But don’t forget: a good webinar is a well-attended one. When it comes time to promote your webinars, use  Biteable  to create a promo video in minutes. Brandable video templates, ready-made scenes, and smart editing tools make the whole process a breeze.

Create videos that drive action

Activate your audience with impactful, on-brand videos. Create them simply and collaboratively with Biteable.

What is a webinar?

As we already mentioned, a webinar is a style of  video conference  employed often by businesses, trainers, and entrepreneurs in all industries. Webinars are used to teach, train, or demonstrate a concept.

Webinars are sometimes pre-recorded, but more often they are live and interactive, with time built in for Q&A, discussion, polls, and other features.

People use webinars to reach a larger audience in scattered locations or when meeting in person isn’t convenient or feasible. Many businesses and entrepreneurs use webinars as a way to engage with potential customers.

A webinar example

Here at Biteable, we know the value of a good webinar. To give you an example of a webinar in action, here’s a recorded video of our live talk on making on-brand marketing videos.

How do webinars work?

Just like an in-person workshop or seminar, a webinar will usually consist of one host or a panel of participants presenting live for 30-60 minutes.

Attendees watch a live webinar from their computer screen. Then can often interact via chat and messaging, though some webinar hosts also allow them to use their microphones to speak during the Q&A portion.

The  average webinar  has around 100 attendees (with 260 registering and 40-50% actually attending). That said, it’s not unheard of for webinars to have 500 or more viewers in attendance.

Webinars are generally free, but may be paid as well. The value in free webinars tends to be lead generation, though they may also be used for onboarding or training purposes.

When should I use a webinar for my business?

Many companies use webinars as a way to connect live with new customers, demonstrate expertise and build brand authority, or to promote a launch. Webinars can also be aimed at existing customers for training or onboarding, as an extra value add, or to upsell.

Generally webinars work best for B2B or  SaaS  companies, bloggers, and small business owners who want to share their expertise.

For e-commerce companies, other marketing tactics tend to work better, though B2C companies who offer bigger-ticket items or services may also benefit from the webinar format.

6 tips for hosting effective webinars

Though actual attendance may be low, a well-promoted webinar may drive hundreds (or even thousands) of leads. Paid webinars can also be a source of revenue for bloggers and thought leaders who have a niche audience eager to learn from them. No matter who your audience, here are some general tips to keep in mind for an effective webinar:

1. Schedule smart

Consider your audience’s schedule — a B2B audience is  very unlikely  to attend a webinar on a weekend, but Wednesdays and Thursdays tend to be good days. If you have an audience across multiple time zones, aim to land somewhere in the middle.

In the U.S., 11am and 2pm local time tend to work well. Don’t get too hung up on scheduling though — many of your viewers will likely opt to watch a replay over attending live anyway!

2. Prepare well

With a webinar, it’s important to be well-prepared so you’re not stumbling over your words or leaving out key points, but you also don’t want to be blandly reading from a script.

Instead, you should map out a detailed outline of the information you want to cover, with plenty of time factored in for questions and audience interaction. You should also always do at least one dry run — preferably in the software that you’ll use.

If you’ve never used your webinar software, make sure to take time to get familiar with all the tools so there are no surprises on the day.

3. Know what you want to achieve

Are you hoping to build your email list? Provide well-qualified leads to your sales department? Onboard new customers? Market your product?

Generate revenue with paid registrations? The structure of your session, the content you cover, and your promotion strategy will vary depending on your goals, so be clear from the start about what you want to achieve and you’ll save a lot of time.

4. Leave time for questions

81% of marketers use Q&A  as a way to engage webinar audiences. Be sure to pause for questions, and/or leave time at the end. Make audience interaction part of your session too, by incorporating real-time polls, chat, and surveys.

5. Surprise the audience

People love surprises! Teasing a surprise in your promotions is a great way to drive interest and registrations. Try inviting a special surprise guest, providing an exclusive download, like an eBook or worksheet, or offering a limited-time discount for attendees.

6. Have one big takeaway

Be sure to clarify exactly what you want audiences to walk away with. Depending on your goals, that might mean sharing a handout or worksheet, clarifying next steps, or ending with a specific call to action.

How to promote webinars

How you promote can make or break your webinar’s success. The key here is to promote early and often. Keep in mind that about 15% of registrations will occur well before the big day — around 3-4 weeks ahead of time.

That said, some 33% of people who register will wait until the day of the event, so make sure you continue sending reminders right up until it starts.

Even if you do everything right when it comes to promotion, expect that only one quarter to one third of people who register will actually attend. That’s OK. Just by registering, they’ve identified themself as a lead and opted into your email list. Reach out to them with special offers or send a link to the webinar recording after the fact.

Here are the top marketing channels for promoting your webinar:

The  majority of marketers  cite email as their top promotion channel, so make sure you’re sending invitations to your existing email list. In the weeks leading up to your event, you can re-send emails to any recipients who didn’t open last time.

If you don’t have an email list, that’s OK too — webinar registration is a fantastic way to grow your email list and generate warm leads.

Social channels

Start promoting your webinar on your social channels several weeks ahead of time. Share sneak peeks of what attendees will learn in the session and invite your followers to submit questions ahead of time. If you’re holding a paid webinar, consider offering a special discount for your social media followers.

Your website​

You should definitely include information about your webinar and registration links on your website. Many webinars are aimed at either onboarding new customers or marketing and demand generation. For both objectives, your website is an ideal place to get the word out.

Pop-up or banner calls to action, blog posts, videos, and dedicated landing pages can all help you drive interest and registrations.

Whether embedded on your website or landing page,  embedded in an email blast , or shared on YouTube and  social media , video can greatly improve your click-through and engagement rates, ultimately driving registrations for your webinar.

Use  Biteable  to make a beautiful, affordable webinar promo video in minutes. Our video templates make it simple to get started with just a few clicks:

Best webinar software

While sharing unique and valuable content is hugely important for a successful webinar, perhaps the most important decision you’ll make is what  webinar software  to use.

There’s nothing worse for a webinar host than dealing with embarrassing technical problems that prevent you from delivering the information your audience has made time to hear (or even worse, paid for).

Luckily, there are some great  webinar software options  at every price point. As you’ll see below, choosing the right one comes down to your budget, the number of attendees you expect, and the features you need.

Free: YouTube Live or Facebook Live

While not the platforms you usually think of when you think ‘webinar,’ we’d be remiss not to include  Facebook Live  and/or  YouTube Live . Both offer live streaming features that can be used to host a webinar, provided your feature needs are simple and a more informal session is what you’re after. Let’s look at some pros and cons to hosting your webinar on social media:

• Browser-based, no additional software needed
• No limit on audience size
• Long duration limit (240 minutes on Facebook, 36 hours on YouTube)
• Potentially massive audience
• No barriers to participation like registration or downloading an extension
• Live chat functions can be difficult to manage — you’ll likely need someone else to help field questions
• Audience interaction is limited — no polls, surveys, etc.
• No registration pages means fewer lead development opportunities
• Less polished and professional appearance than a custom, branded webinar room
• No webinar-specific features like join by phone, Q&A tools, automated email, or CRM integration

While Facebook can be used for webinars, in terms of features, YouTube’s  video-specific features  make it a more powerful tool if you must choose just one, though it’s also possible to stream simultaneously on both.

The other option is to  choose webinar software with Facebook and YouTube integrations, which offers the best of both worlds — all the tools you need, combined with the large potential reach of social media.

Low-cost: Zoom Webinars

This popular conference calling software has a number of features that can be used for  webinars  too, but there may be some drawbacks depending on your needs:

• Free for up to 100 participants (however, free calls are limited to 40 minutes)
• An affordable $14.99/month plan removes the call duration limit and gets you some other helpful features, like reporting and a custom meeting ID.
• All plans include traditional webinar features like whiteboarding, messaging and chat, raise hand, and more.
• Participants don’t need a Zoom account to join meetings or webinars.
• Integrations with Facebook Live and YouTube Live allow you to stream simultaneously to both platforms.
• Zoom allows you to have multiple active participants without extra cost — ideal for panel discussions or webinars with multiple hosts.
• Duration limit on free calls.
• The  webinar-specific Zoom plan  increases the price to $79/month, which puts the cost closer to more expensive competitors.
• No built-in monetization, but an integration with Zapier allows you to charge a registration fee via PayPal for your Zoom webinars.

Mid-range: BigMarker

With strong user reviews and an affordable base price,  BigMarker  has some compelling features built specifically with webinars in mind.

• Many webinar format options, including live, simulated live, on-demand, recurring, and automated
• Audience interaction tools including chat, polls, Q&A, and handouts
• Built-in marketing features like email invitations, registration pages, customized landing pages, and custom branding
• Integration with CRM and email platforms like HubSpot, Salesforce, and MailChimp
• Built-in monetization allows you to sell tickets for your webinar
• The $49/month Plus plan (billed annually) gets you unlimited webinars for up to 100 attendees with two hosts
• No downloads required
• May be less reliable — some user reviews reported technical issues with audio and video
• Lacking some advanced webinar features like breakout rooms or practice sessions
• Top-tier plan allows 1000 attendees — if you need more than that, you may need to go with a competitor

High-cost: GoToWebinar

Created by the same company as the popular GoToMeeting conference call platform,  GoToWebinar  offers some top-of-the-line features for webinar hosts. However, those features do come at a higher cost.

• Robust audience interaction features, including polls and QAs, handouts, whiteboarding, and more
• Custom registration pages and branding, automated emails, and reporting and analytics
• CRM and email integration for lead management
• Simulated live webinars for pre-recorded sessions that feel like live ones
• Many advanced features, including mobile webinar management, practice sessions, and more
• Join by phone or computer
• Free, 7-day trial
• It’s expensive — the lowest pricing tier is $89/month (billed annually) for just 100 participants
• Users must download software in order to join the webinar — this can be a barrier to attendance if they have trouble downloading or just don’t want to
• The platform’s user interface has a dated appearance compared to some competitors with a more streamlined look

Further options

The webinar and  web conferencing  space is a crowded field, and we’ve just scratched the surface. Depending on your needs, other options you may want to investigate include Cisco’s  WebEx on the higher-end enterprise side, and WebinarNinja ,  WebinarJam  or  LiveWebinar , some other mid-range favorites of bloggers, startups, and small businesses.

After your event is over, don’t let your webinar go to waste! Share the recording on the same channels you used to promote it, including email, social media, your website, and recaps on your blog.

You can also  repurpose the webinar  content into other formats: email courses, ebooks, training and course materials, or videos.

Remember, many B2B consumers will opt to watch a replay over a live webinar. To get the full value of your webinar, be sure to send the recording to all your registrants, not just those who attended.

After the webinar

Webinar faqs.

You’ve got questions, we’ve got answers. Here are the most frequently-asked-questions about webinars.

A webinar can be live or pre-recorded. Most (but not all) webinars start as a live event. The hosts often make a recording of the webinar available for people who couldn’t attend the live event. It’s a good idea to lightly edit your webinar recording before releasing it (add an intro scene, cut out dead space, etc.).

Zoom is a webinar software platform. More precisely, Zoom is a video conference platform that can be used for live video meetings of all types, including webinars. Zoom has a specific “Zoom webinars” plan. This plan allows hosting up to 500 attendees and includes other features ideal for webinars.

A webinar is a  type  of video meeting, while Zoom is a platform for  hosting  video meetings of all kinds. When you meet on Zoom, it might be for a webinar, but it can also be for a regular video meeting. Webinars are usually less interactive than video meetings, and they almost always include a learning component.

To make your webinar engaging and effective, the most important thing is to speak as though you were in front of a live audience. Don’t read from a script, and make sure to give plenty of “eye contact” to the camera. Also include interactive elements like polls, breakout rooms, and Q&A so people stay engaged.

Here are some ideas for making your webinar interactive:

• Enable chat at the beginning for attendee intros.
• Create breakout rooms.
• Take a poll(s) during the webinar.
• Let attendees submit questions ahead of time.
• Let people raise their hands or ask questions in chat (with the help of a moderator).
• Draw for a raffle prize.

Make your webinar promo video with Biteable

Make your webinar promo video (or any other video for that matter) with Biteable, the world’s simplest online video making software.

Biteable has hundreds of brandable video templates and scenes, plus over 1.8 million stock clips, images, and one-of-a-kind animations to make your video a resounding success. Intuitive editing and a collaborative platform make creating a video as simple as creating a PowerPoint (but a whole lot more effective).

Automatically fetch your brand colors from your website and apply them to your entire video with a single click. Record video clips, add a voice over, or include a screen recording without ever leaving the app. Share your video with a single, trackable link on all your platforms and wait for the magic to happen.

Make stunning videos with ease.

Take the struggle out of team communication.

Try Biteable now.

• No credit card required
• No complicated design decisions
• No experience necessary

Webinar Presentation Full Guide | Step-by-Step & Top Tips

Do you want to create a webinar presentation that engages your audience and bolsters the strength of your brand? An engaging presentation can be key to hosting a successful webinar!

Research shows that a whopping 57% of marketers run up to 50 webinars every year, with communication webinars proving to deliver a whopping 67.05% conversion rate. Learning how to produce a good webinar presentation can help boost your webinars and make them more successful.

But where should you begin when it comes to creating effective online presentations? 

Riverside has the answers you're searching for! This is our easy step-by-step guide, along with our top webinar tips.

What is a webinar presentation?

A webinar is an online event or seminar that allows a remote audience to meet in a shared virtual environment. Typically, webinars serve an educational purpose, giving participants a chance to learn more about a specific subject matter or skill. This is where presentations on webinars are useful.

Webinar presentations bring a visual element that helps you communicate complex ideas. Presentations are usually in the form of slides, but you can also use video and other visual media. They add value to your webinar and enhance audience engagement . 

For example, you can check out Riverside’s webinar on AI for podcasting, which cover key points effectively yet succinctly. 

Why should you use presentations in your webinars?

Not all webinars include presentations, but they should. Here’s why: 

• Add more value to your webinar: Incorporating presentation materials can help you add value and clarity to your webinar content, making it more impactful and memorable for your audience.
• Cater to your audience better: Using a slide deck can help you sum up key information and cater well to all kinds of learners. 
• Emphasize main points: It can also help you draw extra focus to pain points and solutions, as well as including interactive features and a clear call to action.
• Puts the focus on what’s important: If you're prone to stage fright, a presentation can help you take yourself out of the spotlight and stay on track with what you want to communicate. You'll be able to prepare documents ahead of time that ensure your audience learns from your event. You can even share slides later on!

All of these elements allow you to take control of your virtual event and more comprehensively cover your webinar topic in a way that instills trust and purpose. This will make people more likely to tune into more webinars from you in the future!

How to create and deliver an effective webinar presentation

If you want to master the webinar format and deliver excellent results, you need to know where to start. Follow these steps to get started with your first webinar presentation.

Step 1: Prepare and plan your webinar

Before you begin, it's a good idea to plan your webinar well. This can help you ensure an engaging event that focuses on valuable, relevant content.

Think carefully about what you want to communicate and what lessons you want your audience to take away from your event. Look for clear, simple ways to highlight important details, and consider how you will engage your target audience.

Step 2: Create your presentation and outline

Next, it's time to create your presentation and outline! At this stage, using an existing webinar presentation template can help you get started while learning from what's tried and tested.

Go over the details you need to communicate, and aim to structure your event logically. Use your presentation template to guide the flow of information and the extra elements you include. Create visually appealing slides that help you communicate clearly. Remember to allow reasonable time for each webinar section, and don't forget a title slide or call to action slide!

Step 3: Encourage people to join the event

When you know what your webinar will include, you need to start spreading the word! If you're hosting a live event, you'll need to provide your target audience with the opportunity to sign up ahead of time.

Create a user-friendly sign-up form that directs attendees to the links they'll need to access your webinar. Share the news of your webinar wherever you can! Often, webinars gain traction through advertising on social media platforms and via email marketing.

Step 4: Set up hosting and technology

Prior to your webinar presentation, you'll need to make sure that all hosting and technology is working correctly. This includes choosing a webinar software solution that you trust.

Try a high-quality system like Riverside, which offers presentation recording along with live call-ins, local recording technology and separate video and audio tracks for up to 8 participants. (You can learn more at riverside.fm .)

Check that your internet connection is stable enough to host virtual events. You might even consider recording a test project so that you can learn your tools, including chat, recording, and screen-share functionalities.

Step 5: Host your webinar event

Finally, you're ready to create a webinar presentation! Log into your chosen platform at the predetermined event time, and wait for people to start joining.

While hosting your webinar, refer back to your presentation template and outline. Use your materials to guide you through, and remember to encourage engagement from your audience. Ask questions that allow your live audience to get involved.

Step 6: Share your webinar presentation

The impact of your webinar doesn't have to stop once the event is over. If you record your presentation, you can share the on-demand recording for ongoing impact and lead generation.

Position yourself as an industry expert, and take your webinar to a post-production audience by sharing it on social media. You can also use this as an opportunity to reconnect with live attendees and invite people to your next event.

Step 7: Follow up with webinar attendees

Last. but not least, it's important to follow up with your audience. This can help you build relationships and make the most of conversion benefits.

In the days that follow your webinar, send a brief follow-up email to attendees, and ask if they still have any questions or future event requests. You can also use this as a place for gathering feedback while you generate leads and direct to your CTA.

The secret to a successful webinar presentation: 4 factors to consider

When hosting a webinar, there are a few factors you should be aware of to ensure the best possible outcome for you and your audience alike. Keep these webinar practices things in mind!

Highlight key information clearly

During a live webinar, you'll be delivering a lot of information! This is great, but it could be overwhelming for some audience members. That's why it's important to prioritize clarity.

As much as possible, work to highlight key details clearly and succinctly, using bullet points or another streamlined communication format. If you're working with a lot of complex material, you might even email attendees with a summary of key points after your event.

Use visual cues to support content

Next, it's a good idea to think cleverly about the visual cues you rely on during your webinar. From images and graphs to listed text, visual data can help people retain information.

When creating visual presentation materials, don't be afraid to rely on a presentation template that helps you format information effectively. Just remember to bring in your brand colors and logo for consistency and recognition.

Showcase your expertise

If you're hosting a webinar, you need to position yourself as the expert. Create a presentation that highlights your skills and experience, including what you bring to the topic at hand.

In some instances, you might even preface your presentation with a brief editor's note demonstrating your educational or professional background. If these details are relevant, they can help you emphasize your value and boost your credibility as a presenter.

Make it a two-way interaction

A live webinar doesn't have to be a lecture ! You can turn your event into a conversation, inviting and responding to audience questions to help maintain a high level of engagement.

Encourage people to share their ideas and participate proactively in your event. This can make your webinar more fun for the people who attend, all while providing you with further insights into what might be missing from your standard webinar presentation template.

5 tips to master your webinar presentations

Still need more tips to help you master the art of a good webinar? Here are 4 quick and easy tips!

Attend other webinars

Sometimes, the best way to learn is by watching other people. While you shouldn't copy another host, you can attend other webinars to get a sense of what works well and what needs improvement. Check out webinars in your industry or niche, and find out what people want to see more of. Then you can deliver these things in your own content!

Note what works

Similarly, it's important to take note of what works well in the world of webinars. Document effective strategies that you notice in other people's events and in your own. Aim to incorporate more of what you know helps a webinar thrive. Always keep looking for new ways to further enhance your hosting approach.

Invest in tools

Investing in the right tools can make a big difference to the overall quality of your webinar and, subsequently, your audience's experience. Choose a webinar platform with great built-in features. Invest in webinar software that aligns with your goals and needs, including presentation tools and audience size limitations. We recommend Riverside, which prioritizes quality and ease of use to help you achieve the best digital communication results.

Listen to attendees

Importantly, listen to your audience. Your attendees will help to guide you in the right direction for future webinar content. Give people a chance to offer feedback, voice opinions, and ask questions about your delivery style. This could help you hone your presentation skills or even discover new high-impact topics to cover.

Present with passion

Did you know that 67% of webinar attendees say a passionate presenter keeps them watching? Make it clear that you care about what you're saying, and show audiences why they should care too. When you are enthusiastic about your content, you'll find it easier to drive engagement and get people interested in what you have to say.

FAQs on webinar presentations

Still have webinar questions? You asked, and we answered!

Where can I find webinar presentation templates?

There are many webinar presentation templates that you can access online to help guide your event. We recommend trying Canva's free and customizable templates as a beginner-friendly starting point.

How do you plan a webinar presentation?

Planning a webinar presentation doesn't have to be a challenge! Simply think about what you want to communicate and what you want your audience to learn. Then consider the simplest way to articulate this information. If you're feeling stuck, you can use a webinar presentation template to help you establish a strong content structure.

What is the difference between a webinar and a seminar?

A webinar is a seminar that takes place online, instead of occurring in an in-person environment. Live webinars can often have more marketing benefits than real-life events, as they allow users to join in from anywhere in the world. You can also give people access to a recording if they are unable to attend your event live!

How long should a webinar presentation be?

The right length for your webinar presentation will vary depending on your industry, the audience you serve, and the topic you're covering. However, popular research shows that 60 minutes is a good length in many instances. This allows you to introduce yourself, present for 40 to 45 minutes, and host a 10- or 15-minute end-of-session Q&A, which 92% of attendees find beneficial.

Final thoughts

If you're ready to create real impact for your audience, a webinar is the perfect solution! Watch some of Riverside's webinars to help you develop your understanding of the medium. When you're ready, log into your Riverside account, and get started on a studio-quality virtual event!

Kendall Breitman

leads Riverside's community. She has over ten years of experience in television and video production for places like NBC and Bloomberg News. You’ll find Kendall on our webinar, where she shares her expert insights on content production, branding, and more.

Table of contents:

Try Riverside today

Record in studio quality without the studio. Transcribe, clip, and edit within seconds.

Keep reading

Riverside resources

Virtual webinar platform.

Expand your reach and engage with your audience using Riverside’s easy webinar tools for live call-ins, repurposing content, and quick webinar branding.

Screen recorder

Easy-to-use HD screen recorder with local audio and video recordings, simple editing tools, and customization.

Easily record your screen and presentation slides.

Start creating with Riverside

Podcast guides

© 2023 RiversideFM, Inc.

What is a webinar?

Webinars let you connect with large online audiences and share video, audio, and content from any location and device for better engagement. Most organizations offer recordings of the webinars they host; a link to the recording is made available so that the live webinar can be replayed at a later time. This provides an opportunity for people to either re-watch the session or to watch the original webinar for the first time if they were unable to attend the live event.

The difference between a webinar and a video conference meeting is that a webinar typically features one or several key speakers or presenters addressing a large audience, whereas a video conference is usually a smaller meeting that supports informal discussions between all participants.

The audio is usually broadcast via a microphone connected to the speakers’ laptops, tablets, or smartphones.

The video is shared through a web camera connected to the speakers’ laptops, tablets, or smartphones, using conferencing software and/or an internet browser.

Webinar host and panelists are able to share presentations, videos, web pages, and other multimedia content.

In a webinar, the host organization is able to interact with its audience. Often questions or comments are communicated in real-time via a live chat and Q&A feature.

Webinar audiences can join the event from anywhere they have access to a decent internet connection.

Webinar features

Today’s best-in-breed webinar software offers hosts and participants a variety of features that support and enhance their online event experience.

Webinar control management gives the host the ability to manage participants. It enables the host(s) to check the audience list, mute and unmute individuals and groups of people, and even block a person from participating if they don’t adhere to appropriate behavior.

Screen sharing allows presenters the ability to share presentation slides, images, and even videos. With Zoom Webinars, panelists can present their presentations directly. The webinar host does not need to upload the presentation to accommodate final edits.

Q&A (question & answer) enables attendees to ask questions during the webinar, and for the panelists, co-hosts, and host to answer their questions. Optionally, attendees can answer and upvote each other’s questions.

In-webinar chat offers the host and panelists a simple and easy way to communicate with attendees. Presenters can share links, resources, and helpful advice throughout the event to give webinar participants information that is helpful to complete their experience.

Webinar polls give hosts the ability to check in with their audience in real-time. Questions can be customized to hone in on the particular interests of the webinar attendees. The level of audience attentiveness can be gauged by tracking their responsiveness. If appropriate, live poll results can be displayed to the audience to facilitate further discussion and interaction between panelists and the audience.

Post-webinar surveys can be scheduled to share with webinar attendees at the end of the event. A survey’s responses can be downloaded as a report to simplify feedback collection. In a Zoom Webinar , the host can redirect attendees to a third-party survey service (like Google Forms or Survey Monkey).

Recording the webinar provides the host with the ability to use the video of the event for various other purposes such as marketing, education, new hire onboarding, etc.

The Zoom Dashboard allows administrators on the Zoom Webinars account to view information ranging from overall usage to live in-meeting data. This data can be used to analyze issues that may have occurred as well as better understand how users are holding meetings within their companies. With Zoom, the Dashboard data updates at 12:00 GMT daily. Data is stored in the Dashboard for 12 months.

How do you create a webinar?

Scheduling a webinar.

Zoom Webinars allows you to broadcast an event to up to 50,000 view-only attendees, depending on the size of your webinar license. They can require pre-registration—with the option for the host to add custom registration questions—or registration can be turned off for attendees to join by simply clicking a link at the time of the webinar. Webinars can be held once, can reoccur in a series, or can be the same session held multiple times.

Webinars can require pre-registration before the event. Using webinar software, the host can typically approve the registrants, add custom registration questions and pull reports on the registration. Registration is not always required, although attendees usually need to enter their name and email address when joining the event.

Scheduling a webinar with registration requires your registrants to complete a brief form before receiving the link to join the webinar. In this way, host companies can collect the names, email addresses, and other information from the registrants. Using most webinar software, after you’ve scheduled a webinar with registration, you can:

• Import registrants via CSV
• Collect additional information by customizing your registration questions
• Edit the webinar emails and choose which emails to send
• Customize the registration page
• Use multiple URLs to track where your registrants are coming from
• Manage registrants and resend confirmation emails

If you do not need to collect registrant information, you can schedule a registration-less webinar.

Webinar presenters and panelists

With different webinar software, there are different definitions of those who are key webinar presenters. In a Zoom Webinar, there is the host, and there are presenters called panelists. Panelists are full participants in the meeting. They have access to most host controls including sharing video and viewing the attendee list. With Zoom Webinars, panelists receive permissions to do these things from the webinar host.

The maximum number of panelists is dependent primarily on meeting capacity, but also the webinar capacity the host sets.

Most webinar software allows you to manage the panelists and attendees in your webinar. With Zoom Webinars, you can promote a panelist to co-host or attendee to panelist, demote panelists to attendees, unmute, stop the video, and more.

You are also able to view reports after your webinar concludes, to see registration, attendee, polling, and other information.

Webinar attendees

Attendees are view-only participants who can be unmuted if the host chooses. Their view of the webinar is controlled by the host. They can interact with the host and the panelists through the Q&A, chat, and even live polls.

If the webinar does not require registration, you can copy the join link and share with your attendees.

If the webinar requires registration, the host will need to share the registration link and have the attendees complete the registration form. Once registered, they will receive an email notification with a unique join link.

With Zoom Webinars, there are three different ways to invite attendees to register: 

• Copy the registration URL and share via email, your website, etc.
• Select “Copy the invitation” to view and copy the invitation created by Zoom to send out to your attendees.
• Select “Email me the invitation” to receive a copy of the Zoom invitation that you can then forward to potential attendees.

Webinar benefits

Webinars are a relatively easy, cost-effective way to reach a broad audience and even generate new leads for your business. For business, education, healthcare, and other industries, a webinar provides an organization the opportunity to inform, educate, and interact with its key stakeholders and constituents.

Webinars help you present important information to a large audience to drive awareness. For example, webinars are commonly used by large companies to host all hands or town halls to convey important company information with distributed employees. Government and educational institutions may use webinars to communicate important information to the public community.

Nothing gives your newly launched product or service more credibility than a webinar that clearly shows features and benefits. This kind of webinar can help you to qualify leads, attract new customers, and accelerate your sales process.

Webinars support single-session virtual events with a group of presenters or panelists to an online audience who joins to learn and engage through chat and Q&A. A multi-session virtual event may consist of several webinar sessions.

A webinar is a very effective way to generate more leads and get new customers. For example, people who want to attend your webinar will need to register by leaving their email addresses. This gives an organization the opportunity to build up a large email list, which can be useful for future sales and marketing campaigns.

Share valuable information with your audience and receive immediate feedback. Webinars are a valuable tool for training and education. Q&A sessions allow the audience the opportunity to ask about the subject matter and any concerns or issues they may have. Since you can record the webinar, it can be used for educational and instructional purposes.

Webinar FAQs

Webinar software is the underlying software that supports web-based seminars Webinar software is designed to facilitate hosts to organize presentations that engage a large number of attendees through live or prerecorded video and digital content.

Zoom Meetings connect a group of people for interactive discussion and collaboration. Every participant joins a meeting with the ability to share audio, video and their screen to fully participate in the session. Meetings are best for group collaboration, team meetings, sales demos, online learning and training, and office hours. Meetings allow all participants to easily interact and share with each other and the host.

Webinars are best for presenting to a large audience where the host wants more control over the experience and audience members join without their audio or video turned on. The focus for webinars is on the presenter or panelists. The audience joins to listen and learn and then ask questions at the end. Zoom Webinars supports large internal and external events, such as company all-hands, city council town halls, product announcements, customer conferences, concerts, and even religious gatherings.

Yes. Most organizations offer recordings of the webinars they host, even if the actual webinar is live. Typically a link to the recording is made available so that the live webinar can be replayed at a later time. This provides an opportunity for people to either re-watch the session or to watch the original webinar for the first time if they were unable to attend the live event.

Webinar attendees typically receive an email or text notification about the webinar. They may also find a notice about the upcoming webinar online. To register as an attendee, click on the link or registration and complete any information that is required. After submitting the information, you should receive a confirmation email or text with a link that you will click to join the webinar at the scheduled date and time. As an attendee, you will be able to virtually raise your hand, submit questions in Q&A, and send messages to others. You will need the Zoom Desktop Client or Mobile App to join the webinar.

View flexible and affordable options to get started with Zoom Webinars

How to Create Your Perfect Webinar Presentation (+Examples)

Whether you’re doing webinar slides for the first time or just want to level up an existing deck, here you’ll learn how to create the perfect webinar presentation. We’ll go through best webinar practices and identify the key slides every webinar presentation should have. Are you ready?

Webinar Best Practices: 6 Things to Consider for a Great Webinar Presentation

First, let's set this straight: Powerful webinars don’t just happen. Impressive facts and figures don’t do it anymore. Nowadays, you have to be strategic in order to create webinar presentations that convert. So, before getting into the nitty-gritty of this post, I recommend you review these six aspects :

#1 Be clear on your webinar objective

As with all business activities, you need to set a clear objective for your webinars. Ask yourself: What’s the main purpose of doing this webinar? What action do you want your audience to take at the end of your presentation?

#2 Do your research

I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to adjust your content to your audience’s needs. The big difference between a perfect webinar and a poor one is how the information you share solves your audience’s big questions . There are plenty of social media platforms, forums, and blogs you can review to ensure your webinar presentation covers what potential customers want to know.

#3 Only use high-quality visuals

People engage more with visual content ; that’s why pictures, graphics, and videos are a must in webinars. However, you need to be careful with the quality of your visuals. Consider that your audience could be looking at your presentation from a laptop, iPad, or mobile phone , so making sure your visuals are top quality is always a smart move.

#4 Brand your Webinar Slides

In the same line, your webinar presentation design is key for a well-rounded delivery. Don't make your work harder by pitching in plain boring PowerPoint slides. Instead, get your presentation on-brand and elevate trust in your business.

If PowerPoint design is not your strongest suit, consider hiring a presentation designer . Most companies outsource the design of their presentations, and it doesn’t cost as much as you think. For reference, you can check the 24Slides pricing table .

#5 Present your own data

Go one step further and conduct your own research. Start by simply sending an online survey to your customers or preparing a trend report around your market. Any finding that you get will only enrich your webinar presentation. And you'll likely position your brand as an authority in your niche.

#6 Cite your sources

And if you happen to use second-hand data, always cite your sources! Just because we find something on the internet doesn't mean it doesn't belong to anyone. This practice also helps to double-check where the information comes from and adds up to your credibility as a speaker.

The Anatomy of the Perfect Webinar Presentation (Key Slides)

Note that the “perfect webinar presentation” looks different for everyone because it depends on the topic and type of information you’ve got. However, all impactful webinars include a key set of slides that I’m going to break down for you:

#1 Introduce yourself

One of the reasons webinars are so popular is because they allow you to engage with an audience in real-time. But for people to get comfortable and spark conversations, you have to make the first move.

Use an “About me” slide for a quick introduction. You can highlight your credentials as an expert in the field or, even better, share the unique experience you went through that makes you qualified to lead the webinar. This is not about bragging but showing why they should listen to you.

And if you’re conducting the webinar with your team, there’s a special slide for them as well:

#2 Let your audience know what’s coming

Some people think of this slide as obsolete, but they just don’t know how to use it the right way. I’m talking about the Table of Contents slide.

Your webinar's first minutes are crucial to building your audience’s interest. Provide them with a glimpse of the topics you’ll cover using a table of contents. It also serves you to interlink your slides (as a menu) and create an interactive presentation.

The divider or section header slides also fall under this title. Use them to make strategic transitions between topics. Adding these breaks will make your presentation easier to follow.

#3 Present your content in different formats

We’ve made it to the meaty part! This is what people came for, and you can’t disappoint.

You’ve already got top-notch information, but what’s the best way to present it?

You can go the usual route and use text slides (no judging here!), or… you can channel your audience’s attention with fresh alternatives :

Data charts

It's very common to overload your slides when talking about data. But a wall of numbers won’t make your findings appealing.

Instead of copying your Excel tables, use data visualization slides. Check out these examples:

Another great thing about presentations is that you can insert multimedia elements! Use videos to illustrate a point, explain a complex idea, or show a testimonial. Just make sure to keep it short - people are eager to hear you, not to watch a movie.

Here are some webinar slides where you can embed your videos:

It’s not rocket science why people engage with diagrams. They provide a quick visualization of something that otherwise would take several paragraphs to explain. So, as a quick reminder, whenever you face the text-or-visuals dilemma, always choose the latter.

Now, there are so many diagrams that this post won’t suffice to show them all. But to give you an idea of what type of diagrams you could pick for your webinar, here are the most popular ones:

Want to see more options? Visit the 24Slides templates site and download the diagram slides you like the most - for free!

Quote slides have gained a bit of a bad reputation. We’ve seen for so long these random motivational quotes that add little to no value to a presentation and think it’s all these slides can do. But I’m here to prove you wrong.

A strategic way to use your quote slides is for social proof. You can showcase product reviews, client testimonials and even collect what people say about your brand on social media.

This is my favorite template for quotes:

Key takeaways

Help your audience remember the main points of your topic with a slide for key takeaways. Be succinct and sum up your key lessons or conclusions in a few words.

#4 Be open to Questions

As I said before, one of the benefits of doing webinars is that you can start a direct interaction with potential customers, so it makes sense to include a Q&A section.

To break the ice, try to prepare some initial questions for them and get the conversation going. You can use these webinar slides for an interactive session.

#5 Don’t forget your call-to-action

This point is linked to the webinar best practice #1 “Be clear on your webinar objective.”

What’s the whole purpose of doing this webinar presentation? Maybe you’re about to release an online class and want your audience to sign-up . Or perhaps you’re looking to increase brand awareness and it’d be cool if they tweet about the webinar . It’s all up to you, but you have to tell them. And these are the right slides for it.

So, to recap, these are the key slides every webinar presentation should have:

• About Me Slide (or Meet the Team Slide if there's more than one speaker)
• Table of Contents Slide
• Header Section Slides
• Data charts (to summarize complex information)
• Video (for visual engagement)
• Diagrams (to present a process)
• Quotes (to include social proof)
• Key Takeaway Slide (to refresh your audience's memory)
• Q&A Slide
• Call-to-Action Slide

But we're not done yet. Keep reading to find out how all your hard effort will come together in a perfect webinar slide deck.

Final Step: Your Webinar Presentation Design

Unlike traditional presentations, webinars are highly visual experiences . And to get there, the design of your slides plays a huge role. So, make sure to give your final presentation an eye-catching professional aspect.

But if PowerPoint design is not really your thing, there are still some alternatives. For instance, you can use a free webinar template like the examples above, or follow the 24Slides PowerPoint designers' secrets to create top presentation. Or even better, you can let them work on your slides! Check out how to get your webinar slides expertly designed from as little as $9 per slide.

If you've made it here, you're ready to take on your next webinar presentation like a pro. Just remember: Be strategic when it comes to choosing your slides and put the same effort into the design as you do into the content. Happy presenting!

You might also like these articles:

• +20 Creative Webinar Flyer Templates to Drive Registrations
• 20+ of the Best Webinar Slide Deck Templates for This Year
• How To Use PowerPoint For Your Webinar

Create professional presentations online

Other people also read

How To Write Effective Emails That Will Improve Your Communi...

How to Make a Marketing Plan Presentation in PowerPoint

Alternative presentation styles: Takahashi

See how Cvent can solve your biggest event challenges. Watch a 30-minute demo.

• Request demo
• Find event venues

What is a Webinar: The Ultimate Guide

Webinars have become an integral part of many companies' event programs. But what is a webinar? For starters, they're an excellent way to engage an audience between larger events, create a reputation as an industry thought leader, and educate attendees on niche topics. 

So, how do you craft a webinar that can do all this? And how do you attract attendees when there are so many other digital events going on? Let's start with the basics, then we'll dive into everything you need to know about hosting successful and memorable webinars.

What Is a Webinar?

Webinars are seminar-style virtual events hosted by an individual or panel of experts who share their knowledge on a particular topic. Webinars generally last about 30-60 minutes, providing an opportunity for attendees to learn from experts in a convenient and cost-effective way using a video conferencing tool .

Your Guide to Planning and Conducting Webinars in 2024

For planners, marketers, and sales teams alike, building an effective webinar program is a major priority. In fact, 73% of B2B marketers say webinars are the best way to generate quality leads, and 99% of marketers believe webinars represent a critical element of their marketing plans.

Clearly, webinars are a necessary part of your organization's total event program, and your webinar strategy should evolve to meet current expectations and technological advancements.

This ultimate guide to webinars will help break down webinar basics and offer tips to improve your webinar programs to better feed your webinar funnel and maximize your ROI.

Benefits of Hosting a Webinar

Types of webinars, webinar formats, 6 tips on how to conduct webinars effectively in 2024, planning a successful webinar, webinar best practices, difference between webcast and webinar, must-have features in an ideal webinar tool, choosing the right webinar platform, let your webinar software lead the way, webinar faq's.

Webinars are held for a variety of reasons, including generating leads, educating or training attendees, conducting product demos or product launches , and hosting internal meetings . Webinars have long been used as an effective way to expand a brand’s reach, establish a company as a thought leader in the industry, and engage with prospective customers through an accessible platform.

In meeting these goals, webinars offer immense benefits not only to attendees but to the organizations who host them. The benefits of hosting a webinar include:

• Reaching a global audience
• Cost savings associated with virtual events
• Ability to offer access to on-demand recordings for those who cannot join the webinar live
• Increased brand engagement
• Continuous between larger events
• Lead generation (this one is HUGE, with webinars offering an average conversion rate of 55% )
• Establishing hosts as industry thought leaders
• Building brand trust and loyalty
• Opportunities for networking

If you're unsure whether a webinar is the right format for your event or you just want to see all the possibilities of hosting webinars, read on to understand the various types of webinars, including webinar formats and reasons you might choose to host a webinar. 

Webinars can serve many purposes, and with a short window of time to engage attendees, webinars must have a clear intention. Here are just a few examples of webinar types your organization might choose to host:

1. Thought Leadership Webinar

A webinar hosted by an industry expert or influencer to share insights, trends, and expertise on a particular topic within their field, positioning themselves and their company as a thought leader.

2. Panel Discussion Webinar

A webinar that features a panel of experts discussing a specific industry topic or issue, providing different perspectives and engaging in interactive discussions with the audience.

3. Educational Webinar

A knowledge-sharing webinar hosted to deliver lectures, workshops, or training sessions on a specific subject or topic.

4. Training Webinar

A webinar conducted by a company or organization to provide training and education to employees or clients, covering topics such as onboarding, software training, or compliance regulations.

5. Professional Development Webinar

Similar to a training or educational webinar, professional development webinars are intended to educate attendees with a specific goal of helping them achieve their professional goals.

6. Internal Communication Webinar

A webinar conducted within an organization to communicate important updates, share company news, or conduct a webinar meeting with remote or distributed teams.

7. Product Demo Webinar

A product demo webinar is a great lead generation tool companies can use to showcase and demonstrate their product or service to potential customers, highlighting its features, benefits, and use cases.

8. Sales Webinar

A webinar hosted by a sales rep or team to showcase products or services, address customer pain points, provide solutions, and allow for feedback and questions from prospective customers, with the goal of generating leads and closing sales.

9. Customer Success Webinar

A webinar hosted by a company to onboard new customers, provide ongoing support and guidance to customers, showcase best practices and new features, and answer customer questions.

10. How-To Webinar

A webinar that breaks down simple concepts, product features, or service options to help attendees better understand how to accomplish a particular task.

Now, you might be wondering, Does a webinar have to be live? No, a webinar does not have to be held live. There are various types of webinar formats to choose from, including live streamed, simu-live, and pre-recorded. Let's break down these options:

• Live Video:  The webinar occurs in real-time. Doing a webinar live can be more challenging, as there is no room for mistakes, but it also allows more options for attendee engagement through live polls, Q&A, and responding to comments in a live chat.
• Simu-live:  This is a webinar that is mostly recorded ahead of time, but the presenter jumps on to answer questions or discuss recorded elements. This format can allow for greater production value and requires less on-the-spot involvement from your hosts.
• Pre-recorded:  This is a webinar that is recorded ahead of time so attendees are logging on to watch at their leisure. This format allows you to push your content on-demand immediately without the hassle of live streaming. The downside here, of course, is decreased engagement from attendees.

The type of webinar you choose to host will play a large part in determining the best webinar format for your event. In many instances, on-demand Webinars offer a great solution for quick and routine communication, such as internal onboarding, new customer onboarding, trainings, and how-to content.

In 2024, we've reached an age of digital disruption — one that is helping planners and marketers alike reimagine the webinar format and reevaluate how they utilize webinar programs to make the biggest impact. Webinars can range from single speaker presentations or multi-person discussions to open forums and interactive conversations with attendees.

With improved webinar software, webinar programs have grown leaps and bounds, offering exciting new ways to engage with attendees, increased levels of interactivity, and heightened production value. If you aren't making the most of the latest webinar tech , it’s time to rethink your strategy and tools to meet attendees' heightened expectations for webinar engagement .

Before we dive deeper into the finer details of planning your webinars, here are a few tips to help you conduct webinars effectively in 2024:

• Choose a reliable webinar platform: Select a w ebinar platform that offers advanced features, seamless integration options, and excellent technical support to ensure a smooth and glitch-free webinar experience for both you and your attendees.
• Make your webinars free to attend: While there may be instances where it makes sense to charge for attendance, if your webinars are part of your total events program and help feed your marketing funnel, you'll likely get more out of them by charging no fees and raking in as many attendees as possible.
• Leverage interactive features for improved engagement: Encourage active participation by using interactive features like quizzes, audience polls, live chat, Q&A, and breakout rooms for group discussions. This will make your webinars more engaging and help your attendees find greater value in the experience.
• Incorporate multimedia elements: Make your webinar visually appealing and dynamic by incorporating multimedia elements such as videos, animations, and interactive slides. This will enhance engagement and make the content more memorable.
• Keep it concise and focused: Webinar attendees likely spend many hours a day at their desks staring at their screens. Keep your webinar content concise, focused, and relevant to ensure maximum engagement and keep the attention of your attendees.
• Provide valuable takeaways: Offer valuable insights, practical tips, and actionable takeaways that participants can apply immediately after disconnecting. This helps attendees recap what they're learned and decide how to put this knowledge to use.

Of course, there's always more to learn and consider when planning your webinars. Forbes even has  12 commandments for hosting a great webinar if you're looking for more tips!

Though webinars are everywhere, not all are created equal. It takes careful planning to create an effective webinar . From content to engagement, webinars must be created with the attendee in mind, and webinar hosts should utilize a webinar hosting platform that's up to the job.

Define the Purpose of Your Webinar

What is the purpose of your webinar?  It's a simple enough question, but your answer guides everything else — content creation, the tech you need, how you interact with attendees. It's important to view the purpose of every event through two lenses: what you want attendee to gain from the experience and what you want to gain from the experience. Webinars are no different — webinars boost your profits  and provide valuable data, and they also offer attendees something they were missing, whether it's information, training resources, access to experts, or otherwise.

Webinars work so well for both hosts and attendees because they’re accessible. They don’t take an enormous time commitment those producing nor attending them, they're often free, and getting to the "venue" is as simple as clicking a link. That’s why webinars are a wonderful lead generation tool. With the right form fill, you can collect key information about your attendees that can be used to set them off on their  attendee journey  to engage with more content, establish their level of intent, and get them in front of sales.

Set Goals for Your Webinar

Once you've defined your purpose, you can set more specific goals for your webinar. Whether this is your first webinar or hundredth, you need some benchmarks, or key performance indicators (KPIs) to help you track and measure your success. 

The best goals are based on past performance. If you regularly get 100 registrations, make the goal of increasing that number by 20%. If you often achieve huge registration numbers but significantly lower attendance rates, set a goal for attendance to better measure the impact of your webinar. Because webinars use technology at every stage, there is no end to what you can track and improve upon.

Think about your attendee touchpoints when setting your goals. Set goals for  email marketing campaigns, social media, time on the webinar event website, form fills, attendance, view time,  and, of course,  survey results  after the event. Data is powerful. It should be analyzed, learned from, and used to set new goals.

When choosing goals, don’t forget to think about your stakeholders. What do they want to see? Do they care how long an attendee watches the webinar, or do they care more about how many leads are sent to sales and the quality of those leads? Often, your internal stakeholders — from leadership to marketing , to planning, to tech — all care about something different. Articulate stakeholder needs, and use them to guide your goals.

Build Engaging Webinar Content

Find the Right Topic

You have your purpose, now you need to create a webinar topic that will match your purpose. A great webinar starts with great content. What do your attendees want to see? What products is your organization trying to drum up interest for? Once you have an initial idea of your webinar market, you can refine your topic. Want to teach customers to use new product features? A how-to webinar with an open discussion style allows attendees to learn and ask questions in real time. Trying to spark discussion in the industry? Start thinking of expert speakers to bring in for a lively panel discussion.

The right topic can only be chosen when you have an audience in mind. Who is your target audience? The topic you choose should interest potential attendees and align with a pain point they need to solve.

Pick Your Webinar Content Format

This is where content creation gets interesting.  Webinar tools  have grown leaps and bounds, and you no longer have to put up with a pre-recorded webinar built from simple slides, zero video elements, and no live features like chat or Q&A. You have options! As you consider the format of your content, keep in mind the different webinar formats available, including live streamed, simu-live, and pre-recorded.

Popular Webinar Content Formats:

• Single speaker presentation
• Multi-speaker presentation
• Panel discussion with moderator
• Live Polling with moderator
• Interview led by moderator
• Open Q&A led by moderator

Choose the Right Date

While a webinar can be thrown together quickly, the best ones take preparation, especially if you’re planning to promote the webinar in advance. A strategic email marketing campaign cannot be thrown together at the drop of a hat. When choosing a date and time for your webinar, first consider your webinar process. How long will it take to find a speaker, build the event, create a marketing campaign, and so on?

With an idea of how long it will take to execute, it’s time to open the calendar. Go as many weeks in advance as it will take to build your webinar. Webinars that take place on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday see higher registration than those on Monday or Friday (and much higher than those on the weekend).

If your webinar is global, consider that when choosing the time. Otherwise, choose 11:00 am or 1:00-2:00 pm as your start time. Why? Participants are unlikely to attend webinars early in the morning, during lunch, or late at night.

Most importantly, be aware of holidays or special events. If you decide to plan a webinar on a government holiday, there is a good chance you will have very few registrations. Remember, attendees want times that are convenient and don’t take away too much time from their personal or professional lives.

Choose a Relevant Title

Many companies have their own terminology and are used to phrasing things in a specific way. But that doesn’t mean attendees speak the same language. As you refine your webinar topic , look to SEO keywords to guide the way. You’ll want to create an engaging title that will show up in search and explains what the webinar is about.

How to Pick a Title That Will Show Up in Organic Search

• Find trending keywords using Google Trends and keyword tools
• Think about industry terms
• Utilize keywords in the title
• Keep the title short and keyword-focused
• Make sure the title properly conveys the topic of the webinar
• Test a few titles with colleagues to see which resonates most

Find the Perfect Webinar Host, Speakers, or a Moderator

Choosing a group of speakers can be a challenge but can also help to vary the webinar format. A team of speakers that is well-practiced at switching back and forth and sharing their thoughts can help to keep attendees engaged .

A moderator can be used when there are many speakers or if the webinar is a Q&A or an interview. A moderator should be thoughtful, able to think on the fly, and good at keeping the conversation moving. If you’re conducting a live poll, your moderator will need to understand how your  webinar technology works so they can pull questions from the live audience.

Here is a quick list of webinar best practices as you plan your webinars:

• 60 minutes or less
• Schedule for midweek at 11 am or 2 pm
• Pick a title that is SEO optimized
• Make sure the presentation is branded
• Follow presentation best practices
• Vary formats during the presentation
• Engage attendees with quizzes, chat, and surveys
• Break long sessions into a webinar series
• Provide speakers with instruction or tech

Check out the full list of webinar best practices !

The difference between a webinar and webcast is that a webinar is an interactive virtual event designed for smaller groups of attendees in the hundreds, whereas a webcast is a more like a broadcast, allowing for no input from attendees and generally streaming to larger audiences with thousands of attendees.

From high-quality production to chat features, here are a few webinar platform features that will help improve the viewing experience and ensure great ROI for your webinars.

Webinar Registration Page

By creating a branded, detailed registration page for your webinar, attendees will be able to understand the purpose of your webinar, see critical details like the date, time, and speakers, and register for the webinar.

Embedded Video

Display embedded video live streams or recorded videos within the your webinars for a seamless virtual attendee experience.

Live Q&A

With a Q&A feature, attendees can submit questions to speakers for an additional layer of interactivity. This allows attendees to engage with the event more fully, personalize their experience by having their questions answered, and impact other attendees' experiences by bringing forward topics they might not have considered.

Session Chat

If you want attendees to feel more like they're watching your webinar together and have the ability to engage directly with your webinar hosts, allow them to use a session chat. This is a great way to encourage networking, raise quick questions, and highlight great points made during the webinar.

Web Analytics (Clicks & Views)

Get page-by-page web analytics with clicks and views to understand what content is being engaged with the most so you can modify your future webinars and inform your total events program strategy.

Engagement Scoring

Engagement scoring  gives your sales and marketing teams a simple, actionable view of attendee activity for faster and smarter follow-up.

Virtual Attendance Tracking

Track attendance during sessions for governance and enable CE credit tracking. Data from tracking can help marketers and planners understand trends.

Screen Sharing

Screen sharing is a great way to share your screen with others during a webinar. This feature allows you to share your screen with participants and even give others control of your screen so they can navigate and interact with your content. 

Elevated Production Tools

If you want your webinars to be more than a slide deck viewed over screen share, opt for a webinar platform that features elevated production tools to help you build a more engaging, visually appealing webinar. Production tools can help you customize backgrounds with preloaded options, create lower thirds, switch between layouts, and use smooth transitions between videos, speakers, or slides.

You may already have an event management platform that's capable of handling your online events, including webinars. If so, that’s great! But even if you have a tool that works, take a moment to consider whether it does everything you need it to do. 

Webinar hosting technology has exploded in recent years, and capabilities are improving and expanding every day. As you execute your webinars, keep track of what did and didn’t work from a technical perspective, and consider how different webinar platforms might better meet your and your attendees' needs.

As you look at webinar solutions, ask yourself the following:

• What features does my current webinar platform provide?
• What capabilities do I need (Chat, Quizzes, production help, etc.)?
• What is my budget for webinars?
• Do I need a total event management and marketing platform that can be used for all my events?
• Is the webinar software user-friendly?
• Does the webinar tool integrate with the event software I already have?
• How many attendees can a room hold?
• Can I have more than one presenter?
• Do I need to host live webinars , on-demand webinars , or both?
• What data do I need, and what data and analytics can the webinar tool provide?
• Are there support resources available?

Read more -  How to Create and Host a Webinar

Webinars are often lower effort than in-person, virtual, or hybrid events, but the benefits they provide long-term can be just as impressive. From establishing your organization as a thought leader to gathering leads, webinars play a big role in your  total meeting and events program . 

With a great team that combines the expertise of planning and marketing, your event program can be a huge driver for sales and impact the organization as a whole. As you build your webinars, do it thoughtfully and strategically, and consider how your webinar software can not only help you deliver great content but track your success .

Start creating webinars with the Cvent Webinar Platform today!

Still have questions about planning and hosting webinars? Check out these FAQ's!

Are Webinars Effective?

Yes! Webinars can be highly effective for delivering targeted content, generating leads, building brand awareness, and engaging a wide audience. Take a look at the section titled "Benefits of Hosting a Webinar" at the top of this post for all the great ways webinars can bring value to your marketing funnel!

How to Create Webinars?

When you're ready to start creating webinars, you'll first need a webinar platform that can engage your attendees with interactive features, offers top-notch production capabilities, allows your speakers to collaborate easily, and offers you the insights you need to measure your KPIs.

How Do You Make Webinars Interactive?

To make webinars interactive, utilize features such as live chat, Q&A, live polls, post-webinar surveys , breakout rooms, and interactive multimedia content to encourage attendee engagement.

What Is the Difference Between a Meeting and a Webinar?

While a meeting typically involves collaboration among participants with very little production involved, a webinar is primarily a one-to-many presentation or training session with visuals, audio, and other elements produced in advance.

How to Cancel a Webinar?

Although canceling a webinar is generally worst-case scenario, sometimes it can't be helped. In such cases, you should be able to easily cancel your webinar from within the webinar software you're using and automatically notify attendees that the event has been canceled. Of course, it's best to reach out to attendees directly to explain why the webinar has been canceled, whether it will be rescheduled for a different date, and whether there are any resources or other events they might be able to access instead.

Hope Salvatori

Hope is a Senior Content Marketing Associate who has been with Cvent for more than two years. She has 8 years of experience producing content for corporations, small businesses, associations, nonprofits, and universities. As a content professional, she has created content for a wide range of industries, including meetings and events, government and defense, education, health, and more.

More Reading

Conference networking: an expert guide, top 9 interactive event ideas in 2024, pop-up events: everything you need to know in 2024.

Subscribe to our newsletter

How many kinds of webinars are there? 🤔 Join us on Sept. 10 and discover a webinar format for every occasion. Register  

• Services & Support

Discover how intelligent engagement transforms:

ON24 Intelligent Engagement Platform

AI-powered ACE

Performance analytics

Content hubs

Integrations

Landing pages

AI-generated content

Virtual events

Virtual conferences

Professional services

Financial services

Associations

Life sciences

Manufacturing

Learn how you can use intelligent engagement for:

Demand generation

Partner enablement

HCP engagement

Customer marketing

Professional certification

Product marketing

Member enrollment

Upcoming webinars & events

Compare software

Customer stories

What is a webinar?

Investor relations

Executive team

Corporate responsibility

Board of directors

What is a Webinar and How Do Webinars Work?

November 27th, 2023 Michael Mayday

Webinars are one of the most indispensable weapons in a marketer’s armory. But what is a webinar and how does a webinar work ?

There’s a lot going on behind the scenes of even the most basic webinar software . And, when it comes to a world-class solution like the ON24 Intelligent Engagement Platform , we rely on some of the best talent in the biz to make the experience of setting up and delivering a webinar seamless for you.

Webinars are different from meeting tools, which are designed to let small groups meet and collaborate in real time. They’re also different from traditional streaming media like videos, which don’t give the audience any way to engage with the content.

Webinar Definition

A webinar is an engaging online event where a speaker, or small group of speakers, delivers a presentation to a large audience who participate by submitting questions, responding to polls, and using other available interactive tools.

Webinars differ from meeting tools, designed to let small groups meet and collaborate in real time. They’re also different from traditional streaming media like videos, which don’t give the audience any way to engage with the content .

Learn more about webinars:

• Going Bigger: How to Promote Webinar Marketing Events
• Taking In-Person Events Digital? Five Things to Consider
• 11 Excellent Questions for your Post-Webinar Survey

Even the most bare-bones webinar has separate streams for slides and audio. But most modern webinars go far beyond that, with slides, presenter video, integrated social media and live attendee feedback in the form of questions, polls, idea storming and more.

Webinar basics — how to create a webinar

To produce the best webinar experience possible, follow these five basic steps:

• Define your audience.
• Brainstorm relevant topics.
• Create content — from slides to scripts — for your presentation.
• Practice your material and present it.
• Analyze webinar successes and failures.

How to prepare webinar content

The first step to preparing webinar content is understanding the audience you’re trying to reach. Are they early in the buying cycle? About to close? Are they already customers? If so, are they looking for educational content? Thought leadership? Once you know who you’re trying to reach, you can prepare your content.

Webinar content should be designed to keep a conversation going. Presentation slides should be light and easy to read. Presenters, too, should be the centerpiece and set the pace of the event. Finally, create opportunities for audience members to ask questions and participate in the webcast. Webinar content works best when it invites conversation.

Is a webinar always live?

No! Webinars can be live, simulive or on-demand. Each version has its own benefits to consider.

Live webinars allow you to engage your audience in real time and get instant analytics on that behavior. Simulive webinars let you record a webinar in advance and engage your audience in real-time — often through Q&A chat features — during the pre-recorded presentation. You can even roll over to a live presentation from simulive for further interaction and engagement.

On-demand webinars can be live-turned-on-demand events and pre-recorded on-demand webinars. Using on-demand gives your audience flexibility regarding when they consume your content. It also gives you, the presenter, more flexibility on providing a more polished experience.

ON24 webinar benchmarks

When is the best time to start promoting webinars?

According to our webinar benchmarks report , most attendees register either the week before the webinar launch (41%) or two weeks in advance (29%). Marketers should plan to start promotions over a three-week or longer time frame.

What is the average registration-to-attendee conversion rate?

Overall 53% of webinar registrants converted into an attendee. Of registrants, 35% converted as a live attendee and 23% converted as an on-demand attendee.

What’s the best day to send promotional emails?

In terms of driving registration, Monday (21.7%) and Tuesday (21.4%) are the best days to send promotional emails followed closely by Wednesday (20.1%).

How many attendees can I expect at my webinar?

The average number of webinar attendees in 2022 was 188.

How long should a webinar be?

Audiences engage with webinars for an average of 55 minutes.

Learn more essential webinar statistics

Download the ON24 2023 Digital Engagement Benchmarks and get a high-level look at the best practices that make webinars great. Download Now!

So what are the most important factors of webinar technology? Let’s take a look:

Making the webinar presenter successful

At ON24, we’ve spent years perfecting our presentation manager, PMXD. Obviously, we wanted to make it easy for you to upload, modify, manage and deliver your presentations. We quickly discovered that great webinar presentations take more than a well-uploaded presentation deck.

Most of our customers go into every webinar with at least two key players:

• The presenter delivers the webinar content.
• The producer handles all the behind-the-scenes work, like queuing video clips, managing guest speakers, and routing questions from webinar attendees.

Webinar tips for presenters

Before the webinar.

Webinars have a lot of moving parts, so preparation is essential. Once you have a topic and an audience in mind, outline a presentation and draft slides. As you build your deck, look for opportunities to drive audience engagement through polls, surveys or Q&A.

Schedule a practice session with your finished deck, including anyone involved in the webinar — from presenters to producers and guests. Practicing identifies weak points and lets you adjust for better flow.

During the webinar

Start your webinars by guiding attendees through both the webinar console and the engagement tools included in the event. This way, attendees know how to interact with your event should they want to when prompted.

Run through your presentation as you normally would during your event, highlighting engagement opportunities (e.g., polls, surveys) as they arrive. If you’re running a Q&A session, your producer should select and prepare questions for the presenter to respond to.

After the webinar

Turn your live event into an on-demand webinar and email a link to your registrants and attendees within 48 hours of the event ending. Then, get creative.

Webinar tips for attendees

As a webinar attendee, all you need to do is fill out a form to register for an event. Once registered, you should get an email with the details of an event, including a calendar invite.

Place the event on your work calendar and, on the day of the event, click the link to log in. Then, it’s just a matter of adjusting console windows as you see fit.

During the webinar, you’ll have the opportunity to interact with the host through engagement tools like Q&A, polls, surveys, certificates and downloadable resources. To access, or hide, these tools, simply click on the corresponding icon on the bottom row of the webinar console.

Other than that, sit back, relax and enjoy!

After the webinar ends, you should receive an email linking you to the on-demand version within a day or so. Click the link to enter the webinar.

We knew delivering live webinars can be stressful, so we helped the production team keep in touch with real-time chat and intuitive controls for controlling the webinar flow, pushing polls, and swapping out presentation content on the fly.

Providing an engaging webinar experience

Engagement is what makes the ON24 platform stand apart. And we take that very, very seriously.

When you’re asking people to stare at their computer screens for up to an hour you have to give them something interesting to stare at, it helps if you can also give them something interesting to do.

Most webinars these days include basics like a place to submit questions. But we don’t think that’s engaging enough. So, we’ve added to popular interactive tools like surveys, polls, downloadable assets, and integrated social media. We’ve also created more niche widgets like idea storming, testing and certification tools and group chat.

But that isn’t where it ends. We also built a robust suite of integrations to make sure the data collected through all that interactivity is passed to your marketing automation and CRM platforms, creating a seamless marketing data environment.

Treating always-on webinar audiences like live audiences

If you only consider the live audience, you aren’t taking the full picture into account. According to our Webinar Benchmarks Report , more than 40% of webinar attendees only sign up for the on-demand event .

That presents an interesting challenge for us on the back end of webinar software. How will we treat all those people who, for whatever reason, just couldn’t make it to the live event?

Sure, treating on-demand webinars like static videos would be easier, but then your audiences wouldn’t get the full webinar experience. When we think about webinar engagement, we always consider additional viewers who watch webinars on-demand or simulive (pre-recorded webinars, then broadcast to a live audience at a designated time).

Every ON24 webinar, no matter how it’s delivered or when it’s viewed, must have all the bi-directional interactivity of a live webinar, from moving windows around the console to the ability to submit questions — and get an answer.

Webinars have changed significantly over the past decade or so, and they’ll continue evolving as new technologies emerge. But for those of us who build the platform, the mission is always the same: to give you everything you need to engage an audience and meet your business goals.

What is a Webinar and How does it Work: The Full Guide

Discover what is a webinar and learn how to make engaging webinar content that converts your audience.

What is a webinar ?

Webinars are workshops, video presentations, or lectures hosted online .

It is a virtual presentation in which the hosts share valuable information with their attendees—like an online seminar.

Most webinars are business-related and allow webinar hosts to share knowledge, expertise, or tips with a vast global audience.

Webinars are a smart addition to your content marketing strategy . They are great way to build brand awareness and authority.

They're interactive, engaging, and with the right webinar guests or key-note speakers, they can be highly informative .

As an added bonus, webinars are easy to host, especially compared to in-person events. Instead of renting out a large venue and paying for flights and hotels, an online conference just needs a reliable webinar hosting platform and a set time.

How does a webinar work ?

Webinars can be live-streamed or accessed on demand . To host a webinar you need a video engagement platform that allows people to join remotely through their web browser or download the recording.

The webinar host (or guest speakers) will share a virtual presentation with attendees, where they explain the topic at hand and emphasize the most important points by going through a slide deck.

Afterward, the webinar attendees typically have the chance to raise queries . A strong webinar platform will have a Q&A function and question upvoting to help you manage audience questions.

Get an introduction into webinars

In this video, we explain:

• What you can expect from a webinar
• Who to involve when running a webinar
• How to create a webinar presentation

What are the benefits of webinars?

Now you know exactly what webinars are, here are some of the benefits of webinars , of the reasons they are so popular in the business, education, and marketing communities.

Showcase your product

Webinars are an excellent way to demo a product in front of an interested audience. Features can be highlighted, ensuring your prospects understand your product’s value.

Webinars provide companies with a great way to showcase their products. They can be used to educate your existing customers about a new product or features.

Hosts can learn from potential through polls and interactive chat. The data from the polls and questions asked are added to the post-webinar analytics and can help shape future webinars.

Engage, educate, and onboard customers

A user onboarding webinar is an excellent way for companies to engage users and help them achieve their "a-ha moment" with your product.

Video is proven to help users retain information , which is essential for services with a steep learning curve.

Modern products can be pretty complex, so helping users understand how your product can help them solve their pain points is a vital point for adoption.

Generate new leads and marketing opportunities

Webinars are a great way to get high-quality leads . Webinar attendees are people who are interested in your niche and open to your product.

Webinar registration can provide you with the names and contact details of warm prospects. And if your webinar is valuable, they could be very receptive to your outreach.

Additionally, webinar platforms provide detailed analytics about who attended, how long they watched, and whether they watched the replay.

This information can give you further insight into which leads are the most interested in your product or service.

Learn how we do it here at Livestorm

Increase your authority online with webinars

Webinars provide an excellent way to showcase your expertise through unique and valuable content . They allow you to speak specifically to a problem that prospects are facing and then provide them with the solution to their problem.

Webinars allow you to demonstrate that you understand the problem, know the solution and are able to help implement it.

Read more on how You can see how Recruitee used Livestrom to build their authority .

Improve internal business communication and employee training

Of course, webinars aren't just limited to customer outreach. They can take the place of traditional internal business meetings , which is especially valuable in the age of remote working .

The versatility of many webinar platforms allows you to go from 1:1 meetings to large-scale company events.

Additionally, you can use webinars for training sessions and employee onboarding. Video can help your remote employee onboarding process by connecting your team no matter where they are in the world.

Webinars benefit marketing teams

A web seminar or virtual event is an excellent way to engage with an audience or your actual customers .

By providing attendees with valuable and useful content , you can build up your engagement funnel or generate warm leads. Of course, webinars are about more than just marketing.

You can use them to educate the public, help with user onboarding, or share thought leadership on a wide range of products.

Webinars are an effective tool in your marketing strategy , to reach a global audience or engage a remote workforce.

Whether you've got interesting things that you'd like to share, or you want to use webinar marketing to boost sales or awareness, this exciting video conferencing tool allows you to communicate and engage with anyone around the world, as long as they have an internet connection.

Livestorm’s Guide to Webinars

Get the most out of webinars. Learn how to set up great webinars, promote them, and follow up on your leads.

What are the different types of webinars ?

There are lots of different webinar formats or webinar types that you can use to get across your message or reach your business goals. Some of which include live webinars, paid webinars , on-demand webinars, evergreen webinars, and more.

Live webinar

Live webinars are online presentations that take place in real-time . These live events are interactive and the audience can engage with the content as it actually occurs. Live webinars are the most engaging kind of webinars.

A live webinar is usually interactive and attendees have the opportunity to ask questions or share comments.

On-demand webinars

Just like on-demand screening services, on-demand webinars allow users to access an online seminar when they want . Once someone registers for the webinar they can watch it on-demand.

Paid webinars

Some information is too valuable to give away for free. A paid webinar can be your entire business model , with attendees tuning in just to hear your message. Some integrations can facilitate payment walls for your webinars.

Evergreen webinars

An evergreen webinar is a great way to attract qualified leads because they are always relevant, no matter what is happening in the news or pop culture.

The key to producing evergreen webinars is selecting content that is relevant for a long period of time.

Learn more about Evergreen Webinar

Evergreen webinars are a great way to communicate information that can be available to your audience either on-demand, where it's available 24/7, or as an automated webinar that can be pre-recorded and scheduled at a certain time or even on a recurring basis.

How to successfully plan a webinar ?

A successful webinar requires good planning and even better content. Here are some tips for your webinar, to make sure everything goes as smoothly as possible.

First, you need to lay out your webinar skeleton . Choose a topic and format, truly know your audience, approach guest speakers, and sort out the technical requirements. Here are all the steps to plan a webinar:

Plan and outline your webinar

• Define your target audience
• Choose the topic that will interest your audience
• Invite guest speakers
• Pick your format
• Choose your webinar platform

Create your webinar presentation

• Get high-quality video and audio
• Define your goals

Webinar conclusion and action plan

You are planning your first webinar? The first thing you need to do is define what you want to get from your event.

Is it about brand awareness? Generating new leads? Educating customers or employees on a new product?

Always understand what you want to achieve from each webinar and use this as your North Star Metric to guide and define the KPIs or business goals you want to achieve.

The next thing to consider is the script . While you may not be giving the talk yourself, you'll need to work out what needs to be said by way of introductions or between each speaker.

Then, decide which guests you'd like. Remember, valuable guests are often busy people, so contact them well in advance so their schedule can accommodate it.

Finally, your webinar will need a host. It could be you, or in some cases, a hired presenter.

Get to know your target audience

The most important part of planning any type of marketing intervention is to get to truly know your audience.

You need to be able to tell:

• If they prefer a live or on-demand video webinar
• At what time they’re more likely to join the live streaming
• What’s keeping them awake at night and how can your webinar solve that problem
• If they’ll be willing to attend or would rather consume any other form of content
• What are the type of problems they usually encounter at their jobs and personal lives

Plan your webinar content

Use your published content to define your webinar title .

Review your social media and blog analytics and spot the topics that perform best. Look at your social media comments and user feedback to plan your webinar content.

Another idea is to center your webinar around industry trends or news . Make it specific, e.g. instead of presenting “marketing trends for 2023”, host a webinar on “TikTok trends for promoted content in the first quarter of 2023.”

Learn how to create and host a webinar

Webinars are growing in popularity, and for good reason. Compared to live, in-person events, they're easier and cheaper to plan, and allow audience members to connect from anywhere. If you're interested in getting started, this video is for you!

Reach out to partners and guest speakers

Your speakers are one of the most important parts of your webinar. They should be subject matter experts and have an existing audience of their own that will be drawn to register for your event. Choose experienced public speakers to entertain (not bore) your online event attendees.

List out all of your potential guest speakers and start contacting them in order of preference. Also think about any partnership you would do with other companies.

If you have a flexible date, stick to your first or second option and adjust to their agenda.

Choose a webinar format

Webinars can happen live or on-demand. Choose which one suits your purpose best.

Host a live webinar if the content you’re presenting is:

• Likely to generate doubts that you don’t want to leave unanswered
• Designed to facilitate idea sharing, brainstorming, or networking (e.g. in breakout rooms)

Plan your event to be accessible at any time using an on demand webinar software if:

• The content is pretty straightforward and you can anticipate most of the questions
• It’s an introduction to your product or a topic in which you’re an expert

Take time to determine other considerations such as:

• The number of speakers
• The flow of the presentation (panel, Q&A session, standard presentation)

Pick the right webinar platform

To ensure your presentation goes smoothly, you'll need a reliable webinar platform .

Look for a webinar software that lets you:

• Host your expected number of attendees without crashing
• Record your session and create on-demand links that you can gate for lead generation purposes
• Create custom registration landing pages
• Invite people on stage so only they can speak
• Automate the start and end of an event, e.g. use this feature to play an intro and closing video
• Send automated email reminders
• View and export all your attendees' contact information and spot the most engaged ones

Livestorm is webinar software for companies of all sizes that lets you plan, promote, and host all kinds of virtual events, from webinars and sales calls to internal meetings.

Plus, this automated webinar software can help you follow up with all registrants via integrations with CRM tools like HubSpot and Marketo.

To keep your webinar engaging, visually interesting and to increase the impact of your talk, it's a good idea to have presentation slides to back up your talking points.

Prepare them well in advance and even do a run-through to identify and solve any potential issues you might run into. You can do this through screen sharing or integrated presentation software.

Our 5 tips for webinar presenters

In order to stand out from the crowd, optimizing your presentation and engaging your audience is key.

From incorporating storytelling into your webinar presentation, to finding moments to interact with your audience, don't miss these 5 tips for webinar presenters!

Make sure your video and audio tech is high quality

Organize a set and pick your hardware to present your audience with good audio and video experience.

There are several technical issues that can affect your webinar. Echoes, choppy sound or video, invitation emails not being sent. If you want to do things right, choose a professional webinar hosting platform .

If you plan to be on camera some or all of the time, make sure you have a webcam that works and outputs a decent picture.

You'll need to think about sound too. A decent microphone will offer a crisp, professional sound at a reasonable price.

Buy or rent a high-quality 4K camera that’s compatible with your webinar software and use an external microphone . Don’t rely on your computer-integrated options and have a backup in case a device fails on the event date.

Define goals and success measures

Set yourself specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound (SMART) goals. Define what a successful webinar looks like and how you’ll measure it.

For example, if you’re on Livestorm, you can use the analytics dashboard to measure things like attendance rate, audience retention, and poll engagement.

See how your webinars stack up on our webinar statistics page

Once the webinar is done, it's not over. There are many actionable insights that you can get from your audience .

These can be on your presentation itself or the product or service that you are using the webinar to promote.

Additionally, conducting a webinar post-mortem is crucial to learning the lessons which will improve your next webinar.

Build the best webinars

Create engaging webinars with Livestorm and delight your audience.

How to create a webinar ?

You have well planned your webinar strategy and now you’re ready to create your webinar!

Create your webinar registration page and invite people to join .

Determine other crucial steps regarding branding and logistics of your webinar marketing. Follow these steps:

• Pick a date and time
• Design your registration form
• Set automated emails
• Invite others
• Promote on social media

Share resources with your speakers

• Brief your moderator
• Host a dry run

Confirm the date and time

Confirm the date and time with all the key stakeholders . Manually block the time in their calendars after they’ve confirmed.

Then, invite them to the webinar event and let the platform send them automatic email reminders. If you’re inviting a global audience, be mindful of the different time zones before setting a time.

Build your registration page

Create your registration form for the audience and embed it on your webinar landing page.

With Livestorm, you can build your registration form and add custom fields to gather as much information from the attendee as you need. Automatically include that form in your registration page and customize your branding.

Check your email cadence

Email cadences are important to ensure a high participation rate .

Depending on your webinar platform, you might need to set email reminders manually in your customer relationship management (CRM) system.

With Livestorm, these are set automatically as soon as you create your registration page. Every attendee that joins gets a series of automated messages:

• A “thank you for registering” email
• A reminder email X days before the event
• Another reminder email X hours before the event
• A post-attendee email with the webinar recording link for them to watch on-demand Adjust the cadence and delivery time to your liking.

Send out invitations

It’s time to invite your potential attendees by email. Rather than spamming everyone on your mailing list, segment your audience and reach out to the ones that will find it interesting.

You can also use personalized fields to tailor each invitation to the recipient. Generic emails that aren’t relevant will irritate your audience and make them unsubscribe from your email list.

Promote your webinar

The next step is to promote the event . You should have some idea of who your target audience is and where they congregate.

If you have a mailing list, that's one of the best ways to get the word out. Additionally, social media is a great tool to find people who are interested in your online events.

Use your social media channels to promote your webinar . Don’t stick to your mailing list alone, find communities where a potential audience is already engaged and reach out to them.

This means joining and participating in Facebook and LinkedIn Groups and eventually promoting your webinar (watch out for specific group guidelines). You can also pay for influencer marketing or Facebook Ads.

11 ways to promote your Webinar

Looking to promote your virtual event across all marketing channels? Check out this video for 11 tips to promote your online event via your website, email, social media, and through collaborative marketing.

Share the final presentation and any other relevant resources with your speakers ahead of time.

Give them a how-to-join booklet if your platform isn’t intuitive enough, or choose a platform like Livestorm that has one-click browser-based access.

You can also provide them with audience insights like pain points, motivators, and desires to help them tailor their presentation.

Brief your webinar moderator

A webinar moderator works behind the scenes to make sure the entire event goes smoothly.

While the moderator won’t be on-screen during the presentation, they’re an important member of the webinar team. Brief them on the flow of the event, the speakers, and the actions they’ll need to handle for you.

Test your software and hardware

Schedule a practice run for your webinar several days before the actual event. Run through the slides and script with the speakers and ensure that the moderator is aware of all their responsibilities.

Ask your team members to use the webinar tools to test the microphone and camera. Consider this your webinar training for organizers.

Make sure that everyone involved with hosting the webinar is comfortable with the technology and software you’ll be using. If you run into any issues, take care of troubleshooting before the big day.

What are the webinar mistakes to avoid

People will forgive you for being nervous, making mistakes, and even a few technical glitches on one condition: that you provide valuable content .

Good content is paramount. It needs to be helpful, fresh and provide audiences the sorts of insights they can't get elsewhere.

Otherwise, some of the other webinar mistakes you'll want to avoid are:

• Under-promoting the event : A lot of organizers send reminders a week before. But don't be afraid to up the cadence.
• A boring presentation : A little interactivity goes a long way. Polls, live Q&As, and group chats are excellent ways to keep your audience alert and absorbed.
• Too sales-focused : While the focus of your webinar might be to sell products, your audience shouldn’t feel like they are being pitched. Try to help people solve their problems. Again, offer valuable content.
• Poor quality video or audio : Try and make the best product you can. Avoid presenting from a mobile phone, test your equipment beforehand, and present from a room with good sounds and no echoes.

Learn all the webinar best pratice in our dedicated guide

How to find new webinar topics ?

To keep your customers engaged and use webinar marketing to generate leads, you'll need to produce great content frequently. Here are some tips that you can use to develop ideas that will resonate with your audience.

Customer feedback and questions

Your own customers are one of the most valuable and rich sources of potential content. As the end-user of your product or service, they know and understand the pain points your product solves.

There are several ways to get customer feedback, from open-ended surveys, product reviews, social media, etc. Look for interesting questions that come up a lot. These are often the subjects your audience wants to hear about.

Key website and marketing data

Use your website and marketing data to evaluate which topics and areas engage your audience the most. It could be the pages or products on your website that drive the most traffic, your most downloaded ebook, or even your most liked or shared posts on social media.

Online research

We are living through the information age. There are resources for every type of niche or discipline you can imagine, no matter how arcane. Subscribe to industry newsletters, website feeds, follow thought leaders on social media, and read relevant magazines and websites to stay up to date on the latest news, and you'll never be short of ideas.

Attending other webinars

To keep your finger on the pulse, you should occasionally attend webinars by competitors or adjacent industries. You'll pick up ideas, new approaches, and strategies that you can use to power or improve your own webinar.

Related Posts

6 Tips for Running Awesome Paid Webinars That Convert

September 19, 2019 • 1 min. read

Everything You Need to Know to Create Your First Webinar

February 10, 2020 • 1 min. read

What are the key webinar features ?

There are many webinar tools available, and some are better than others. If you want to start creating webinars, you'll need a webinar tool packed with features that can keep your audience engaged.

Below, we list some of the things you should look for when choosing the best webinar software .

Avoid cumbersome, featureless webinar solutions

The best webinar software is browser-based, meaning they don't require you or your attendees to install software to access the event. They should be end-to-end platforms, that will allow you to organize, promote, activate and report. Additionally, you should look for a webinar solution that captures analytics.

Webinar landing page

A webinar landing page will help you attract as many attendees as possible. After all, it's the best place to describe your event and turn page visitors into registrants. Webinar tools like Livestorm allow users to create a landing page with one click and easily customize them to fit around your brand identity. Additionally, you can even manage and send promotional emails straight from the dashboard.

Activation features

An effective webinar engages the attendees. But it can't just fall on the guest speaker or webinar host to keep the attendees interested. Interactive tools like chats, polls, and emoji reactions are an excellent way to get feedback and build a relationship with your audience. Automated page redirects and CTAs during your webinar are great ways to drive conversion.

Integrations

Integrations allow you to extend the functionality of your webinar platform even further.

CRM and Marketing automation integrations are also very important when creating a webinar in order to pass the data from your webinar platform to your CRM. The Livestorm app marketplace provides integrations for more than 1,000 apps, such as Google Analytics, Google Calendar, Zapier, Slack, Salesforce, Marketo, Pardot, and hundreds of others. You can also connect Livestorm with HubSpot by using the native integration within the two platforms.

Whiteboard presentations

Digital whiteboards are another powerful webinar tool. They allow you to present ideas and collaborate with your attendees. Users can enrich their webinar content with text, drawings, shapes, and more. These compelling and creative tools will add a professional edge to any presentation.

The most important features of a great webinar platform should help you to plan, host, and follow-up after your webinar. All-in-one solutions will give you the tools you need to create powerful marketing tools.

>> Find out how Untapped New York used Livestorm to increased attendees by 84% and save time

Livestorm, the best webinar software for video engagement

When it comes to hosting webinars , video engagement is absolutely critical. An audience that isn’t engaged with the material won’t retain the information and they probably won’t take any meaningful action after the webinar is over. They won’t sign up for a product demo or schedule a follow up call or any other action you want them to take.

Livestorm is designed specifically to help you keep the audience engaged before, during, and after a webinar .

• Automated emails make it easy to invite contact lists and remind registrants to attend
• Pre-built registration pages can be customized to meet your exact needs
• Polls, chat tabs, Q&A, emoji reactions, and virtual backgrounds help to activate attendees
• Automated recordings take the guesswork out of following up with registrants

These features, along with others, allow you to make your webinars far more engaging than they would be otherwise. And higher engagement almost always translates to better results down the road.

Discover the world's first video engagement platform

Create the most engaging webinars with the world's first video engagement platform.

What is not a webinar?

By now, you might be wondering what is not considered to be a webinar. Since there are so many different ways to communicate online, some clear distinctions need to be made.

Webinar vs. online meeting

A webinar is like a live event or conference. They typically happen on a much larger scale. Online meetings, on the other hand, are typically smaller, more collaborative events. They are a lot more like a typical office meeting.

Webinar vs. webcast

Webinars generally have attendee limits. A webcast is something more like a television broadcast. TedTalk is a good example of a webcast. People are free to watch these casts, often on-demand.

Webinar Benefits: How to Supercharge Your Marketing Strategy

January 26, 2021 • 1 min. read

Automated Webinars: Benefits compared to Live Webinars

June 5, 2017 • 1 min. read

Table of content

Frequently asked questions about webinars

Is there a free webinar service.

Livestorm offers a free version of its software with some limitations on lengths and attendees. A paid version of any webinar platform will come with significantly more features and overall quality.

Can people see you in a webinar?

If you are the webinar host, you can choose to let your audience see you. If you are attending a webinar, other attendees won't be able to see you unless you are invited "on stage" by the guest speaker or other team members.

How to schedule a webinar?

Scheduling your own webinar requires a few considerations. What day (Wednesday and Thursday traditionally have the highest attendance), how and where you'll promote the webinar, and how long you plan the event to last are all factors to contemplate. 

How to record a webinar?

Webinar software tools like Livestorm come with an option to record the webinar automatically. You just have to set it and forget it. It's good practice to offer an attendee or a registrant a link to a recording after the event.

How to be more confident during your webinars?

Public speaking is a big fear for many people. But like everything, practice and preparation will go a long way to becoming a more accomplished speaker at a webinar or similar event. Just relax, breathe, and focus on the topic at hand. 

Try Livestorm for free

Only 3 minutes away from your most engaging webinars and meetings. Yes, it's that easy.

• No credit card required
• No software to install

• Design for Business
• Most Recent
• Presentations
• Infographics
• Data Visualizations
• Forms and Surveys
• Video & Animation
• Case Studies
• Digital Marketing
• Design Inspiration
• Visual Thinking
• Product Updates
• Visme Webinars
• Artificial Intelligence

How to Create Successful Webinar Presentations (Tips & Templates)

Written by: Rae Oliver

Webinar presentations have become an important communication tool for many businesses around the world, and their popularity is increasing year on year.

In fact, 83% of marketers in the United States believe in the continued effectiveness of webinars in 2022.

They are a tool for the present and the future.

If you’re looking for an effective way to reach customers and clients, market your products or services, or simply present an idea, a webinar presentation does the job. And it does it well.

Being able to create an engaging webinar is an excellent skill, and it’s certainly one you should cultivate.

To help you master the art of great webinar presentations, we’ve created the ultimate guide.

Get your creative thinking hats on and let’s dive in.

Table of Contents

• What Is a Webinar Presentation?

How Can Webinar Presentations Benefit Your Business?

Webinar presentation design tips and best practices, how to create a webinar presentation in 6 steps, 5 webinar presentation templates you can customize, webinar presentation faqs, what is a webinar presentation.

In the modern world attending events are no longer only “in-person” affairs. We're firmly in the digital era now, and virtual events are the norm. Being at the same event as someone on the other side of the globe has become as simple as clicking your mouse.

A webinar is essentially a gathering of people in an online space utilizing some sort of conference room technology. In other words, a webinar is a seminar, but on the web.

These online conferences usually involve a video presentation (aka webinar presentation) by the host or others invited to present. But they can also be used to host meetings, talks, and other public or private online events.

Webinars are especially useful in the professional world. Businesses and entrepreneurs can host meetings, present pitch decks , or conduct employee training . The possibilities are endless.

There are three main types of webinars hosted by companies:

• Pre-recorded

An on-demand webinar is a recorded version of a live webinar that can be accessed at any time after the actual webinar has occurred. Visme’s presentation software allows for the hosting of live webinars should you be looking to share your presentation online using a simple link.

Creating Memorable Visual Presentations

Raise the bar on your presentations with our ebook chock full of visual examples, cheat sheets and case studies.

Free Download

Webinars are powerful tools for growing your brand and your influence. Let’s take a closer look at how webinars can benefit business owners and marketers specifically:

Interact with customers in real time.

Just because you aren’t in the same room, doesn’t mean you can’t engage with your target audience. With a live webinar presentation, you have the ability to build stronger relationships with your customers. They can ask questions about your brand, and you can ask them for feedback to better understand how to meet their needs.

Generate leads.

More interaction and engagement with your clients lends itself to lead generation. With an interactive webinar, you can better understand what drives your visitors and how you can offer them better deals.

Holding an effective webinar presentation is also the perfect opportunity to position yourself as a thought leader and an authority within your field. By providing value to your audience through a webinar, you can demonstrate your expertise and build trust with potential customers.

Create brand awareness.

Webinar presentations are a cost-effective promotional tool to increase awareness around your brand . It’s essentially free advertising — those who attend your webinar are your potential customers. They’re already either interested in your product or services, you just need to showcase your brand in the best way possible.

This is where a branding kit comes in handy. Visme gives you the power to store your logo, fonts, color palettes and templates and apply them throughout your webinar presentation. You can also use them in your other brand and marketing materials later. This way, even if multiple members of your team are creating visuals, they can all stay on-brand and use a consistent design.

Keep these tips in mind for an effective webinar presentation that keeps your audience engaged.

1. Use the right platform.

Using a platform that’s tailored to presentation design is the first tip for webinar presentation beginners. But there’s no need to work at it alone. Visme’s presentation software helps you create beautiful, highly effective professional presentations in no time.

In terms of presentation design , Visme is all-inclusive. It allows for the creation of all types of presentations with built-in graphics, backgrounds, stock photos, videos, and shapes. Choose from a variety of presentation theme templates that will enhance the message of your webinar. These bells and whistles are what bring your webinar presentation to life and capture your audience.

2. Choose visuals over text.

Use minimal words (no more than 6 lines per slide) so as not to dampen the visual aspect of the presentation. Instead, use visual cues such as infographics, charts and graphs to convey the point you’re trying to make. These visual aids are often more effective than spoken words.

Make sure to avoid using blurry images or pixelated photos in your slides. Using high-quality images and visuals is key to capturing your audience’s attention. Visme offers you over 1,000,000 of high-resolution stock images and videos . No matter the topic, we’ve got a selection of hand-picked visuals to suit your presentation.

Want to tweak an image a bit? No problem. Our photo editor lets you drag and drop photos, and fully customize to fit your design needs.

3. Decide on a color scheme.

If there’s one thing that’s going to make your webinar presentation look professional, it’s maintaining a strong color scheme throughout. Having a mix match of random colors is going to distract your audience from what your presentation is really about.

When choosing a color scheme, be mindful of the power of color psychology in marketing. Choose colors that resonate with your brand or message. Knowing how colors combine and emit different moods and feelings will help you get better results.

To make your life even easier, Visme offers an AI-powered brand design tool to seamlessly integrate your branding colors to your presentation. Once you’ve selected your primary color palette, you can apply your chosen colors throughout your presentation to create a unified, professional look. It’s that simple.

4. Practice your presentation skills.

Like with any presentation, success isn't reliant solely on the design of your slides and graphics. It also relies on your hosting etiquette and ability to convey ideas through your words.

Listeners should walk away knowing exactly what it is you were trying to explain. Your speech and the slides you display should work in tandem to create the perfect audio/visual experience.

Have a look at these common presentation mistakes to avoid.

5. Add some variety.

No one likes a long and boring webinar. A practice that many experienced hosts like to observe is to get more than one speaker to handle different parts of a complex topic. Having multiple good public speakers at a webinar will give the audience different voices and different experiences to enjoy during the presentation. This keeps everyone interested and engaged and ensures the success of your presentation .

Lastly, you need to make sure that all of the speakers are comfortable speaking in front of a crowd. Don’t let a nervous speaker ruin your online event.

6. Include dynamic, moving visuals.

Psychological research shows that we remember things more easily if we watch moving pictures compared with static ones. The movement of moving pictures can immediately catch the attention of your audience's eyes, directing them to look at your content.

Here are just a few ideas for ways to include movement in your webinar presentation:

• Use animated transitions between slides
• Insert fully animated graphics to explain concepts
• Insert audio and videos
• Include interactive infographics
• Add popup graphics and hover effects

Here’s a short video tutorial on how you can create popups and hover effects in any Visme design.

A great example of when to harness the power of moving visuals is with a product demo webinar presentation. Let’s say you want to give a product demo on a new mobile app you’re launching. You can show your product works in real-time, pointing out key features and benefits. Seeing a video of how users can interact with the app will be much more effective than static screenshots.

By following the steps below, and adding your own touch of creativity, you can create a professional webinar that audiences will love.

1. Choose and Research a Topic

Step one is to have a full understanding of what your webinar presentation is about.

Maybe you have expert knowledge that you’d like to share with your peers. Or maybe you have a ground-breaking product that you’d like to market via a webinar presentation. The reasons for your webinar will lay the groundwork for a successful seminar.

Once you’ve chosen a focus area for the topic, start brainstorming ways to convey the information to an audience. This may require some additional research to better understand your presentation’s audience , so you can tailor the information to them.

2. Create a Presentation Outline

This is an essential step in any creative project. Whether you’re writing a book, doing a case study , or a roadmap is essential to long-term success.

Give your presentation structure by mapping out all the major points in your presentation. This will help keep you focused during your presentation. Knowing what’s coming next as you work through each section of the presentation will help you to create a flowing and easy-to-understand webinar.

3. Choose Your Team and Brainstorm Visual Ideas

The more creative minds involved in a project, the more engaging and diverse the final product will be. Having several people involved in a presentation will throw more ideas into the mix when deciding what you want to present, and how.

For example, working with others to choose the right visuals and the right fonts will be hugely beneficial. Having more than one set of eyes examine the visual aspect of the presentation will allow for a level of artistic consistency to be achieved.

Visme has a whole host of collaboration features that will help you create the ultimate webinar presentation with your team. Leave comments, tag collaborators, and share ideas, all within one engaging platform.

4. Compiling And Proofreading

At this stage, you’ve decided on your presentation fonts , colors, visuals, text, and images. Now it’s time to put all the individual parts of the presentation together.

This part isn't always easy, but luckily Visme has numerous tools to create presentations from scratch and streamline the process. Once the final product is created, proofread the project and save it.

5. Rehearse With the Team

The actual presentation requires more than just good-looking visuals and a striking set of slides . Overall success will require rehearsal and practice from all of the speakers to ensure success on the day of your big webinar presentation.

Figuring out the outline and format for webinar presentations can be challenging and unnecessarily time-consuming. Visme offers a host of webinar presentation templates that can be downloaded in either PDF or PowerPoint format for you to customize. You can even add branding to your presentation such as your logo, fonts and colors, to really make it your own.

Here are a few templates for you to choose from:

1. Finance Webinar Template

Personal finance and management is a topic that many young people are working hard to come to grips with. In the modern world financial advice is highly sought after, and giving a webinar presentation on financial literacy is a great idea. This template uses money as the visual cue and the aesthetics of financial expertise. It is perfect for conveying messages related to saving and growing your money.

2. Motivation Template

Are you the head of an office and feel as though it’s time to motivate your employees? This template is the perfect presentation to cultivate an environment of hard work and productivity. It provides an aesthetic that suits a productive workplace with a team of inspired workers. This motivational presentation provides a great foundation for a webinar that could inspire your team.

3. Business Webinar Template

If you’re someone who understands the ins and outs of the economy and the global business world, then this template is for you. The infographics presented include graphs and charts so that you can easily convey economic messages and the trends of the business world.

4. Technology Template

Do you want to showcase a new piece of technology or discuss the trends in the realm of modern technology? This template provides a brilliant futuristic-looking presentation to potential organizers and speakers. The template is clean and sleek looking, mirroring what many people hope the future to look like.

5. Graphic Design Template

The realm of graphic design is filled with color and the Visme graphic design template perfectly reflects this reality. This template is perfect for anyone looking to share knowledge and creative techniques when it comes to graphics and designs. The visual style and bright, contrasting colors perfectly represent the career at hand.

Have you still got some questions and queries about webinar presentations? We cover some common queries below.

What is the difference between a meeting and a webinar?

A webinar and a meeting are two very different things. Normally, when someone schedules an online meeting, all participants are allowed to screen share and interject into the conversation with their own viewpoints. A webinar, on the other hand, is hosted by one or more people. The invitees are simply guests who have elected to listen to the speakers of the webinar presentation.

How many slides should a webinar have?

There’s no set rule, but a good webinar presentation should have around 30 unique slides. Ideally, your webinar shouldn’t exceed 60 minutes, so you can keep your audience engaged and interested. Slides should never be text-heavy. Instead, use bullet points so that speakers can move to the next slide every two minutes.

How do you start a webinar speech?

The best way to start your webinar presentation is to introduce the audience to the schedule and all of the speakers, including yourself. Make them feel comfortable and warm, and make sure that all invitees understand the topic of the webinar presentation.

Webinar Presentations Are The Way Forward

Webinar presentations are extremely valuable in a world that relies heavily on technology for communication and collaboration. Many companies are making use of webinars to talk to employees, investors, or any other group of people that might have an interest in the services of the business. With Visme, you can even track your webinar analytics to see how many people are watching. This is especially useful for pre-recorded webinars that may get viewed at different points in time.

Whether you need to educate and inform people or simply want to share a great idea, a webinar is an excellent way to go about it. Visme offers top-of-the-range webinar technology that makes creating a webinar easy and ensures your audience is engaged right from the first slide.

Get started with our presentation software today.

Create engaging webinar presentations for your audience.

Trusted by leading brands

Recommended content for you:

Create Stunning Content!

Design visual brand experiences for your business whether you are a seasoned designer or a total novice.

About the Author

What is a webinar and how does it work? A simple guide to webinar marketing

A webinar , short for ‘web-based seminar’, is an online presentation, meeting, or workshop that allows individuals or groups to interact in real time.

With the increasing popularity of video content in marketing, webinars have become a go-to strategy for businesses looking to educate, engage, and convert their audience.

In this article, we will explore the key benefits of webinars and provide tips on how to create and host a successful one.

What is a webinar?

Webinars (web seminars) are video presentations, workshops, or lectures hosted online, usually via webinar software . These online events are usually interactive and business-related and allow you to share your knowledge with virtually anyone in the world.

Web presentations and conferences are a highly interactive form of marketing and can be used as a relationship-building or authority-building tactic. But the possibilities are endless. You can even use webinars for internal team meetings if you’re part of a remote team.

Planning a webinar is so much easier than organizing a seminar or lecture in real life. Mainly because you don’t need to have a big venue to host a large number of attendees. You can invite people from all around the globe to meet in real time, and if they can’t participate live, you can record the webinar and send them the recording later.

Editor’s note: Are you looking for a webinar platform that’ll let you run, promote, and even sell webinars in one single dashboard? GetResponse Webinars come packed with all the necessary tools that’ll help you grow your online business with ease using both live and on-demand webinars. Go ahead and sign up today to try our webinar + marketing automation + landing pages combo! Not convinced? See how our team leverages the power of GetResponse to drive success in our webinar campaigns.

What are the benefits of a webinar?

So, now you know what webinars are. But why do you need webinars?

Here are the main reasons you should host a webinar :

• First of all, they help you build a list . Every registered person is a new contact in your database.
• Online seminars e stablish you as an expert , a trustworthy and reliable source of information in your industry. They allow you to share your expertise with your target market. You can personally provide solutions to their problems, which can clear their doubts about your product.
• If you record your webinars, they will serve you as valuable content you can share with your audience later.
• By registering, people are demonstrating an interest in what you are offering – they become qualified leads , making it easier to nurture and convert them.
• They can help you train and onboard new employees in a ‘fun’ way – it’s always better to explain important issues by talking, not writing long-form text.
• Every webinar you run gives you many branding opportunities . With webinars, you build brand awareness and set the brand voice.

Michael Leszczynski, Head of Content Marketing & Partnerships at GetResponse, says:

Here, at GetResponse, webinars play an important role and not just because we provide webinar software. We use them to onboard new customers, support our product launches, and establish authority when inviting world-class experts. We also use them internally, when onboarding and training our new employees who are joining our remote offices. They’ve been great for knowledge-sharing, especially given the fact that you can record and re-use the content later.

Case study: Learn how Ravenol , a producer of high-quality automotive lubricants, moved online and started using live webinars to reach their yearly email-list growth target in just three weeks.

Webinar types

There are many types of web seminars you can use to achieve specific goals or to adjust to the needs of your audience and your business. Here are some of the most popular types of content and techniques you can use while video conferencing and planning your webinar marketing strategy. Follow by them are the most popular webinar types categorized by the goals you can achieve with them.

Keep in mind these might look slightly different depending on what webinar software you’re using.

Webinar content types

• A slideshow

If the purpose of your webinar is educating your audience, the web presentation itself should provide accompanying educational visuals – and presenting what you want to convey in presentation slides is the easiest option.

Here’s how we do it with GetResponse webinars:

A quick tip: The first slide of your presentation should have all the important “technical” info – how long the webinar will last, whether it will be recorded & sent to participants, and the agenda for the video seminar.

There’s, of course, more to creating an engaging presentation . If you’d like to learn more about the best practices, read this article on how to create a webinar presentation and this post by Chloe West .

Creating a web seminar in a live-video format is great if you want to build closer relationships with your customers or conduct a team meeting. It’s very personal, and you can show the “human side” of your business in a professional way. This type of webinar could also be useful if you’re making a video presentation of a physical product.

When you’re hosting a webinar, your audience can use the chat option to ask questions or answer yours. It builds the relationship between you and establishes your authority when you provide answers to their problems in real time. People feeling seen by you makes the connection stronger and creates a bond that keeps the customers coming back to you.

You can use the whiteboard to better visualize more complex topics. By drawing over charts, images, or mapping out various concepts from scratch, you can help your audience follow your thought process.

A quick tip: While explaining concepts on whiteboards during the web conference, don’t hesitate to collaborate 😉

• A pre-recorded webinar

If you need to do an online presentation on a specific topic more than once – or maybe you even need to do it regularly – you can use a pre-recorded webinar instead. This option is also useful if you’re doing a webinar with a guest speaker who’s unable to schedule a meeting around the time that best fits your audience.

Once you’ve got a polished presentation, all you need to do is hit the play button once the webinar has started. To make sure the video presentation remains personal and your audience is happy with the experience, you can run the chat and answer their questions live while the pre-recorded webinar is running.

This is a common practice among SaaS companies that need to run product training webinars for their new customers on a regular basis.

• Screen sharing

When your topic requires demonstrating some step-by-step in software or online, there’s no better way to do it than by sharing your desktop during your live webinar. The attendees will be able to see exactly what you’re doing and follow along. This format is especially useful while onboarding new users to your software.

You can also use screen sharing if you’ve created your presentation in a non-standard way, e.g., using Prezi. Since these aren’t based on slides, the best way to present them is through sharing your screen with your audience.

The same applies if, instead of using one presentation, you’re sharing multiple apps or files like spreadsheets. Rather than taking screenshots and adding them to your presentation, you can share your desktop and jump between different apps freely.

A polling tool is something that will provide both you and your audience with stats and information not available anywhere else. You can set it to be either anonymous or public.

Webinar types by different purposes

1. educational webinars.

If you want to educate your audience on the field you’re an expert within, webinars are one of the most effective ways to do it. To run an educational webinar, it’s best to use well-prepared slides or a whiteboard video, as it utilizes the visual capabilities of webinars.

Also, don’t be afraid to ask external expert speakers to collaborate with you!

2. User onboarding webinars

If your company is offering software, you will benefit from a user onboarding webinar the most. Make sure the learning curve is as soft as possible by inviting new users to participate in a webinar that you run for newbies regularly, for example, once a month. Run a user onboarding webinar making use of a screen-sharing option.

3. Product webinars

When you have a great product to showcase to a lot of people, turn your usual event-goers into webinar participants. You can give them a detailed presentation, including every detail, answering their questions. While running a product webinar, you’re educating the participants and getting their attention with your product, so you’re able to nurture your leads and even convert them into actual customers, making a sale. This allows you to collect much-needed feedback on your product or tool.

4. Lead generation and list-building webinars

When you promote your webinar across different channels, focus on one persona that you’d like to attract. When they register, they will trust you with their email address, and that’s the starting point. You’ll gain valuable and interesting leads you can follow up with and nurture them into conversion later. You can also host paid and free webinars with the help of marketing funnels .

5. Employee training and team meetings

Of course, running webinars to convert is beneficial to your business. But that shouldn’t stop you from using webinars for team meetings and training your employees when you have a remote team or a team too big to fit into a room together. Webinar training is the best way to pass the knowledge and teach practical skills to your employees when you made the switch to remote work, as this type of content is more engaging than written material.

6. Customer retention and nurturing webinars

While hosting inspiring webinars may be great for attracting new people to your brand, it’s equally as good for nurturing customers that are already on board with you. The personal relationship you build along the way is key to keeping them coming back. With such webinars, they can keep track of your newest products and announcements. It’s also a great opportunity for your clients to ask important questions when you’re more approachable than ever.

How to run a webinar + webinar best practices

If you’re wondering how to start creating webinars, here are a few webinar tips and steps you need to take.

1. Attend other webinars beforehand

It’s hard to imagine how to prepare for such an event if you’ve never attended one yourself. Find a few seminars with experienced hosts, like industry influencers, and register now. Make notes of everything you find interesting, starting from the webinar’s landing page to the way the speaker talks. See what you can implement in your own preparation.

2. Choose the right topic, title, and format

First of all, think of what the purpose of your webinar will be.

Is it to generate leads, grow your list, sell a product, or onboard new users?

Then, decide on the topic. What is the most important knowledge you can share with people in an hour or so? If you’re looking for inspiration for your webinar’s content, you can run through your other content’s stats to see what drives traffic to your site and what your audience is the most interested in. This step will definitely ensure a higher engagement.

Remember to be precise. It helps people understand what they’re signing up for, and it also helps you with your landing page’s SEO. Consider naming it with a question, e.g., ‘How to make a webinar sale? Free webinar with *an industry influencer*’. Specify whether it’s a webinar directed toward people new to the subject or experts. It will save you from lots of negative opinions like “I already knew that” and “It was too complicated; I need to know the basics first.”.

When you’ve decided on the topic, choose a format that would suit your webinar’s needs.

3. Choose the presenters & team

When preparing for a webinar, you’ll need to pick a qualified presenter. It should be a person who’s knowledgeable on the subject, not afraid of public speaking and answering tough questions, has good charisma, and is at least a bit immune to stress. Of course, your web seminar can have more than one presenter and even a separate webinar host.

Webinar hosts usually organize the event, introduce the presenters to the audience, and simply make sure the webinar runs smoothly. At the same time, charismatic webinar hosts can make all the difference and help your brand stand out in a crowded market.

Then, you can choose an assistant who could admin the chat and possibly answer some of the audience’s questions while the speaker continues with their presentation.

After you’ve found the perfect people who will create the webinar’s content, you can also ask someone (or a few people) to take care of the technical side of your web seminar (make sure the Internet connection is strong and that you can be heard and, if required, seen)

Webinar setup checklist

Want to be sure that your webinar is a success?

Then grab this handy checklist to make sure you’ve covered all the bases.

4. Plan out the content of your webinar

Planning is crucial If you want to construct an online seminar that’s engaging from start to finish.

Webinars that involve the presenters running through subjects in chaos and stumbling aren’t the best and most memorable. If you plan your webinar right, it should deliver on your promise and have the perfect amount of content for your audience to absorb.

The webinar’s outline

When you know the topic and purpose of your online seminar, it shouldn’t be hard to create an outline. Remember that the average webinar lasts about 40-60 minutes, so that’s the standard timeframe you’re going to work with. If you’re creating a prerecorded webinar, create a storyboard first, just like a film director would.

The webinar’s structure

The content you provide throughout the webinar should be engaging enough to keep the participants until the end. You can also tease a bonus at the start to create an incentive to keep watching. Then, it should naturally lead to a paid offering if that’s a part of your webinar’s purpose. There’s an 80-20 rule for this – make the webinar 80% solid content, and you can promote your product for the remaining 20%.

Always start by welcoming participants. Ask them where they are joining you from, and you’ll create instant engagement.

Make the participants sure that it’s the right place for them to be by specifying who will benefit from the online seminar. Also, introduce not only the subject of your webinar but yourself. Start with a relatable story to prove you’re trustworthy, and keep it brief.

Remember to always save some time in the end for a Q&A session. Mention it at the beginning so that the audience will have time to think through the questions they want to ask.

Read more : How to structure your webinar content .

How long should a webinar be?

In most cases, webinars last from 30 minutes to an hour. 60 minutes is enough time to have a 45-minute presentation and leave room for answering questions the audience might ask throughout the webinar in a designated Q&A session.

But, the ‘usual’ webinar length isn’t set in stone. If you have well-structured content that will take you over an hour to present – go for it. If you have just a short presentation, TED Talks style, you can make it a webinar on demand, as audiences tend to engage with longer video content when it’s live.

5. Prep the tech & environment

Before you run a webinar, make sure you have a camera (a working laptop camera is good enough) and a working microphone with settings adjusted to the environment you’re in. Speaking of which, choose a set for your webinar – it can be your office or even your living room, but keep it professional and ensure nobody interrupts you during the webinar. It can throw you off guard and disrupt the focus of participants.

To minimize the risk of some miss-ups, check if your Internet connection is stable, make sure your laptop charger is plugged in, or that your computer won’t start updating itself.

And it should go without saying – if you’re going to share your screen, don’t have any unnecessary tabs open in your browser and possibly clear your desktop.

It’s also best to log into the webinar room 20 minutes before the scheduled meeting and check if everything goes smoothly.

6. Schedule the webinar using your webinar software

What is the best time to run a webinar?

It’s hard to pinpoint the ‘perfect’ date and time, but the rule of thumb is to schedule a webinar for the middle of the week, Tuesday to Thursday (with Tuesday as the winner). The other days are more likely to have people vacationing. Most people will only commit to one webinar per week, so you’ll be competing with other players in the field.

While you may assume people want to attend web seminars in the afternoon when they’re off work, it’s not entirely true. Some statistics suggest that the time most people prefer to attend webinars is 10 a.m. or 11 a.m. Keep in mind that you’ll probably have guests from different time zones, and if you’re really far away from your targeted audience, you may even have to sacrifice some sleep to host. And try not to schedule the seminar for lunch hours.

While promoting your video seminar, mention that it will be recorded – people will know it’s worth signing up even if they can’t attend and that they’ll receive the recording later.

7. Promote your webinar

To run an online presentation, you need people to register for it. It’s not just the content that makes them register – it’s how you promote it. Mixing different digital marketing tools is the way to go.

Webinar landing pages

Create a landing page with an invitation that will encourage people to sign up and tell the audience everything they need to know beforehand.

First, write a short copy explaining the topic. In a few pointers, highlight what the participants will take away from it. Then, place a signup form where your leads will leave their name and email, and finish it off with a clear CTA button – the word “register” should be enough.

Don’t forget to introduce the hosts. It’s a nice touch that will set the foundation of your newly-built relationship.

And there’s the last step that you should never skip – highlight the date and time of your webinar (especially the timezone if you expect participants from all over the world).

Below’s an example of a webinar registration page we used for one of our webinars.

In this post, you’ll find more great webinar landing pages .

If you’re feeling extra fancy when creating a webinar registration page in GetResponse, you can add a countdown timer .

Banners, popups, ads

Place a banner on your website or blog in a visible spot at least a week before the scheduled date. The CTA button, again, is of the utmost importance – build a sense of urgency by using phrases like “save your seat” or “register now”. Then, link it to your landing page.

You can promote your event in popup forms on your website if you want a quicker way to get people to register.

Advertise where the people are. If you know your audience’s preferred means of communication is social media like Facebook or Instagram, create social ads that lead to the registration page.

Spreading the word

When you have a great following on social media like Twitter, you can use it to your advantage and spread the word, possibly gaining new followers along the way. Create a dedicated hashtag – it can engage the participants before, during, and after the seminar and allow you to interact with them.

Share links and tease the presentation’s content. And, just before the start of your online seminar, state that it’s about to begin – the audience will be reminded of it in real-time while scrolling their feeds.

Webinar invitation emails

You may use the webinar as a means to build your list. But what about the people that are already on it? Seize the opportunity and invite them to your web seminar by email.

Start with the subject line. To make clear what you’re promoting, consider stating it first, in brackets, like so:

If you’re partnering up with an industry expert, don’t shy away from namedropping here 😉

In the copy, don’t just communicate the details and reiterate the webinar’s topic. Address your prospects’ pain points and tell them how the webinar will help. Only then should you jump into the details and write about the overall agenda, the date and time, how long it will last, and how they can register.

I will touch on the subject of emails one more time in a minute, but in the meantime, you should definitely check out our article on how to design great webinar invitation emails .

How to Promote Your Webinar in 9 Easy Steps

Want to make sure your next webinar is a success? Promote it in 9 easy steps. In this guide, you’ll find our best webinar promotion strategies plus tips on how to sell more with your online presentations.

7. Practice

You shouldn’t jump into your first webinar without proper preparation, with the hopes of improvising. Sure, being flexible in your presentation is an asset, but practice a lot in the days leading to your seminar to make everything smooth and sound convincing and knowledgeable. Also, everyone on your team should have a bit of first-hand experience and know how to use the webinar software you’re going to use – so it’s great to do a dry run with everyone involved.

Keep away from last-minute tweaks and changes in your scenario. They usually make everything a bit messier and cause unnecessary stress.

8. Send reminders

As I mentioned before, there are more emails you should send than just invitation emails.

On average, only about a third of the people who have registered will attend your webinar, so you should really make sure they don’t forget to join you.

When people have registered for your event and left you their email addresses, it’s expected of you to first thank them for registering.

Secondly, remind them of the upcoming seminar.

Marketers usually agree that the best times to send event reminder emails are a week before, an hour before, and 5 minutes before.

One week before, encourage the registrants to mark the date in their calendar for the next week.

And the email sent 5 minutes before the webinar creates such a sense of urgency that they make up for the greatest percentage of attendees.

Sounding both professionally and personally in these emails is crucial. One of my favorite examples is an email from GetResponse’s Irek Klimczak. It asked a question in the subject line: “Will you make it today?”. This line alone gave him surprising results. It generated a 42.41% open and a 3.67% click-through rate and boosted the registrants-to-attendees rate by 5%. It also received a decent number of personal replies.

9. Run the webinar

It’s time to host your live webinar. Get ready and familiar with the number of attendees you’ll be dealing with.

Keep a glass of water nearby. Now, focus and go through the planned agenda. Don’t let anything distract you – you’ve got only about an hour, and there are many people excited to hear you. Good luck!

10. Follow up!

Now that the webinar is over, you need to follow up on it.

If you were recording the webinar, make sure to send the recording to people who have registered but couldn’t attend.

If the attendees didn’t make a purchase, it doesn’t disqualify them from being valuable leads. They may need more information.

Ask for feedback – you could use it in the future to improve your webinar endeavors. Provide them with additional resources to continue the nurturing process, and guide them through your sales funnel, converting them as a result.

What equipment do you need for webinars?

If you’re planning to host a webinar, the equipment you need is:

• A webcam (if you’re showing your face)
• A good headset with a microphone – you don’t want to use speakers, as they might create an unpleasant echo when you talk during your presentation. A microphone will be necessary to host.
• Reliable webinar software
• A steady internet connection.

Are you unsure if you can get good-quality video while presenting from your laptop? Check out what our colleague, Irek, does to improve his video’s quality in a few simple steps.

How to record a webinar?

You may want to record your webinar to repurpose it later (please, mention the recording to your audience before you begin). If so, you should find out if the webinar room has a “Rec.” button in the menu. Then, after clicking, usually, the recording will be saved as an mp4 file. Also, make sure that you don’t exceed the time limitations.

If you want to learn more, read our article: How to Record a Webinar: Everything You Need to Know .

When you’re comfortable recording webinars, consider using on-demand webinars to make your webinar available to new leads anytime, anywhere, even long after it has taken place.

On-demand webinars

When you know, you’ll be hosting a webinar so good that it could be promoted and generate leads long after it has ended, that’s when you should start using “webinars on demand”.

On-demand webinars (evergreen webinars or webinars on demand) are the best option to extend the shelf life of your live webinar. With such webinars, there are no time-zone constraints, there’s less manual work and higher engagement potential, and they’re an ongoing & automated list-building method. What’s not to love about it? See the article about on-demand webinars in GetResponse to learn more.

How to make your webinar more engaging?

There are many rhetorical tactics to make a speech or presentation insanely engaging, but webinars give you more (and slightly different) options to get your audience involved and listening.

Here’s how to engage the audience during your webinar:

• Make the waiting time more pleasant

Greet the attendees. Mention that you’ll wait a minute for the other registrants to show up, or ask the attendees where they’re from, what industry they’re in, etc..

• Start by introducing yourself in a relatable way

The attendees know you’re an expert (they wouldn’t register otherwise), so make sure to show them you’re approachable – so that they can ask questions and relatable – so that they can empathize with you, which will result in higher engagement.

• Speak with passion for what you present

Why should your audience care if you sound uninterested in what you preach?

• Make relevant comments throughout the webinar

Don’t just read aloud what’s on the slides. Allow yourself to digress in moderation, but keep the digressions relevant to the webinar or your audience. A good-ole pop-culture reference or an inoffensive joke is also a good idea ;).

• Do regular check-ins with your audience

Pause for a minute and ask the attendees if they understand everything you’ve covered so far. Make sure they’re comfortable sharing what they’re struggling with at this point.

• Answer a question

During your webinar, people might get stuck on something hard to grasp, and if a burning question pops up – answer it along the way. It will result in a sigh of relief from the audience, and they’ll be able to get back to listening carefully.

• Have the right people around

Sometimes it’s hard to keep up with an overload of questions from the webinar attendees – that’s why you should have a dedicated moderator on board. They should regulate the chat and direct its course in a professional way.

Also, if you can bring in a guest during your webinar, the element of surprise, the slight change in tone, and the additional expert to learn from will surely get the audience’s attention!

Making the webinar interactive doesn’t have to be all about you answering questions – stimulate your audience’s brains by devoting a few minutes during the webinars to a pop-up quiz. Share the answers straightaway, or make them wait until the end!

• Ask your audience for feedback

This one has two main benefits – it will make the attendees active in the comments and provide you with information on what you can improve for the future or what was great ( bonus benefit: good webinar feedback will make your day!).

How to create a paid webinar?

Free webinars are a great option for spreading brand awareness, generating quality leads, presenting an offer, or maybe even holding a meeting. But, you might be wanting to gain something more from a webinar, and you’re sure the knowledge or a skill you’ll be teaching is worth investing in. That’s when you host a paid webinar.

Remember that your audience will expect more from a paid webinar than they would from a free one. When hosting a paid webinar, try to steer clear from up-selling your audience at the end. Also, a “thank-you email” afterward will be greatly appreciated.

You can create a paid webinar funnel in GetResponse . It’s really easy and quick, and GetResponse provides you with four of the most trustworthy payment processors to choose from. With a webinar funnel, you’ll also have an easier time setting up the funnel stages I mentioned earlier (like a signup page, post-registration welcome email, a sales page, and a confirmation page). Once these steps are set up in the funnel, you’ll be able to see how many people completed the funnel and purchased access to your paid webinar.

For detailed instructions, click here .

How to participate in a webinar?

To participate in a webinar, you need to register first through a form provided to you via a landing page or a registration email. Then, on the day of the webinar, join the room a few minutes before the start (via the link provided after registration). When the presenter joins the room, the webinar will begin.

Do you need to be on camera for a webinar?

If you’re hosting a webinar, you don’t need to be on camera as long as you have a visual presentation to engage your audience with. Although, an added webcam segment is always recommended, as it makes the experience more personal and enjoyable.

If you’re attending a web seminar, you don’t have to participate on video. Unless the host invites you to co-present, neither the host nor the audience will see you. Usually, the preferred way to engage with the host is in the chat window.

What do you use webinars for?

Now that you know everything, from what a webinar is to how to promote it effectively, it’s time to hear your opinions—what do you / will you use webinars for?

If you’re curious about how we’re using webinars in GetResponse, be sure to check our Webinar Library , where we share all our past events and other educational materials.

Also, here are some tips for you if you need to know which mistakes to avoid while creating webinars .

And if you’re looking for a marketing solution that has a built-in webinar platform, too, be sure to give GetResponse a try!

1.  Best affiliate marketing programs in 2024

2.  GetResponse vs. AWeber comparison

3.  Best newsletter software tools in 2024

• Definitions
• How to Buy XRP in 2024
• How to Buy Bitcoin in 2024
• How to Buy Shiba Inu in 2024
• Crypto Gambling
• Crypto Casinos
• Crash Gambling
• Crypto Sports Betting

Webinar (Web-based seminar)

Short for web -based sem inar , a webinar is a presentation, lecture, workshop or seminar that is transmitted over the web using video conferencing software . A key feature of a webinar is its interactive elements and the ability for a presenter to give, receive and discuss information in real time.

Using webinar software , participants can share audio, documents and applications with webinar attendees. This is useful when the webinar host is conducting a lecture or information session. While the presenter is speaking they can share desktop applications and documents. Today, many webinar services offer live streaming options or the ability to record your webinar and publish to YouTube and other video services later.

Common Webinar Software features

There are many free, ad-supported and subscription/paid webinar software and services to choose from, some of the more common and useful webinar software features include the following:

• Support for multiple presenters
• Video file sharing
• Live chat for attendees
• Screen share
• Prerecord video (or voice) options
• Conference options for viewers to listen in live
• Chat filters to connect attendees and presenters with social accounts
• Other attendee incentives such as live Q&A tools, polls and feedback forms
• Live capture to save presentation or streaming capabilities
• Calendar scheduling and invites

Business webinar platforms may also offer options to integrate the webinar software with other business apps, such as CRM platforms and email marketing tools.

Image: Example Webinar software screenshot, Courtesy AnyMeeting.

Note that a webinar is not the same as a webcast . Webinar data transmission is one way and does not allow interaction between the presenter and the audience. Usually, webinar software and online services do not offer any functions or options for video conferencing or meetings.

The term webinar may also be written as Webinar.

Vangie Beal is a freelance business and technology writer covering Internet technologies and online business since the late '90s.

Login To Remo

Elevate Your Events Today!

Seamlessly host virtual events

3.2x your attendee engagement

Freely move between breakout rooms

Fully branded virtual spaces

Share this Blog Post

What Is a Webinar? A Definition and Overview

July 25, 2023

In today's digital world, webinars have become an increasingly popular means of communication and learning. Whether you are a business professional looking to host a virtual event or an individual wanting to expand your knowledge, webinars offer a convenient and interactive platform to achieve your goals. Understanding the concept of a webinar and its various elements is crucial for those who wish to make the most of this powerful tool.

Understanding the Concept of a Webinar

A webinar is a live, web-based seminar or presentation conducted over the internet. It allows a speaker or a group of speakers to deliver content to an audience spread across different geographical locations. Combining audio, video, and interactive elements like chat rooms and polls, webinars provide participants with an engaging and immersive learning experience.

Webinars have become increasingly popular in recent years due to their convenience and accessibility. They offer a unique opportunity for individuals to learn and connect with experts in various fields without the need for physical presence. Whether you're a professional seeking to enhance your skills or a student looking to expand your knowledge, webinars provide a flexible and interactive platform for growth.

The Evolution of Webinars

Webinars have come a long way since their inception. Initially, they were primarily used for training and professional development purposes within organizations. Companies would conduct internal webinars to train their employees on new processes, technologies, or products. These early webinars were often limited to a specific audience and were not widely accessible.

However, with advancements in technology and the growing demand for remote learning and communication, webinars have evolved into a versatile tool used by businesses, educational institutions, and individuals alike. The emergence of web conferencing tools and video streaming platforms has made it easier than ever to host and participate in webinars.

Today, webinars are no longer limited to internal training sessions. They have become an integral part of marketing strategies for businesses looking to reach a wider audience. Companies use webinars to showcase their expertise, promote their products or services, and engage with potential customers. Educational institutions utilize webinars to offer online courses, workshops, and lectures to students around the world.

Furthermore, webinars have also become a popular platform for thought leaders and industry experts to share their knowledge and insights. These webinars attract participants from different backgrounds who are eager to learn from the best in their respective fields.

The accessibility and flexibility of webinars have made them an essential part of today's digital landscape. They provide a cost-effective and efficient way to disseminate information, foster collaboration, and build connections across distances. As technology continues to advance, we can expect webinars to further evolve and revolutionize the way we learn, communicate, and share knowledge.

The Importance of Webinars in Today's Digital World

In today's fast-paced and interconnected digital world, webinars have emerged as a vital tool for businesses and individuals alike. With their numerous benefits and advantages, webinars have revolutionized the way we communicate, learn, and conduct business.

Benefits of Hosting a Webinar

Hosting a webinar offers numerous benefits for businesses and individuals alike. Firstly, webinars provide a cost-effective alternative to traditional in-person seminars and conferences. The elimination of travel and accommodation expenses makes webinars an attractive option, especially for small businesses and startups with limited budgets.

But the benefits of webinars go beyond the financial aspect. Webinars allow presenters to reach a wider audience. With participants attending from various locations, webinars break down geographical barriers and enable connections that would not be possible in a physical event. The potential for global reach can significantly expand the influence and impact of your message.

Additionally, webinars offer the advantage of flexibility and convenience. Participants can join from the comfort of their own homes or offices, saving valuable time and eliminating the need for physical attendance. This flexibility makes webinars particularly appealing for those with busy schedules or limited mobility.

How Webinars Facilitate Remote Learning and Business

Webinars have revolutionized education and training by enabling remote learning. Educational institutions and training organizations can deliver lectures, workshops, and courses to students across the globe. Participants have the opportunity to interact with instructors and ask questions in real-time, providing a dynamic and engaging learning experience.

Similarly, businesses can use webinars to train their employees, conduct product demonstrations, and host virtual conferences for clients and partners. Webinars provide a platform for efficient knowledge sharing and networking, regardless of geographical limitations.

Furthermore, webinars have become a valuable tool for businesses to generate leads and engage with their target audience. By hosting webinars on industry-related topics, businesses can position themselves as thought leaders and experts in their field. This not only enhances their reputation but also helps in building trust and credibility among potential customers.

Moreover, webinars offer a unique opportunity for businesses to gather valuable feedback and insights from their audience. Through interactive features such as live polls, surveys, and Q&A sessions, businesses can collect data and understand the needs and preferences of their target market. This information can then be used to tailor their products, services, and marketing strategies accordingly.

In conclusion, webinars have become an indispensable tool in today's digital world. With their cost-effectiveness, global reach, flexibility, and ability to facilitate remote learning and business, webinars have transformed the way we connect, learn, and engage with others. Whether you are a business owner, educator, or simply someone looking to expand your knowledge, embracing webinars can open up a world of opportunities.

Key Elements of a Successful Webinar

When it comes to hosting a successful webinar, there are several key elements that you need to consider. Planning and preparation, engaging content creation, and effective promotion strategies all play a crucial role in ensuring the success of your webinar.

Planning and Preparation

Planning is paramount when it comes to hosting a successful webinar. It starts with identifying the objectives of your webinar and defining your target audience. By understanding what you want to achieve and who you are trying to reach, you can tailor your webinar content to meet their needs and expectations.

Once you have identified your objectives and target audience, selecting the appropriate topic becomes crucial. Your topic should be relevant, timely, and of interest to your target audience. It should also align with your overall goals for the webinar.

Adequate preparation is also essential for a successful webinar. This includes creating a well-structured outline for your presentation, ensuring that you have a clear flow of information. It is also important to design engaging visuals that complement your content and capture the attention of your audience.

Furthermore, technical requirements should not be overlooked. Make sure that you have the necessary equipment and software to deliver your webinar smoothly. Familiarize yourself with the features of the webinar platform you are using and test them beforehand to ensure everything works seamlessly.

Engaging Content Creation

Creating engaging content is pivotal to capturing and maintaining participants' interest throughout the webinar. Your content should be interactive and informative, providing valuable insights and actionable takeaways.

Utilizing multimedia elements such as videos, slideshows, and live demonstrations can enhance the overall learning experience for your participants. Visual aids can help illustrate complex concepts and make your content more engaging and memorable.

In addition to multimedia elements, you can also encourage audience participation by incorporating polls, quizzes, and Q&A sessions. These interactive elements allow participants to actively engage with the webinar content and provide valuable feedback.

Engaging with participants in real-time fosters a sense of community and involvement, making the webinar more memorable and impactful. By creating an interactive and dynamic environment, you can ensure that your audience remains engaged throughout the entire webinar.

Effective Promotion Strategies

To ensure a successful webinar, effective promotion is essential. You can have the most valuable content and a well-planned webinar, but if no one knows about it, your efforts will go to waste.

Utilize various marketing channels to spread the word about your upcoming webinar. Email marketing is a powerful tool to reach your existing audience and inform them about the webinar. Craft compelling promotional materials that highlight the key benefits and takeaways participants can expect from attending.

Don't limit yourself to just email marketing; leverage social media platforms and professional networks to reach a wider audience. Share teasers and sneak peeks of what participants can expect from your webinar to generate excitement and interest.

Additionally, consider leveraging guest speakers or partnering with influencers in your field. This can help expand your reach and attract a larger audience. Collaborating with industry experts can also add credibility and value to your webinar.

By implementing a comprehensive promotion strategy that utilizes various marketing channels and leverages partnerships, you can maximize attendance and engagement for your webinar.

Different Types of Webinars

Webinars have become increasingly popular as a means of communication and knowledge sharing. They provide a platform for individuals and organizations to connect with their audience in a virtual setting. There are several types of webinars, each serving a different purpose and catering to specific needs. Let's explore some of the most common types:

Educational Webinars

Educational webinars focus on providing valuable and educational content to participants. They can be conducted by educational institutions, industry experts, or organizations looking to share their knowledge on a particular subject. Educational webinars often incorporate interactive elements and encourage active participation from attendees.

During an educational webinar, participants can learn about a wide range of topics, from academic subjects to professional skills. These webinars often include presentations, case studies, and practical exercises to enhance the learning experience. By attending educational webinars, individuals can expand their knowledge, gain new insights, and stay updated on the latest trends in their field.

Product Demonstration Webinars

Product demonstration webinars are commonly used by businesses to showcase their products or services. These webinars allow companies to present the features and benefits of their offerings, answer questions, and address any concerns potential customers may have. Product demonstration webinars can be interactive sessions that provide participants with a comprehensive understanding of the product.

During a product demonstration webinar, participants can see the product in action and learn how it can solve their problems or meet their needs. The presenter may use live demos, videos, or slides to showcase the product's key features, functionality, and unique selling points. Attendees can also ask questions and receive immediate feedback, helping them make informed decisions about whether the product is right for them.

Q&A Webinars

Q&A webinars are structured around answering participants' questions and addressing their concerns. These webinars foster direct interaction and allow individuals to seek expert advice and guidance on specific topics. Q&A webinars can be highly valuable for participants looking for real-time solutions and insights.

During a Q&A webinar, participants have the opportunity to engage with subject matter experts and get their burning questions answered. These webinars can cover a wide range of topics, from personal development and career advice to technical troubleshooting and industry-specific challenges. Participants can submit their questions in advance or ask them during the live session, receiving immediate responses and benefiting from the collective knowledge and experience of the webinar host and other attendees.

Webinars have revolutionized the way people learn and interact online. Whether you're looking to expand your knowledge, explore new products, or seek expert advice, webinars offer a convenient and engaging platform to connect with experts and like-minded individuals. So why not join a webinar today and unlock a world of opportunities!

How to Participate in a Webinar

Necessary tools and equipment.

Before participating in a webinar, ensure you have the necessary tools and equipment. A reliable internet connection, a computer or mobile device, and compatible web conferencing software are essential. Check for any specific requirements or technical specifications provided by the webinar organizer beforehand to ensure a seamless experience.

Furthermore, consider using headphones or a headset with a microphone to ensure optimum audio quality and minimize background noise. Having a quiet and distraction-free environment is also crucial for active participation.

Etiquette for Webinar Participants

When attending a webinar, it is important to adhere to proper etiquette to maintain a respectful and engaging atmosphere. Be punctual and join the session on time to avoid disrupting the presenter and fellow participants. Mute your microphone when not speaking to avoid background noise that may distract others.

Participate actively by asking questions and contributing to discussions when appropriate. Utilize the chat feature to interact with the presenter and other participants. Remember to be attentive and respectful to ensure a positive learning experience for everyone involved.

In Conclusion

Webinars offer a dynamic and convenient platform for communication, learning, and knowledge sharing. Understanding the concept and importance of webinars will empower individuals and businesses to harness their benefits effectively. By mastering the key elements of a successful webinar and exploring different types of webinars, you can enhance your communication skills, expand your knowledge, and connect with a global audience. Whether you are a presenter or a participant, embracing webinars can open up a world of opportunities in today's digital landscape.

Like what you see?

‍ Inspired to take your webinars and virtual events to the next level? Unlock the full potential with Remo's cutting-edge platform Elevate your gatherings with Remo's dynamic features. Sign up today and embark on a journey of unforgettable connections and growth! Book a demo today!

Related Articles

The best time for webinars

What Is the Meaning of Webinar in English?

Webinar vs Seminar: What's the Difference?

Understanding the Meaning of Webinars

Supercharge Your Event Engagement and ROI

Discover how Remo can boost your event’s attendance, engagement, and revenue

3.2x attendee engagement

Authentic breakout room networking

Interactive presentation tools

Fully branded & immersive event spaces

Schedule a Free Demo

Best Webinar Practices

Tips on creating a good webinar presentation.

Have you ever imagined that you can captivate an audience even when they are miles away? Yes, you can with the power of webinars. However, you should admit that hosting a successful virtual event is more than technical know-how. You need to have a deep understanding of delivering an engaging presentation that resonates well with your audience and urges them to take action.

Luckily, we have done the hard work for you and created this comprehensive guide on how to create a webinar presentation. Here, we will discuss all the things from crafting an attention-grabbing introduction to leveraging interactive techniques. In short, you will know all the secrets of creating and managing webinar presentations that are memorable and force your attendees to talk about the event even when it is over.

So, consider these best webinar presentation tips to transform virtual events into best-in-class experiences!

9 Webinar Presentation Best Practices 

Here are some essential tips that you should consider for presenting webinars. 

1. Understanding the Audience and Goals

The first and most important webinar presentation tip is to know your target audience. Why? Knowing your audience inside out allows you to cater to their needs and deliver a successful webinar presentation. 

To determine your audience, define your rough topic for the webinar and then find a relevant audience. You can identify the audience by considering the demographics of the audience, like age, occupation, location, education, and more. You can even search for your audience on social media groups, professional networks, etc. You can then create an outline of the webinar and present it according to their needs.

The next important thing is to define the goals of the webinar, its direction, and its purpose. The purpose denotes whether you want to inform the audience or solve a critical problem. The goal indicates what target you want to achieve with the help of the webinar. 

Now, it’s time to customize the content & deliver it to the audience. You should focus on understanding needs and offer practical tips, solutions, and insights. It would be best if you also considered using language & tone that they know. Lastly, it would be best if you leveraged attractive visuals to keep the session interactive.

2. Choosing a Compelling Topic for a Webinar

There are a lot of public speakers who try to present so much valuable information that they end up leading a dense, unnecessarily complex webinar. Cramming too much information into your webinar also forces you to rush through your points to finish in the allotted time. Hence, it would be best if you chose a relevant webinar topic that satisfies the need of the audience. 

“Slow down, and keep your message simple,” recommend the experts at Mindvalley . “It is better to deliver less information that people can actually follow and understand than to try to put as much content as possible into a shorter time frame.” It is one of the best webinar presentation tips that you should consider.

Another thing you need to focus on is researching the latest industry trends. Knowing what cooking is in your industry helps you to determine relevant and timely subjects for your webinar. Also, studying the interests of the audience is necessary. 

But the question is, how to know audience interests? Simply conduct surveys or engage with the target audience on social media channels. 

Based on the research, you can list out all the topic ideas. Look at the ideas from different perspectives and angles. Then, shortlist a few options that set well with your goals and provide value to the audience.

3. Planning & Organizing the Content

After deciding on the webinar topic, one of the best webinar presentation tips is to research, plan, and finalize the content. You need to go deeper and obtain information, examples, and other details about the presentation. You can even obtain information via industry reports, case studies, and expert opinions for the content. 

Now, it’s time to structure the webinar’s content in a way that is easy to digest. You can divide the long content into small manageable chunks. Every section should justify the header and relates well with the sequence in which it is presented. Utilize subheadings that convey the meaning of the presentation to the audience efficiently. And how can you achieve this?

The best way to present a webinar is to create and organize an outline that helps you while you are presenting. It should consist of main headings along with the key points. You also need to ensure that every section delivers an excellent message to the audience. 

Planning and organizing content will give you a highly interactive and engaging podcast.

4. Designing Captivating Webinar Slides

When you have finalized the content of the webinar and organized how you want to present it, you need to choose the slides. 

Initially, you need to decide on the template or the theme that aligns well with the topic you are presenting. In other words, the design should match the content you want to deliver, like educative, creative, etc. Hence, you need to choose color, typography, and other aesthetics effectively. You need to ensure that the title slide of the webinar is intriguing as it leaves the first impression.

The second thing you need to focus on is keeping the text in the slides clear and easy to read. To achieve the same, you need to leverage proper fonts & typefaces, integrate bullet points and make smaller sentences & phrases. 

Thirdly, people now don’t like to read the text a lot; they love images, videos & other media content. Hence, you should consider integrating high-quality charts, graphs, images, etc., into the webinar. 

Besides this, most people get bored with the text and look for examples to understand any topic. Therefore, you should include real-world examples to explain content effectively. 

Lastly, focus on keeping the branding the same throughout the entire webinar slides to pass your message effectively to the audience. It creates a compelling brand identity.

5. Deciding Engaging and Interactive Elements

Nobody likes a webinar that has a monotonous tone, as it leaves the audience to sleep. Then, how to ensure that the audience doesn’t get bored with the webinar?

To make the webinar interactive and engaging, you should include different elements like polls, surveys, and quizzes. All of these things help you obtain feedback, test the knowledge base of the audience, and spark better conversions in the webinar. 

You can also integrate various video or audio clips in the webinar to make it more interactive. Here, the best strategy is to explain complex topics through examples & case studies. 

In addition, people love to get live demonstrations of new things they are learning. Hence, explaining concepts with action helps users understand things better. This event allows the audience to become familiar with the complex idea by experiencing them.

Another thing you should include during a webinar is Q&A. It allows users to ask questions, share feedback, and get instant clarification. By this, you not only improve engagement but also offer a more personalized experience.

See Also : 13 Effective Post Webinar Survey Questions

6. Scripting and Rehearsing the Presentation

It is crucial to prepare your webinar script in advance before presenting it to the audience. It helps you to deliver webinars and create a positive impact. But the question is, what things to consider for scripting webinars?

First of all, create a script that goes well with your slides. For the same, you can outline the key points, use language that is easy to understand, and ensure each slide supports the script. To make it more engaging & interactive, you can even leverage storytelling, anecdotes, etc.

Engage, Educate, and Empower: Webinar Script Template

Craft compelling webinars with our free, comprehensive script template download.

The second thing you need to focus on is practicing the webinar a lot until you become fluent in it. But why? Speaking in front of a group is quite different than thinking about the topic in your head. If you try to “wing it” off just a few notes, there’s a good chance you’ll forget important points, blow through complex topics, and fail to connect the pieces (because, in your head, they’re already connected). How to resolve this?

Practice the webinar loud and make sure there is a proper flow of information from one slide to the next. Decide a time frame in which you want to complete the entire webinar, for example, 60 minutes. The best way to judge yourself is to ask a friend or a colleague for feedback.

One more thing you should focus on is practicing the webinar presentation along with a timer. It helps you determine how much time you are taking for the webinar. Also, keep a buffer time to handle any kind of interruptions like poor internet connection, technical glitches in software, etc.      

Lastly, record the rehearsal to review and improve the content delivery in your webinar. By doing this, you can analyze all the good things and make improvements related to the tone, body language, and flow of the webinar. You can even modify the script of the webinar and make any kind of corrections if needed.

7. Preparing for a Successful Webinar

There are several critical webinar best practices that you should consider to prepare a successful webinar. What are these?

Firstly, you need to focus on testing the webinar platform and the audiovisual equipment you will be using. You should leverage the best platform for webinars. Get a proper understanding of how the platform works. For instance, if you use WebinarPress , you should explore all the functions of the platform. You should ensure that audiovisual equipment is connected and functions well. See if your mic is working properly and delivering the perfect and clear speech. In addition to that, check the internet connection and bandwidth.

See Also : Best Microphones for Webinars  

One more factor you should consider to make your webinar successful is setting a destruction-free environment. For this, you need a quiet place with proper lighting.

In the end, you should have a proper backup plan in case of any difficulties related to technology, like audiovisual equipment malfunction or software error. 

8. Delivering a Compelling Webinar Presentation

Ensuring to deliver an engaging and informative webinar is one of the best tips for public speaking for presenters . And how do you achieve this?

Introduce yourself and your expertise on the topic. It lets you build credibility with your audience and provide them with a clear understanding of what they can expect from you.

You can grab the audience’s attention with an intriguing question or statistic or start a webinar with a story. 

Besides this, try to gauge the audience’s attention throughout the presentation by including relevant trivia, polls, chat, etc. 

In addition to this, providing actionable takeaways at the end of the webinar helps users understand things better. 

Lastly, including a strong call-to-action like a newsletter subscription or course link forces users to remain connected with your business for a long time if they like the webinar.

9. Post-Webinar Follow-up and Evaluation

One of the most well-known webinar presentation tips is to have a proper follow-up after the webinar. 

First thing first! Send them a post webinar thank you email . It’s a quick way to show gratitude to whoever attended the webinar. Also, for those who did not show up at the event, provide a recorded webinar session to all the participants. It allows participants who have missed the webinar to become familiar with the topic. In addition, it will enable all participants to revise everything they have learned and share the webinar with others.

The second crucial thing that you should focus on is analyzing the feedback of the participants through different mediums like Q&A, polls & quizzes, surveys, etc.       

The next crucial thing you should emphasize is responding to the questions & answers of the users. You can even create a frequently asked questions page that answers all the questions that users might have during the webinar.

Lastly, you can gather all the valuable insights about the webinar and make improvements accordingly for future presentations.  

By following the tips & strategies we have shared in this guide, you can design highly engaging webinar presentations. However, it would help if you allocated sufficient time & effort. 

Eventually, you can connect with your audience and build great relationships through webinars. Always remember to keep learning new things and integrating them into the webinar. 

In the end, whether you are a seasoned webinar presenter or just starting your journey, taking frequent webinars and incorporating new things will help you deliver impactful webinars, engage with your audience, and remain connected with them for a long time. 

Frequently Asked Questions

How can i evaluate the success of my webinar presentation.

To assess whether or not your webinar presentation is successful, you need to consider essential metrics like attendee engagement (via polls, surveys, and comments), viewing time, lead generation, ROI, social media shares & feedback, and post-webinar survey responses. 

How do I effectively incorporate multimedia elements into my webinar presentation?

To integrate multimedia elements into your webinar presentation, you require high-quality & relevant videos, images, etc. Further, you need to find possible areas of integration, optimize multimedia elements for quality, and then add them to the website. 

How do I promote and market my webinar presentation to attract participants?

To promote & market your webinar presentation, you can start with your existing network. You can reach out to existing contacts via email, social media, and newsletters and urge them to share webinar details with their networks. You can even create attractive webinars and promote them on social media platforms. 

3+ Webinar Script Templates

Craft impactful webinars with our free script template download.

Download Webinar Script Template

Free-download form.

" * " indicates required fields

• Published: June 19, 2023

Conduct Live and Automated Webinars with WebinarPress

Join 121,753+ webinar hosts who use WebinarPress Plugin to generate qualified leads

Subscribe to Our Newsletter

Get the latest from WebinarPress

Subscribe to our newsletter

Related article.

On-Demand Webinars: A Complete Guide to Boosting Engagement and Conversions

58% of webinar hosts make their live webinar available on-demand. – Influno The above number depicts the growing trend that’s reshaping how we think about

How to Repurpose Webinar Content?

Content repurposing is the most effective content marketing strategy.  Especially when you invest considerable time, effort, and cost in a marketing activity like hosting a

30 Essential Questions for Your Post-Webinar Survey

The final moments of a webinar don’t have to mark the end of its potential success. In fact, the post-webinar phase is a perfect time

Copyright 2024 Webinarpress Ltd.

Microsoft 365 Life Hacks > Presentations > 7 tips for creating and presenting a webinar

7 tips for creating and presenting a webinar

Creating a webinar presentation requires a blend of technical and content creation skills. A well-crafted webinar should educate your audience and keep them engaged throughout your presentation’s runtime.

If you’re nervous about an upcoming webinar presentation or just looking to hone your craft, use these seven tips to create a webinar that captivates and communicates effectively.

1. Plan your content meticulously

The foundation of a good webinar presentation lies in its planning. Start by defining the purpose of your webinar and thinking about your target audience . What key message do you want your audience to take away from your presentation? Once you have a clear objective, outline your content to build a coherent narrative. Ensure that each slide progresses logically to help your audience understand and retain the information. Here’s how to get started on the content planning phase:

• Identify your main message.
• Outline the structure.
• Create engaging and relevant content.

Tell your story with captivating presentations

Powerpoint empowers you to develop well-designed content across all your devices

2. Design for clarity and engagement

Visuals play an important role in webinar presentations. Use high-quality graphics, readable fonts, and a cohesive color scheme to make your slides aesthetically pleasing and easy to digest. Interactive elements like polls, quizzes, and question-and-answer sessions can also enhance engagement and make your webinar more interactive. Design an engaging webinar with these tips:

• Use clear, concise visuals.
• Incorporate multimedia elements.
• Engage with interactive tools.

3. Master the technical aspects

Technical glitches can disrupt even the best webinar presentation. Before you present the real deal, rehearse your webinar to get comfortable with the tools and platform you’ll be using beforehand. Have a backup plan for technical failures to maintain professionalism should anything go wrong. Follow these tips to master the technical aspects of your webinar:

• Test your equipment.
• Rehearse using the webinar platform.
• Prepare for technical issues.

4. Deliver with confidence and clarity

Learning how to give a webinar involves finding the correct speaking voice and cadence for your presentation. Nail your webinar delivery with these tips:

• Practice your speech.
• Use pauses effectively.
• Pay attention to your inflection and tone.

5. Engage your audience throughout

To keep your audience interested, interact with them throughout the webinar. Ask questions, encourage participants to chat, and address comments or questions as they arise. This interaction not only makes the session livelier but also helps gauge audience understanding and interest. Promote audience participation during your webinar with these tips:

• Encourage questions.
• Use live polls.
• Address audience feedback directly.

6. Follow up after the webinar

The end of your webinar shouldn’t be the end of your engagement. Follow up with attendees via email with a thank you note, additional resources, or a survey to collect feedback. Here are some different ways you can follow up with your audience:

• Send thank you emails.
• Provide additional materials.
• Collect feedback through surveys.

7. Continuously improve

Use the feedback you received and your own observations to improve the way you deliver future webinars. Use these tips to refine your webinars going forward:

• Review feedback.
• Adjust content and delivery.
• Practice continuously.

By following these guidelines, you can create a webinar presentation that not only delivers your message effectively but also keeps your audience engaged and responsive. Think of each webinar as an opportunity to improve your skills and c onnect with your audience over a shared interest and you’ll make a lasting impression.

Get started with Microsoft 365

It’s the Office you know, plus the tools to help you work better together, so you can get more done—anytime, anywhere.

Topics in this article

More articles like this one.

How to introduce yourself in a presentation

Gain your audience’s attention at the onset of a presentation. Craft an impressionable introduction to establish tone, presentation topic, and more.

How to add citations to your presentation

Conduct research and appropriately credit work for your presentation. Understand the importance of citing sources and how to add them to your presentation.

How to work on a group presentation

Group presentations can go smoothly with these essential tips on how to deliver a compelling one.

How to create a sales presentation

Engage your audience and get them interested in your product with this guide to creating a sales presentation.

Everything you need to achieve more in less time

Get powerful productivity and security apps with Microsoft 365

Explore Other Categories

Definition:

A webinar is a live educational presentation in which viewers participate and can submit questions and comments.

A webinar is a short form of “webinar”, it is a presentation, lecture, workshop or seminar that is transmitted through the web using some type of video conferencing software. A key feature of a webinar is its interactive elements, as it possesses the ability to give, receive and analyze information in real time. Through the webinar software, participants can share audio, documents and applications with attendees, this being very useful when the webinar host is holding a conference or an information session.

While the webinar host is speaking, applications or documents related to the topic can be shared at the same time.

• 1 Difference between a webinar and a webcast
• 2 How a webinar works
• 3 Pros and Cons of Webinars

Difference between a webinar and a webcast

The concept of webinar stands in contrast to that of Webcast, where only data is transmitted in one direction and interaction between the presenter and the audience is not possible. A webinar expands the idea of a webcast in a more interactive format. The experience tries to replicate the benefits of attending a live seminar, in which members of the audience can ask questions of the presenter and the presenter in turn can ask them to the viewers, obtaining feedback on how he is performing the presentation.

How a webinar works

To keep these elements interactive, you need a webinar technology provider, which also performs the basic service needed for audio and video. Many software packages also include the ability to schedule events with automated registration for attendees. Some integrate billing and payment processing, for those seminars that have registration fees. Chat functions and questions and answers are often subject to greater control, where presenters can view audience messages and choose whether they want to transmit those messages to all participants, ignore them or respond privately.

Webinars are characterized by the use of slides and projections, streaming content with live communication, functionalities such as chat communication, surveys and questionnaires and the possibility of downloading additional content. To be able to participate in a webinar it is necessary to have a good internet connection, in addition to the corresponding hardware equipment to be connected to the seminar, that is, microphone, webcam and headphones.

Pros and Cons of Webinars

Undoubtedly, the appearance of webinars has meant a change for distance learning, and more and more users are benefiting from this type of seminars that nevertheless have both advantages and disadvantages. Among the main benefits of webinars we find:

• Exchange of information: this is a great advantage over traditional seminars since thanks to the power of the internet we can be in a constant flow of exchange of content, opinions, suggestions, questions and all kinds of information before, during and after the webinar.
• Savings: being able to attend these conferences without leaving home means a great saving both in the economic costs of travel and derivatives, as well as the time we save avoiding having to move.
• Greater capacity: unlike a standard seminar that is limited by the capacity, webinars have a much larger capacity, which can be practically unlimited depending on their characteristics.

As for the disadvantages, we can highlight:

• Connection dependency: any failure in the internet connection or technical problems can lead to the suspension of the webinar or the impossibility of witnessing it by the one who suffers from the technical problems.
• Less presence: the fact that everything is developed online causes the impact that the west can generate in a physical way to be lost, and minimizes the interaction between speakers and participants.

Related Terms

Privacy Overview

• More from M-W
• To save this word, you'll need to log in. Log In

Definition of webinar

Examples of webinar in a sentence.

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'webinar.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

web + sem inar

1998, in the meaning defined above

Dictionary Entries Near webinar

web glazing

Cite this Entry

“Webinar.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/webinar. Accessed 24 Aug. 2024.

More from Merriam-Webster on webinar

Nglish: Translation of webinar for Spanish Speakers

Britannica English: Translation of webinar for Arabic Speakers

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!

Can you solve 4 words at once?

Word of the day.

See Definitions and Examples »

Get Word of the Day daily email!

Popular in Grammar & Usage

Plural and possessive names: a guide, 31 useful rhetorical devices, more commonly misspelled words, absent letters that are heard anyway, how to use accents and diacritical marks, popular in wordplay, 8 words for lesser-known musical instruments, it's a scorcher words for the summer heat, 7 shakespearean insults to make life more interesting, 10 words from taylor swift songs (merriam's version), 9 superb owl words, games & quizzes.

• Daily Crossword
• Word Puzzle
• Word Finder
• Word of the Day
• Synonym of the Day
• Word of the Year
• Language stories
• All featured
• Gender and sexuality
• All pop culture
• Writing hub
• Grammar essentials
• Commonly confused
• All writing tips
• Pop culture
• Writing tips

Advertisement

[ web - uh -nahr ]

• a seminar or other presentation that takes place on the internet, allowing participants in different locations to see and hear the presenter, ask questions, and sometimes answer polls.

/ ˈwɛbɪˌnɑː /

• an interactive seminar conducted over the World Wide Web

Word History and Origins

Origin of webinar 1

Example Sentences

They were able to interact with one another on the virtual platform, as well as ask questions during webinars and workshops.

We also began hosting webinars, which were interactive opportunities to not only get to know our audience, but also to provide them with something valuable rather than a sponsored post on social media.

Join our experts for this webinar as they demonstrate four key reasons a Marketing System of Record can bring greater efficiency and consistency to creative work and marketing campaigns, while allowing your team to prove their value.

For instance, if your business is currently using only the email marketing tool, consider creating a strategy for expanding that usage – integrating podcasts or webinars.

When your brand is featured on a podcast, live show, or webinar, the feature is going to be promoted across that publisher’s website and social media channels.

She had been seeking not only access to the presentation materials, but also a list of ACE members who attended the webinar.

College of Continuing & Professional Studies

• Request Info
• Search Undergraduate Programs
• Construction Management Bachelor's Degree
• Construction Management Minor
• Construction Management Certificate
• Health and Wellbeing Sciences Bachelor's Degree
• Health Services Management Bachelor's Degree
• Health Services Management Minor
• Health Services Management Certificate
• Inter-College Program Bachelor's Degree
• Long Term Care Management Minor
• Long Term Care Certificate
• Multidisciplinary Studies Bachelor's Degree
• Applied Business Certificate
• Information Technology Infrastructure Bachelor's Degree
• Information Technology Infrastructure Minor
• Information Technology Infrastructure Certificate
• Current CCAPS Undergrads
• Nonadmitted Guest Students
• Search Graduate Programs
• Addictions Counseling
• Applied Sciences Leadership
• Arts and Cultural Leadership
• Biological Sciences
• Civic Engagement
• Horticulture
• Integrated Behavioral Health
• Sexual Health
• Human Sexuality
• Leadership for Science Professionals
• Regulatory Affairs for Food Professionals
• Sex Therapy
• Transgender and Gender Diverse Health
• Inclusivity
• Applied Sciences Leadership Programs
• Counseling Programs
• Sexual Health Programs
• Current Graduate Students
• Professional Development Programs
• Search Courses and Certificates
• Agile and Scrum
• Business Process
• HR and Talent Development
• Project Management
• Writing and Communications
• Upcoming Webinars
• Webinar Archive Search
• Annual Concrete Conference
• Annual Institute for Building Officials
• Minnesota Power Systems Conference
• Minnesota Water Resources Conference
• Structural Engineering Webinar Series
• Resources for Professionals in Transition
• Discounts and Financial Aid
• Workforce Development
• Lifelong Learning
• Intensive English Program
• Academic English Program
• Supporting Multilingual Students
• Student Resources
• Student English Language Support
• Professional English
• Customized Training
• ESL Testing
• College in the Schools Home
• Students & Families
• Instructors & Counselors
• Administrators
• Faculty & Departments
• Post-Secondary Enrollment Options
• Mission and Values
• Student Stories
• Leadership Team
• Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
• Jobs at CCAPS

Embodied Communication

Too often, when we’re speaking in front of colleagues, peers, or stakeholders, our nervous system engages in the fight-flight-or-flop response, leaving us anxious and tongue-tied. We know what we want to say, but our body gets in the way. During this hour-long session, you will learn ways to recognize this stress response and then dismantle it using both physical and verbal techniques. It’s time to step out of your own way and harness your personal power to get your point across with skill and ease.

Key takeaways:

• The importance of acknowledging the moment at hand and discovering the gifts it holds
• Ways to release counterproductive judgment and convert it into useful curiosity
• Social engagement techniques that foster connection and reduce self-consciousness
• An accepting, conversational mindset that challenges our zero-sum narratives and allows us to adapt to dynamic circumstances
• The use of humor and play as a means to enliven your presentation skills

Webinar presenter Jim Robinson, PhD , has three decades of experience both as a psychology professor and as a professional improviser and actor. His workshop, “Improvisation and Mental Health,” evolved from his work in both fields and recently was the basis of his Fulbright Specialist project and Citizen Diplomacy Action Fund grant, both in Pakistan. 

Presented on January 17, 2024.

Embodied Communication Takeaways

To effectively get your message across, you need to connect with your audience. Most people can tell when somebody’s engaged with them and when they’re not. They’ll know if someone’s engaged by their eye contact, their poster (e.g.leaning forward), etc. 

Sometimes called “body language” but encompassing much more, in embodied communication we use our five senses; we use our voice and posture, the muscles in our face, particularly the muscles around our eyes and in our forehead, to send out cues to the people that we're talking to.

When our words, physicality, and vocal technique are not in sync, that is, when our body is saying something different than our voice, the people we’re trying to communicate with may not receive the message. So, with embodied communication, the goal is to find a way to relax and be in our body so that when we speak our body is supporting the words we're using. 

We can’t control other people, what they think, or how they react. But we can create communication that allows for connection that may make us more understandable, and perhaps more agreeable or more persuasive.

Things in our control are:

• our boundaries
• our thoughts and actions
• the goals we set
• how we speak to ourselves
• how we handle challenges

Those are things we lose track of when we get nervous. We begin to think that we’re completely out of control because our body is telling us that it is.

Ways to connect with our body to get back in sync are:

• deep breathing from diaphragm
• shaking our hands and body
• chanting or humming
• practicing non-judgement with ourselves
• doing a body scan and relaxing the areas of tension or stress

The above are actions we can take to get in touch with our body while preparing to communicate or present. Watch the webinar to find out what to do when our nerves take over in the middle of a presentation.

Related Courses

Communicating Across Cultures

• Sept. 12-13, 2024 | Online
• Oct. 21-22, 2024 | Online
• Dec. 12-13, 2024 | Online
• March 11-12, 2025 | Online
• June 17-18, 2025 | Online

Communicating in the Moment

• Oct. 8-9, 2024 | Online
• Nov. 13-14, 2024 | Online
• Jan. 23-24, 2025 | Online
• April 24-25, 2025 | Online

Team Communications

• Oct. 24-25, 2024 | Online
• Feb. 20-21, 2025 | Online
• April 1-2, 2025 | Online