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How To Develop Great Webinars To Fill Your Sales Funnel

Webinars are just one of the most flexible methods to attract your audience. They allow you to deliver appealing material that encourages purchasers to purchase your products and services. Thanks to the many different webinar formats, they always become interesting for your customers. But like any other content, a booming demand and lead generation webinar needs to be carefully and strategically created using the right marketing tactics.

Below, you’ll learn how to use webinars in your digital sales funnel, set them up, and advertise them to generate demand and leads for your company.

Why are webinars so effective in filling your sales funnel?

One of the biggest challenges in building your sales funnel is finding quality leads and closing deals. Webinars are essential to your integrated advertising and marketing interactions approach and demand and lead generation.

Webinars are gaining popularity thanks to engaging platforms, remote working conditions, and the need to stay current. A 2019 survey found that 58% of demand-generation marketers consider webinars “the most successful tactic for top-of-funnel engagement.” In addition, 48% said webinars “effectively move prospects through the rest of the marketing funnel.”

Top of the Funnel

At this stage, the focus is on generating awareness and interest. As a sales rep, getting prospects to talk to you is challenging because they prefer to do their research before contacting you. However, webinars allow you to combine the research phase with interaction with sales managers or industry experts. So, if you host just one webinar, it can generate over 1000 leads for your business.

The most exciting thing, however, is that this generates more than just leads. 73% of B2B marketers say that a webinar is the best way to create high-quality leads.” The better the quality of the leads, the more probable you are to obtain a response from them and close the sale. Webinars can be the key to a successful sales funnel in industries that evolve so quickly and where quotas are fiercely competitive.

Middle of the funnel

This stage focuses on nurturing leads and providing solutions to their problems. It’s important to solidify the trust and relationship you’ve already built and show how your products can solve the customer’s problem. This way, your customers can quickly get to the bottom of the funnel.

Goal #1: Share information

When your customers are trying to gather information about your product, a live webinar allows them to ask questions and get answers quickly. You can also conduct product demonstrations so they can see and hear firsthand how easy and effective your product is.

Goal #2: Relationship building

By monitoring your audience’s questions and interactions, you can learn more about them, which helps you personalize your marketing and build better relationships. As you continue to nurture customer relationships, webinars are also helpful in creating emotions that influence your buyers.

One study found that consumers’ subconscious emotions significantly impact buying decisions. So if you host a webinar that creates a human connection from the start, you’ll be better positioned to nurture and convert your leads.

The lower part of the funnel

Lastly, purchasers are curious about your goods and services but need one last push to convince them. With a webinar, you can answer your customers’ final questions immediately. Showing live product demonstrations and case studies and discussing post-purchase support and customer experience are great ways to get your buyers to buy your product.

Webinars have also proven effective at the end of the funnel due to their incredible conversion rates. While an email campaign might achieve a 1-5% conversion rate, a webinar can have a conversion rate of around 20% – four times that of the best email campaign.

Seven essential steps to creating a successful webinar for demand and lead generation

Webinars are essential in all stages of the electronic sales funnel for demand/lead generation and conversion. However, if done correctly, they can be beneficial to your business. For example, you can lose your leads if you offer inappropriate or uninteresting content.

Here are seven steps to creating a successful webinar to avoid these mistakes and get the most out of your content.

1. Determine the goals you want to achieve

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It’s essential to be clear about what you want to achieve, as this will assist you in deciding on your target market, the content, and the format of your webinar. Depending on your digital sales funnel stage, you may have different goals, such as generating demand or leads, increasing interest in your product, converting leads into loyal customers, and increasing demand.

When you have a goal in mind, you can tailor the rest of your webinar planning around those goals. That way, you’ll be better able to achieve the desired results and know what to measure to determine the webinar’s success.

2. Understand your target audience

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Once you’ve established your goals, it’s time to determine your target audience. Consider the industry, specific companies, and the people in the organization you want to reach. Based on this information, you can figure out what problems they face and what they need to do to solve them.

When you understand your target audience, you can create relevant and personalized web content, item offers, qualified concerns, and many more efficient projects to promote your webinar.

Read more: How to keep your audience engaged in a webinar presentation

3. Establish content based on your target audience, phase of the funnel, and goals

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You can share a range of content, such as information concerning your products/services, details about the issues in your customers’ industries, product demonstrations, etc. Despite the type of web content you choose, guarantee you align it with your goals and your target audience’s demands.

Also, consider the stage of the digital sales funnel you’re targeting. For example, if you’re nurturing your leads, it’s better to choose content that highlights the benefits of your product and positions you as the best in the market.

4. Four different types of webinars

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  • Panel: In this type of webinar, you can invite several people from your company to share their knowledge and experience. You can even invite industry leaders to discuss their industry issues to generate leads. These webinars are best suited for top-of-the-funnel and middle-of-the-funnel webinars where you are trying to generate leads and need for your product or services.
  • Q&A: This kind of webinar is more interactive and appealing. One or more speakers from your company answer questions from your audience. Q&A webinars are best when you are in the final stages of trying to answer any lingering questions about your product. This type of interaction is also what makes a compelling webinar. Research has shown that 92% of visitors intend to finish the webinar with a Q&A session, so you must include this in all webinars.
  • Interview: There is typically a speaker and a recruiter in this layout. It is best matched if you are trying to verify your expertise and expertise on top of the sales funnel.
  • Individual Presents: This webinar is best if you share specific information, case studies, and details about your product/service or acquisition cost.

Each webinar is appropriate for a specific phase of the digital sales channel and the goal you are trying to achieve. So select the webinar style that will help you achieve your goals.

5. Find your presenter

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Choosing your presenter is an essential step for the success of your webinar. Nothing ruins a webinar like a monotonous, uncharismatic speaker. Recent research found that 52% of attendees say webinars are more enjoyable with a good speaker. A personable, enthusiastic, and charismatic presenter can make the webinar more engaging and leave a lasting impression that will encourage your customers to buy your product.

A webinar provides personal interaction, allows you to build relationships with your buyers, and engages emotions in the decision-making process. It is well known that emotions and mood influence consumer behavior. So if you put your customers in a positive mood, they are more likely to buy your product.

6. Create your visual aids

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If you have decided to have a one-person presentation, you must create a PowerPoint presentation. If you choose a different format, create handouts or infographics that your audience can download or use to follow along with the presentation.

7. Determine the time and place

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After planning the webinar, you must determine when it will be broadcast. Research has shown that mid-week, Tuesday through Thursday from 10-11 a.m., is the best time to conduct it. It would be best if you also determined the length of the webinar. If the webinar is too long, you risk losing customer engagement.

However, if it is too short, it may not be seen as valuable. It has been noted that “67% of registrations are for 60-minute webinars,” as opposed to only 8% for 30-minute webinars. So, webinars that are an hour long are optimal.

When considering where to host your webinar, consider your technical capabilities, budget, and the various webinar services/software available.

How to make sure your webinar fills your sales funnel

Creating a booming demand and lead generation webinar continues. After you’ve planned and created your company’s webinar, it’s important to start advertising to generate interest and attract attendees.

Advertise

When promoting your webinar, you must create a registration page for the webinar that contains relevant, honest, and engaging information. That is the page you will use in your promotional efforts, so it should be user-friendly and pique the curiosity of your target audience.

However, it’s essential that you only provide accurate information about the content of your webinar because if your attendees get the value they signed up for, you’ll retain those leads.

Now you’re ready to start promoting. How you promote your webinar depends on a few factors. For example, your budget, the channels where your audience is most active, and the stage of the digital sales funnel are essential. It’s important to know that “59% of registrations occur in less than a week before the webinar,” so it makes sense to advertise extensively at this time.

There are four main advertising methods

  1. Social media: This method works best if you are at the beginning of the funnel and trying to create demand and awareness for your product. By spreading the word about your webinar on social media, you’ll reach a wider audience and see more registrations and attendees.
  2. Your website:  You can target buyers who are already interested in and researching your business through your website. That works best for the top and middle of the funnel.
  3. Email campaign: That is especially useful for the middle and end-of-the-funnel. You can contact high-value leads directly using the email list of current customers and prospects you’ve built at past webinars. Email is very effective and has historically generated 57% of webinar registrations.
  4. Paid Advertising:  Paid advertising allows you to target specific audiences and get prime ad placement. That is best suited for the top of the funnel when you are trying to generate awareness and demand. However, using some free methods above is better and still effective if you need more money for paid advertising.

Follow-up

You promoted the event, generated significant interest, and created an excellent and informative webinar! But the work continues beyond there. Follow-up is just as necessary to demand and lead generation as creating a good webinar.

Following up with buyers at the top or middle of the funnel helps them move to the next stage. If your customers are at the bottom of the funnel, following up can help you improve the customer experience, stay in touch with them, and ultimately drive more trust, loyalty, and sales.

Here are four things you can do in the follow-up phase

1. Send a follow-up email to all registered customers: All registered attendees should receive a recording of the webinar. Be prepared to send a different email to those who attended than to those who did not. You can further segment your list and email sequences if you have a platform that captures attendees from the entire webinar.

  • Those who attended: Thank your viewers for taking the time to attend the webinar. If they participated in the entire webinar, encourage them to share it and refer back to it. If they only attended part of the webinar, encourage them to watch the recording. At this point, you can also make an offer, encourage them to book a meeting or demo, ask questions, or whatever the following desired action they hope to take from the webinar. A short feedback survey can help you determine what to improve in future webinars.
  • Those who didn’t attend: Send them an email encouraging them to watch the webinar. Share a webinar recording with an offer or call to action.

2. Send follow-up content: If customers have learned about your product but need more time to be ready to buy, you can engage them in a lead-nurturing campaign. If your audience was at the beginning or middle of the funnel, you could send information about future or past webinars with similar topics.

That is also an excellent time to point them to other blogs, whitepapers, or videos. If prospects are in the middle or final stages of the sales funnel, you can offer them a free trial, demo, or case study.

3. Identify your qualified leads: First, know who your ideal target audience is. Target your webinar to their problems at the right stage of the funnel. Also, promote it through the right channels. Then you’ve taken all the proper steps to target your ideal audience. However, as a rule, you should limit the questions in the registration form to encourage attendees to sign up. So you can only sometimes tell how qualified a lead is based on the signup form. There are other ways to determine qualified leads.

Gather more information to determine sales opportunities: During the webinar, you can gather more information about your attendees.

  • Conduct surveys and ask questions to get attendees to tell you more about themselves. Inquire about their problems, industry, company size, etc., to narrow down the most qualified participants for follow-up.
  • Evaluate the most interested attendees to focus your follow-up on those best suited for sale.
  • Track attendees who attended the entire webinar and those who attended only partially or not.

Some of the benefits of being a webinar host are

1. Increased reach and engagement

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With a webinar funnel, you reach a larger audience with your message and ensure that more people stick around throughout the webinar. That’s because people interested in what you say are more likely to sign up for your webinar, and those who attend will stick around until the end.

2. More leads and sales

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Webinars are a fantastic means to produce leads and sales. Using a webinar channel, you can raise the variety of people who enroll in your webinar and the conversion rate of those who attend. That means more leads and sales for your business.

Read more: How to generate leads with webinars Why should you host webinars?

3. Greater trust and credibility

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When you host a webinar, you can build trust and credibility with your audience. After all, people are more likely to believe you when they see you speak on video than when they just read text on a website or in a blog post. Webinars also allow you to establish yourself as an expert in your field, further increasing trust and credibility.

4. Improved SEO

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Webinars can also help improve your website’s search engine optimization. That is because webinars are often recorded and available afterward so people can find them in search engines for relevant keywords. In addition, transcripts of webinars can also be used to create blog posts or other content, which can further improve your website’s search engine optimization.

5. Increased brand awareness

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By hosting a webinar, you can increase your company’s brand awareness. That is because your webinar attendees will see your company’s name, logo, and other branding elements you use during the event. Promoting your webinar through social media or other channels will also help increase brand awareness.

6. Improved customer relations

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Webinars can also help improve relationships with your customers. That is because they allow you to connect with your audience and build a relationship with them. Offering valuable content during a webinar can further strengthen your relationship with your customers.

7. The ability to scale your business

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Another benefit of a webinar funnel is that it can help you grow your business. That is because webinars can be easily automated and distributed to a large audience with minimal effort. Plus, they can be recorded and used as everlasting content to generate leads and sales long after the live event ends.

How can you track the success of your webinar funnel and optimize it for better results?

Do you run webinars to generate leads and grow your business? Then it’s essential to track the success of your webinar funnel and optimize it for better results.

There are some key metrics you should track:

  • Several people sign up for your webinar.
  • Number of people who attend your webinar
  • Number of people who purchase your product or service after attending your webinar

To track these metrics, you can use a tool like Google Analytics or Kissmetrics. Once you know how your webinar funnel works, you can optimize it for better results.

Here are some tips for optimizing your webinar funnel

  • Make sure you’re promoting your webinar to the right audience.
  • Send reminders to people who have signed up for your webinar.
  • Contact people who attended your webinar and offered them a discount on your product or service.
  • Keep screening and also exploring to figure out what jobs are best.
  • Tracking the success of your webinar funnel and tweaking it for better results will help you generate more leads and grow your business.

Ways to improve your webinar

With the right software, you can increase efficiency and choose one of the best webinar platforms. You also need to analyze the data you have collected from your webinar. That will help you determine how to improve your results next time.

The first important metric you should look at is the attendance rate. While this varies from industry to industry, a rule of thumb is that 40-50% of registered attendees represent good participation. Next, you should look at how many of your customers stayed to the end to determine how much value the webinar added.

A retention rate of 80% is considered good. Analyze the feedback survey you sent to attendees to fill in the gaps. Then review the questions you were asked during the webinar. That will assist you in determining if there is content you need to explain in more detail. Also, review your promotions. Ensure the visuals are engaging and informative to maintain your attendees’ attention.

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