The Webinar Blog

Do You Know Your Webinar Audience?

Over the last two weeks I have moderated events for several clients serving international audiences. Looking back on the webinars, I am struck by some of the differences I saw.

One of my clients has been hosting professional development web conferences for grade school teachers around the world. We have had attendees from countries as diverse as Zambia, Angola, Sri Lanka, China, Singapore, Norway, South Africa, and dozens more. I repeatedly saw people logging in an hour before start time. When I greeted them, many spoke tentatively about this being their first experience with this “new and unfamiliar technology.” Many were noticeably anxious about the experience, and asked me what they needed to do.

I assured them that they could just relax and let us (on the presentation team) do all the driving. I showed them how to type chat messages and use their microphone to communicate. We ran polls during the sessions, we showed slides, we demonstrated web sites. And at the end of the webinars, they were enthusiastic and called for more such virtual get-togethers. It is easy to forget that there are still many people outside of the high tech and professional B2B communities who have not yet used web conferencing at all.

Another client ran thought leadership webinars for professionals in a particular field. The same content was presented at different times – convenient for Europe and convenient for the USA. The audience makeup was the same, the content was the same, the promotion and communications were the same. But the attendee behaviors were different.

Many of the Europeans logged in 20-30 minutes before the announced start time. They wanted to make sure everything worked properly and they didn’t want to miss anything up front. When I typed messages to the audience as a group, I got back many personal confirmations or responses, as if we were having a one-to-one conversation. It felt like ten years ago in America, when business webinars were accepted, but still something of a novelty that was worth making a special effort to attend.

On the American version of the webinar, I was all alone 15 minutes before start time. Ten minutes to go, and there were still only two or three attendees. Most of the audience joined within 1-2 minutes on either side of the announced start time. When I typed messages to the group, I received few (if any) responses. People knew they didn’t have to treat each chat message as a personal conversation. Questions were comingled with sometimes sharp commentary about presenter statements they didn’t agree with.

It was a much more business-like and impersonal vibe. These US audiences treated webinars as a commonplace, and had no doubt been burned too many times by poorly organized, poorly delivered business webinars that started late and took too long to deliver value.

The takeaway is that you should be cautious of ascribing your own level of web conferencing familiarity, comfort, and behavior patterns to your audiences. There is still a wide spectrum of user expectations and knowledge about webinars, and you need to be ready to respond to their needs rather than your own.

 

Technorati Tags: webinar,web seminar,web conference,web conferencing,webcast,webcasting,web meeting,online conferencing,online meeting

Webinar Training For Guest Speakers

Let’s talk about supporting guest speakers who have been invited to share their expertise as a one-off presentation. Sometimes they get a short familiarization/rehearsal session ahead of time. Sometimes they say, “Oh it’s all right. We can cover how things will run in that half-hour before start time.” In neither case is a class on speaking techniques welcomed or appropriate. The goal is to spend the minimum time possible to make the guest speaker feel comfortable and familiar with the technical environment, with maybe a quick tip or two to help them come across better on the webinar.

I usually stick with just a few pointers in terms of speaking style. I urge the presenters to “go big” and put much more energy, enthusiasm, and forcefulness in their voice than they are used to. People simply cannot understand how boring their normal speaking voice sounds on a 20, 30, or 40 minute presentation to a remote audio-only audience.

I reinforce the need for crisp, clear, audio – prohibiting the use of speakerphones or cell phones.

And I tell them they need to practice the entire presentation ahead of time to work out their timings and to feel comfortable with their choice of words and presentation flow.

When it comes to technical familiarization, I am bemused by my clients who want to go over every last feature of the web conferencing platform, overwhelming their guest speakers. I try very hard to cut down the operational overview to the minimum number of things the presenter needs to know. How to move slides forward, where to find audience questions, how to see and type private messages behind the scenes.

Once they have those basics, I assure them they are good to go just with those few items. Then I try to judge their interest, technical sophistication, and presentation needs to add on a few optional activities. “By the way… we can add a poll if you would like. Let me show you what that would look like.”  “By the way… You can highlight items on your slides by drawing with this arrow pointer or highlighter tool.”  “By the way… You can direct-access a slide out of sequence by clicking over here, perhaps to reference it during Q&A.”

For some of the web conferencing technologies I use a lot, I have created little slide decks to help me point out the key features of interest. I take screenshots of the platform tools so that I can show them as I explain each one. I find it frustrating and inexplicable that the web conferencing vendors do not make these orientation aids available to their customers. A simple slide deck with isolated screen shots of the various commands and controls used by presenters would be invaluable in conducting orientations. Moderators or hosts could use the pieces they want to focus on with their guest speakers.

If you are a vendor, I urge you to create a PowerPoint file with the presenter’s view of the console, in full and in detailed closeups of the controls they are likely to use. Make it available for free download to your customers.

I don’t mind picking through your slides and choosing the controls I want to highlight, in the order I want to talk about them. I don’t mind adding my own little animations and highlights on the slides. I don’t mind developing my own script. I don’t need you to do any of that. I just need you to give me some ready-to-use pictures of your software controls.

And fer gawdsake, update it when you update your GUI… I can’t believe how many vendors continue to use old versions of their product screenshots on their own orientations!

Technorati Tags: webinar,web seminar,online seminar,presentation tips,speaking tips,presenter training,speaker training,webcast,webcasting,web conference,web conferencing

Following Up After A Lead Gen Webinar

I gave a public presentation on the “Secrets of Lead Generation Webinars” last week. One of my tips was to follow up quickly with attendees and no-shows. Same day is excellent. Next day is acceptable. After that, the effectiveness of your webinar as a lead-propulsion tool diminishes incredibly swiftly.

Sure enough, the webinar host waited a mere 24 hours to send out the archive recording link and the handout I had prepared for attendees. In that time I had already received four emails asking me where the materials were. And I was just the guest speaker, not the host!

I also received an email from an attendee asking for help in figuring out what to say as an opener when following up with registrants after the event. That’s a tricky question to answer in the abstract. Much depends on what your webinar was supposed to accomplish, what your call to action was, and what kind of audience you were targeting. But I attempted to put together a few possibilities that can be massaged as needed to suit your situation. In no particular order, here they are:

1) I noticed you asked some questions about our product/service during the webinar, and I wanted to get back to you and see if I can help answer those.

2) We appreciate you taking the time to watch our webinar. I know that information was a little generic since we had to speak to a large audience, so I wanted to see if I could help focus the tips to help you apply them to your business or your particular needs.

3) I’m sorry you weren’t able to attend our live webinar yesterday. I wanted to make sure you had received the link to watch the recording and to introduce myself so you know who to call if you have questions after watching it.

4) Thanks for watching yesterday. I wanted to follow through on our promise that we would reach out with some additional information on the subject. I have a <white paper/datasheet/trial offer> that can give some extra value for your company. Are you the right person to send that to?

As that last line indicates, follow up materials might include more detailed info on your product/service or a free trial/discount offer. You might like to send a reading list with links to other articles, blog posts, and materials on the web that are related to the topic. “For more detail on this subject, you might like to use this list of resources we assembled for you.”

The main goal is to keep the conversation framed in terms of value to the person on the other end of the line, not in terms of what you want. You both know that you want their money! But you have to approach them from a standpoint of altruism. Your follow up has to be about continuing the distribution of value from your company to theirs. Make sure your sales and marketing team making the calls or sending the emails understands that and buys in to the philosophy.

 

Technorati Tags: webinar,web seminar,online seminar,lead generation,marketing,webcast,webcasting,web conference,web conferencing

KRM Publishes Webinar RFP Guide

Six years ago I wrote a blog post with some tips and cautions for companies that use a formal Request For Proposal (RFP) when inviting vendors to compete for their web conferencing business. It was based on a quick list of suggested questions in an eWeek article and I pointed out that eWeek’s questions left a lot of room for open interpretation and apples-to-oranges comparisons.

Fast forward to today and a pamphlet I received via good old US Postal Service mail. It is a 23-page guide to constructing RFP questions and interpreting answers from webinar technology and service providers. KRM Information Services created the document and is making it available for free. All you have to do is go to www.krm.com/rfp and click the big orange Download button. Astonishingly, you don’t even have to fill out a form… They’re just giving it away without even taking your name and email address. Wow, is THAT ever refreshing!

The guide contains sample questions grouped into a variety of high-level categories. Each question has tips associated with it to help you understand why the question is important and how you should think about the answers you receive.

As they say on TV: “But wait! There’s more!” The guide also contains a download link that lets you save a clean copy of the entire question set without the explanatory tips. It’s in normal Microsoft doc format and you can edit it to your heart’s content to create your own customized RFP with the questions that are important to you.

This is an incredible asset for enterprise organizations that have to go through a formal purchase review and competition process. But even if you don’t use RFP’s in your purchase decisions, you owe it to yourself to download the guide and read through the questions to help understand differences between webinar products and vendors.

I have to hand it to KRM. This is altruism above and beyond the call of duty.

 

Technorati Tags: KRM Information Services,RFP,webinar,web seminar,web conference,web conferencing,webcast,webcasting

Another New Cisco Collaboration Head

Cisco wrote in a blog post that OJ Winge is out and Rowan Trollope is in as the new leader for its Collaboration Business. That includes Cisco TelePresence, Cisco Unified Communications Manager, and Cisco WebEx.

What is interesting about this is the fact that Winge held the position for less than five months, replacing another short-timer before that. Cisco has been shuffling the deck with executive arrivals and departures for more than a year, causing industry watchers to raise a virtual eyebrow in columns on CRN and Network World. I thought it was interesting that both Jim Duffy and Chad Berndtson used the phrase “Cisco’s struggling collaboration group/business unit.” This refers to the fact that the collaboration unit saw an 8% decline in revenues in the latest quarter. But it also seems to acknowledge the revolving doors at top management levels.

My interest in this blog lies in just a small subset of Cisco’s total collaboration picture. I focus on WebEx – and particularly WebEx Event Center for use in webinars and webcasts. In September I wrote a post about Event Center’s stagnation in features and functionality. In June and July of this year, I looked at warning signs for WebEx in Cisco’s use of the brand name to encompass more and more loosely associated products and application uses – potentially leading to a lack of focus and a lack of definition as a solution for any customer’s particular business needs.

A few of my recent clients have had me working with WebEx Event Center and Meeting Center much more frequently and intensively for the past couple of months than I had been for a year or two. I find going back to WebEx after using its more progressive competitors uncomfortably like visiting the past in far too many ways. I am frustrated by inflexible operations, delays in getting data, and poorly handled visual displays.

When webinar products were novel and evolving, it was easy to overlook little restrictions on functionality in favor of WebEx’s relative stability and support infrastructure, as well as basic functionality that others had not yet implemented. But I can’t overlook those same limitations at this point. The world has moved on and WebEx Event Center hasn’t.

Maybe the future for Cisco collaboration is purely in peer-level social networking, unified communications, and large corporate video telepresence. Support for one-to-many webinars seems to be far down on Cisco’s priority list. I feel more and more like Cisco WebEx is following the path taken by Microsoft Live Meeting. Eventually the market-leading product we all used will simply disappear into a larger suite of generalized communication and collaboration utilities, sold as a generic platform rather than as a specific solution for a particular need.

In my eyes, more the pity.

Technorati Tags: Cisco,WebEx,Event Center,Rowan Trollope,OJ Winge,online collaboration,unified communications,unified collaboration,webinar,web seminar,web conferencing,web conference,web meeting

Does This Picture Make Me Look Phat?

When I spoke recently at The Presentation Summit, I took advantage of an offer for a quick off-the-cuff photo shoot by conference photographer Rikk Flohr. He was snapping photos of attendees off to one side of the main ballroom with a simple little light and backdrop setup.

With no makeup or prep, he managed to get some pretty nice shots and digitally enhanced them for me. I was surprised and pleased to find that unlike most of my previous attempts to get a good business head shot, these managed to NOT make me look like the “before” picture in a magazine ad.

I’ve been using my current head shot for a long time. What do you think, dear readers… Should I update my standard reference picture with one of these? Which do you like the best? Scroll down to vote in the poll.

Many thanks to Rikk. If you need a conference photographer, I recommend his work. He managed to capture people and activities without being intrusive.

Click here to vote and see current results.

PICTURE 1:

 

PICTURE 2:

 

PICTURE 3:

 

PICTURE 4 (my existing photo):

 

Click here to vote and see current results.

 

Technorati Tags: Ken Molay,Rikk Flohr

Click here to vote and see current results.

A Look At The Gartner Web Conferencing Magic Quadrant

David Chao was kind enough to publish Gartner’s 2011 Magic Quadrant for Web Conferencing on his Web Conferencing Blog. Go take a look and read it there. Note that the results are based on research as of November 2011 – Not 2012.

The Magic Quadrant concept has been a massive success for Gartner over the years. It also drives vendors up the wall. Gartner has many criteria for inclusion/exclusion of vendors and products. You have to look far down the writeup to see why some are mentioned and others are not.

I find this quadrant frustrating because it mixes and matches several different things in an attempt to be all-encompassing. I find the results hard to use for practical purchase decisions.

I don’t mind Gartner’s look at the vendor’s business strengths as a company. The “Ability to Execute” axis is not a bad guide to overall vendor strength and stability. But “Completeness of Vision” is simply a mess in this case. Gartner lists their own requirements for functionality, which are a subset of web conferencing features and include no guide to relative weighting. They throw together products intended for peer-level collaborative use, structured one-to-many lecture purposes, and eLearning. Their write-up doesn’t even mention scheduling, event registration, or attendee communications – to pick some obvious areas that are hypercritical in many webinar use cases.

So take it with a grain of salt. But a big thank you to David for sharing the research.

Technorati Tags: David Chao,The Web Conferencing Blog,web conferencing,web conference,webcast,webcasting,webinar,web seminar,web meeting,online seminar,online meeting,Gartner Magic Quadrant

Tips For Lead Gen Webinars

Citrix (makers of GoToWebinar) have asked me to be a guest presenter next week in an online educational web session. I will be sharing tips on ways to make your marketing / lead generation webinars more effective. I can’t speak for the gang at Citrix, but I promise you this in my presentation… Absolutely NO selling of myself, my services, books, white papers, or anything other than tips, recommendations, and best practices.

It’s all free. Just register and log in.

The webinar is scheduled for Thursday, November 15. It should last 60 minutes, starting at 11am Los Angeles / 2pm New York. You can get more details and a link to the registration page from my Upcoming Events page at www.effectivewebinars.com

See you online!

Technorati Tags: webinar,web seminar,marketing,lead generation