Webinars have been around since 1996, but can still be thought of as a relatively new technology.
As such, although marketers have realized the power of webinars as part of their marketing strategies, we are still learning about best practices and what works best.
There are however, experienced marketers who have learned how to maximize sales conversions via webinars and small business owners can certainly learn from them in order to increase their own sales
The webinar pros who offered these expert suggestions include:
- Russell Brunson
- Neil Patel
- David Siteman Garland
- John Lee Dumas
- Steven Essa
- com
- Kimra Luna
- John Lee Dumas
- Amy Porterfield
Before delving into the ideas, the technology you choose for hosting is vital.
This is because of the features each one provides, and which are necessary to maximize results. If you’re just starting out with webinar hosting, you may first want to try a free webinar service like Clickmeeting, who provides everything you need to prepare, promote, run and track a webinar.
Once you get the basics in place, it’s time to optimize your results, and sales conversions:
Before The Webinar
- On the webinar landing page, list the benefits with supposed prices: list the benefits with the supposed price of each on the right. At the end of the list, give a much lower number for how much they will actually pay for all of it.
Here’s an example: “I’m going to teach you about the human body. What this entails is the immune system, which is worth $400. I’m also going to teach you about the skin, and that’s worth $210. You’ll learn about how the eyes work, and that’s worth $340… in total, that’s worth $950… but you’re not going to pay $950… you’re going to pay… $86!”
- Use special live bonuses to increase attendance rates. These bonuses must be really value-add and only offered during the webinar. Mindvalley’s Ewa Wysocka boosted attendance rates from 30 to 35% by doing this by offering exclusive, live chakra workshops that were only available during the webinar.
- Increase attendance rate with “No Replay”. Make sure you tell prospective attendees before the webinar, on the registration page, and in pre-webinar emails, that there will be no replay offered. This is because more people buy during a live webinar than with replays.
- Add details about the webinar on the registration page. Neil Patel found that adding more details to his webinar descriptions increased conversions by 12.8%.
- Announce before the webinar on the registration page, that you will be offering freebies, surprises, and bonuses during the webinar. This increases attendance and engagement and stops people clicking away. Be sure to confirm at the beginning of the presentation that there will be freebies, etc.
- A marketing expert saw that signup forms on the left side instead of the right side of the registration page increased registrations by 15%.
During The Webinar
- Tell attendees to remove distractions: At the start of the webinar, tell registrants that you put a lot of effort into developing the presentation, and because of that, you request they show respect by turning off mobile phones, moving barking dogs and chirping birds, and making sure there are no distractions. Reassure them that they will find much value in the webinar if they focus on the presentation.
- Ensure the biography about yourself on the presentation short. It should be less than 10 minutes. People are there for value and although your bio may add credibility and authority, they are not interested in your life story.
- Make it easy for people to ask questions/raise objections: On his webinars, Russell Brunson increased sales by 25% by adding an option at the end of the presentation that allowed participants to call into a specified number with any questions they still had before purchasing. They were able to leave questions via voicemail on Google Voice, to which Russell responded to. He made it easy for people to raise objections by offering them a free and simple way of contacting him for answers.
- Keep participants engaged. To keep participants from clicking away out of your webinar or from getting bored or distracted, you need to keep them engaged. This is why the webinar software you choose should offer polls, chat, and other methods of engagement. Use these tools to engage with them a few times throughout the presentation.
- Toss the sales pitch. The aim of the webinar is to make more sales, but during the webinar, toss the sales pitch and rather give value. Educate, and show how your offering can solve their problems. It’s interesting to note that one expert found that a sales pitch in the middle of the presentation decreased attendance rate by 20-30%.
- Name and location: Interact with participants at the start of the webinar by telling them to type where they are from, and then call out a few by their names and locations. It’s possible this works well because people like to hear their names and to feel noticed. It also adds credibility to the webinar and to you for others to see that there are indeed other humans who have joined the presentation.
- Take the opportunity to answer objections. During Q&A, answer as many questions as possible, because what you’re really doing is answering objections as to why they won’t buy, which is a positive thing.
- Tell attendees explicitly what to do next. It’s easy to confuse participants with vagueness. They need simple instructions as to what is next in the process. Provide clarity and make it easy by demonstrating with a screenshot what the next step is. E.g. “click the Buy Now button over here to purchase the product.“
After The Webinar
- Live is best for conversions. It converts better at a higher rate than automated or replay.
- Offer a demo instead of a free trial. It was found that offering a demo instead of a free trial converted more than 10% better.
- Send a proposal after the demo. Use an automatic proposal software to increase your sales numbers and make the process faster.
Last Words
All the way back in 2015, Neil Patel for one, disclosed how he generated a whopping 16,394 leads from webinars alone.
Who better to take advice from, than expert marketers like Neil Patel, who have years of webinar experience behind them? With the kind of numbers they produce, you can be sure they know what they are doing.
This article has listed some of the best-kept secrets to increase sales conversions on webinars, and we’d be interested to hear in the comments what you think, and how they work out for you.
The suggestions were originally listed in WillYouLaugh – shout out to them for great research!
