Webinar LAUNCH: Your 7-day, Step-By-Step Guide to Effectively Marketing Your Webinar

You may have noticed that it takes a LOT of effort to increase webinar attendance.

That’s because in business and in marketing, you get out of it what you put in, especially in terms of energy, time, and resources. The more time and energy spent on webinar marketing before the event, the greater the rewards will be in terms of increased attendance and conversions.

But what, exactly, should you be doing the week before your webinar? How many emails should you send? How many times should you post on social media (or should you post on social media at all)?

Our 7-day webinar marketing plan will show exactly what to do and when. Simply follow this guide the week before your webinar and watch as attendance and conversions soar!

7-Day Webinar Marketing Plan    

Let’s say your webinar is going to take place on a Tuesday, because after surveying your target market and thinking about their schedules, Tuesday has emerged as the most convenient day of the week for them.

Begin your marketing at least one week before the webinar, but not too much earlier. Mentioning a webinar 3-4 weeks beforehand is ineffective because there is too much time for people to forget about it altogether.

Tuesday (one week before webinar)

• Schedule your event in your webinar system (This is the one we use). Next, create a webinar sign up page and autoresponder that will deliver to your registrants the date, time, access link and any other details they need to participate in your webinar. (Click here to access the tool we use to create our sign up pages.)
• Create and send an email blast to your list, announcing the webinar (linking to the sign up page) and any affiliate opportunities to promote the webinar.

• Take care to focus on benefits and special guests you may have arranged. Include a strong call to action (sign up!) that links to your webinar sign up page.

• At this point, do NOT use scarcity as a tactic, i.e. “there are only X spots left, so secure your spot now!” Your email list should be the FIRST to know about your webinar – indicating scarcity will make them feel they’re the last to know and may damage rapport.

• Send a personal email to contacts, partners, and colleagues interested in promoting your webinar as an affiliate. Offer a generous percentage of any sales that come from their affiliate efforts. Be sure to provide them with social sharing links, email copy, and graphics to make the promotion process easy for them.

Wednesday

• No email blast

• Announce your webinar on social media. Take care to stay away from features, and focus more on benefits. Talk about how the webinar will solve a specific problem your market is having.

• One Facebook post, LinkedIn post and Google+ post will suffice. Feel free to schedule 5+ tweets on Twitter throughout the day.

Thursday

• Create a ‘sneak peek’ email blast with content from your upcoming webinar. Focus on the content, and make sure there is at least one great takeaway contained in the email itself.

• Create and share social posts to support the information in the email blast.

• Make sure the link to sign up is included in the email and social posts, but focus mainly on the content.

Friday

• No email blast

• Write and post a blog post with more sneak-peaks from the webinar.

• Share the blog post on social media.

• Today, use links back to the blog post instead of the sign-up page, but be sure the sign-up page link is clearly visible in your blog post.

• Follow up with affiliate marketers and make sure they have the materials they need.

Saturday

• No email blast

• Find and schedule a series of social posts related to your webinar topic. Look at the most popular blogs, newspaper articles and magazines in your niche and share viral, trending content with your audience to get them thinking about your webinar topic.

• Create and share social posts more directly related to your webinar, and mix them in with the trending content you’re sharing.

• Don’t be afraid to tweet several times per hour – remember that less than 10% of your followers will see any given tweet, so don’t be afraid to repeat (and retweet!)

Sunday

• No email blast

• Spend today reconnecting via social with colleagues, partners, customers and prospective clients. Answer messages, respond to comments, and continue conversations you may have forgotten about. See how you can mention the upcoming webinar in a way that’s natural and benefits the other person.

Monday

• Email blast: remind your list that the webinar is tomorrow and that time is running out to sign up. Begin to use scarcity tactics if need be (and if that makes sense for your brand and audience).

• Schedule social posts with a stronger focus on the date and time of the webinar, but don’t forget to clearly demonstrate the benefits of attending the webinar.

• Send a final reminder email to affiliates and make sure they have the tools they need to succeed.

Tuesday

• Email blast #1: Email your list announcing today is the day of your webinar. Encourage them to join you and reiterate the date and time. Consider language that highlights the amount of time left, i.e. “Just 12 hours left…”, “3 hours till LAUNCH”, etc.

• Schedule timely posts and tweets throughout the day, reinforcing the time and including the sign up link.

• Email blast #2: One hour before your webinar, two separate emails blasts should be sent out. One should go to those who have not signed up, reminding them it’s their last chance to join. The other should go to those who have signed up, reminding them to attend.

• Email blast #3: 15 minutes before your webinar, email registrants the link to join the event, along with a message that the webinar will start in 15 minutes.

• Email blast #4: 5 minutes after the webinar start time, send an email with a subject line like “We’re live – where are you?” This email can be sent to both attendees and those who haven’t signed up, depending on how your webinar is structured (if it’s a free webinar, it’s recommended to send this final blast to everyone).

• If you have the staff to do so, continue to post/tweet throughout the webinar presentation, further encouraging people to join the call.

Wednesday

You’re not done yet! Now that the webinar is over, the real work begins.

• Email attendees thanking them for attending and reinforcing your call to action. Include links to any order forms and remind them of special webinar-only discounts. Be sure to share any recordings, Hangouts links, slides, etc. with attendees as well.

• Email those who did NOT attend and let them know what they missed. Be sure to reveal any special offers or promotions from the webinar, and tell them how they can take advantage even though they didn’t attend.

In the days and weeks following your webinar, it’s smart to create an autoresponder series to continue the momentum you created with your webinar.

• The recording itself plus slides can be shared via social media
• The webinar content can be repurposed and shared on your blog
• Attendees who did not make a purchase can be placed in a different email campaign than those who did make a purchase

The key to effective webinar marketing is strategic consistency. Whatever you do, don’t simply send one email blast and leave attendance to chance. Remember that people miss emails and social posts all the time, and that many times they may not even know about your webinar until the 5th or 6th time you share it with them.

Finally, be sure to track your results so you can see exactly how effective your campaign was, and how you can improve it for your next webinar.

Are you unsure about the length, content, design, or technical aspects of your next webinar?

Are you wondering how to get more attendees and convert those attendees to customers?

Contact us at Info@SmartSimpleMarketing.com or call 510.601.0470 to set up your Profit Breakthrough Strategy Session today.