One pf the main considerations whenever any business owner begins a new initiative is cost versus profits. Cost can be money, but it can also be the time spent in an already-packed day, week, or month. It can seem almost impossible to try to get more done, but webinars can be one of the most effective ways to improve your lead generation and increase your profits.
Profits can also be more than direct cash sales as a result of the webinar. For example, a webinar is ideal for launching a new product, but there might be other reasons to host a profitable webinar. Profits might also include additional subscribers to your email newsletter, sales of other products besides the one you are launching, building brand awareness, increasing customer loyalty, getting more likes, tweets and other forms of social media networking, and more. These profits might not all be as easy to measure as dollars and cents on your balance sheet, but they are ALL important if you are to run a successful business online these days.
So in making the determination to host webinars to build your brand and business, cost vs profits need to be weighed. What expenses will be involved, how much time will it take, and what profits will it bring in? How will you define profit beyond sales on the webinar?
Once you make this determination, you can see that it is possible to create a whole new lucrative stream of income from webinars if you keep costs down and value up.
In order to offer webinars to large numbers or attendees and provide them with the kind of functionality that is required for audience participation, screensharing and more, you will need to use a hosted webinar service. As a general rule, the more sophisticated the system, the higher the cost. However, there are definitely occasions when your ROI (return on investment) will far outweigh your initial outlay for the webinar costs.
It doesn’t automatically follow that the most expensive set up is necessarily the most sophisticated or interactive, however. Therefore, it pays to shop around, and particularly to ask for feedback from peer entrepreneurs who have tried the system you’re interested in.
Also check out each system for yourself if you attend webinars regularly. There are many free webinars available online from a variety of sources. You might even have the viewing software already on your computer for some of them because you attend webinars so often.
We attend webinars regularly here in the office, and have seen some with very interesting features, but not necessarily ones that we would ever use.
It is also not advisable to go into debt over webinar set up. If you can’t afford a particular service you have your eye on, the chances are that your business won’t be quite ready for it yet either.
In this case, start out with something simpler, like a presentation and Q and A afterwards, rather than trying to launch a full Summit with an impressive panel of speakers the first time you ever offer a webinar.
Compare features and pricing and do not forget to factor in your time and effort as part of the cost of offering the webinar. Even if you are not charging any money for it, there is really no such thing as FREE on the Internet. SOMEONE has to pay.
Only you will be able to make the final decision on whether or not webinars are right for your business at this time, but don’t just look at the numbers. Also listen to your market, and your gut.
If you have all sorts of great products, and new ones coming up, lots of guests lined up and eager, and your market research is positively screaming that your webinars or your Summit event is going to be a high ticket, smashing success, go for it. Explore every option for financing your webinar. It’s definitely a risk, but that’s what being an entrepreneur is all about. It is having the vision and jumping in, while others dither at the edge of the pool, endlessly trying to decide whether or not they should get their feet wet.
But for most of us, start small, and grow organically. Add products, network with potential interviewees or guests, and make a webinar every fiscal quarter a natural part of your business. Record each event and use each recording for marketing, training, coaching, and more.
Survey your current customers to learn more about what they really want from a webinar. Then, if it makes sense and the money is there, start organizing your first money-making webinar.
FURTHER READING
