Planning Your Purpose and Goals for Your Webinar

In order to have a successful webinar you must first establish a purpose for your webinar. Is it to teach, train, inform, excite, impress, market, or a combination of these aspects?

Which products or services do you wish to promote through a webinar? Do you have a clear idea of what to talk about during the webinar?

By being able to answer these questions, you can plan ahead well and set clear goals for your webinar in terms of such measurable benchmarks as sales, dollar value of sales, sign ups for your list, and so on.

First, what product are you promoting? Don’t get too excited and try to sell your entire product line, because this will only confuse your messaging. Choose one with the widest appeal and then choose related or similar products for your upsell, downsell and cross sell. If you can increase the value of your main item through bundling or creating great bonuses, this will make the offer much more attractive.

Also remember to offer exclusive bonuses and gifts only for those who attend the live event or view the webinar, as a thank you for them taking the time and trouble to pay attention to what you have to say.

Second, who is your target audience or market? This will help you plan a great presentation designed especially with them in mind. If you’re talking to business executives, for instance, your examples will be far different than if you are talking to stay at home moms who wish to work from home. Sure some of the moms will also be executives, but all moms relate to “mom things,” but all moms are not executives, so plan your material accordingly.

Third, what is the main purpose of your webinar, to sell, inform, to make initial contact, then follow up? Your purpose of your webinar can be all three, but it is best to err on the site of inform and follow up with more information than to go for the outright sell. You want to seem helpful, without being too pushy as a salesperson.

In particular, if you are launching a new product or service and are using the webinar to help you do this, you can aim for building brand and product awareness. Once you are clear about these goals, you can set targets and measure your achievements to see if your webinar helped you meet as well as make your mark with your target audience.

You don’t want to come off as an annoying telemarketer, so be sure there is a lot of real content in your presentation. And don’t forget to follow up. In many cases, you might think that planning your purpose and goals for your webinar and then presenting it means all of the hard work is over. But in actual fact, it could be just beginning, as you get feedback, make sales, and start planning your next successful webinar.

FURTHER READING
How to Host Successful Money-Making Webinars

Mastering Email List Building: How to Get Subscribers and Entice Them to Opt-In

How to Create Powerful PowerPoint® Presentations: A Beginner’s Guide

Email Marketing Hints and Tips

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Joan Mullally is the author of more than 50 marketing titles designed to help small to mid-sized businesses and their owners gain the kinds of skills they need to make money successfully online.

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