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Planning a successful webinar

By Kami Griffiths
Chris Peters

Planning, organising and actually delivering a webinar to your online audience can be a daunting task. We look at the steps required for planning and running successful webinars.

1. Is a webinar is the right tool for your needs?

The decision to use webinars should meet your strategic objectives and the needs of your audience. While webinars work well for some topics, they're not suited to every training need.

2. Recruit speakers and a support team

You can’t do it all yourself - nominate different people to present, moderate, organise and promote it. Be clear about different roles and responsibilities: the organiser/facilitator manages the virtual meeting process from start to finish; the presenter focuses primarily on understanding the topic, developing slides and handouts, and communicating in a way that makes sense to the non-experts in the audience; assistants, meanwhile, help the organiser by answering participants’ questions and helping them with any technical difficulties they might be having.

3. Determine the format

Webinars can be structured in a variety of formats to suit different purposes – such as lone presenter, a panel discussion or more interactive with audience participation. 

Webinar Formats. Source: techsoup

Format	Description	Pros	Cons
One Speaker	A single presenter speaks, demonstrates, and answers questions from the audience.	Fewer people to coordinate and train on the webinar tool.	A lone presenter is more likely to become the authority at the "front of the room," which might make some in the audience reluctant to participate and ask questions
Interview Style	Interviewer asks a set of predetermined questions.	More engaging to hear multiple voices. The fact that the interviewer is asking questions of the expert(s) often encourages the audience to do the same.	More people to train and coordinate. Scheduling the run-through and the actual webinar may be more difficult.
Moderated Panel Discussion	Multiple people on the line at the same time, with a moderator facilitating the discussion.	Offers a variety of voices and perspectives.	More people to train and coordinate. Scheduling the run-through and the actual webinar may be more difficult. Can be challenging to keep panelists from talking over each other.
Interactive	Audience members participate fully via instructor-led exercises and facilitated conversations.	If done well, participants receive a deeper understanding of the topic because they're fully engaged in the dialog and the exercises.	Can only accommodate a small group. Requires a very skilled, experienced teacher/facilitator.

4. Plan your visuals

Since webinars rely on audio and visuals to get the message across, both should be engaging.

5. Pick a tool

Idealware's A Few Good Online Conferencing Tools offers a roundup of questions to think about and gives affordable webinar options.

6. Create an agenda

About three to four weeks before your webinar, hold a conference call with the speaker or speakers and determine what questions will be asked and the order in which the speakers will present.

7. Registration and prices

Before you begin marketing your webinar, determine what tool you will use to register attendees, (see the idealware article A Few Good Event-Registration Toolsand if you’re charging, take payment (see the idealware article A Few Good Online Payment Multitaskers)  

8. Publicise

Get the word out about your upcoming webinar, especially if you're planning to charge for it.  Send out information two to three weeks before the event, including who the webinar is for - beginners or advanced, managers or accidental techies, for example.

9. Plan B – have a back-up plan

If your presenter cancels at the last minute or equipment fails, your options are pretty limited unless you’ve planned ahead with backup speakers and spare kit.

10. Schedule a dry run

A few days before your webinar, you should schedule at least one 30 to 60 minute run-through with all participants to work out any unresolved questions or technical issues. On the day, set up your workspace and check in with your presenters early to avoid any last-minute glitches, technical or otherwise.

11. Reserve your equipment and space

Reserve a quiet space from which to conduct your webinar.  Remember to mute all the lines to reduce background noise as many participants will work in noisy environments.

12. Keep participants engaged and the conversation on track

Once the meeting begins, presenters will need to stay focussed on leading the discussion and relying on their assistants to deal with anything else. Start by outlining the focus of the meeting, presenter names and titles, an overview of what will be covered when, and so on. Keep the conversation moving - the organiser/facilitator should be prepared to step in and politely move the topic along.

13. Follow up after the event

Be sure to thank everyone for participating and collect feedback.  You should also publish a recap, summary, transcript, or recording (or all four!) of your meeting online.

This is an abbreviated version of a Techsoup article 10 Steps For Planning a Successful Webinar by Kami Griffiths and Chris Peters (Modified with kind permission from techsoup).