Last week, I had a great chat on this topic with Deb Evans on Social Geek Radio and ReadyTalk’s own Beth Toeniskoetter blogged on Promoting Your Webinar Through Social Media.  To keep the conversation going, I wanted to share some of the ways ReadyTalk helps marketers start using social media to promote webinars as well as a recent success story.

Once you’ve scheduled a webinar, we make it super easy for you to promote it (along with a link to the registration page) to your connections, fans, and followers on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.

We also help you leverage the social networks of your audience to drive more leads. A single click adds social media sharing capabilities to your webinar registration page and event emails, so it’s convenient for your audience to help promote your event to their colleagues and peers.

And, after the event, we give you tools to help you continue to drive ROI from your webinar recording. With a few clicks, you can embed the recording on Facebook and your corporate website or blog and share a link to the playback with your Twitter followers.

We’ve found that all of these tools can have a real impact on results!  ReadyTalk customer Trada – experts on crowd-sourced online advertising – has incorporated social media into pre-, during- and post-webinar activities. Anna Sawyer, of Trada, recently blogged about their experience.

Are you using social media to promote webinars? If so, how has it impacted your webinar program?

I’m “jump out of my seat” excited to share with the 5 Marketing Forces that I’ve developed over the years and implemented in over 50 companies through Market Creation Group’s strategy process.

Here’s why you should be excited too!  During Friday’s webinar, you will:

1. Learn about the Five Forces of B2B marketing that provide you with a new lens to marketing success/successfully defend your budget and find the areas to invest more based on results
2. Learn how the volume and velocity of demand generation play in ensuring a successful transition to the sales team
3. Understand the right type of social media program you’ll need based on which marketing “force” is most needed
4. See a new way to have a webinar presented with interactive drawing/sketch work done in real-time

During this presentation, I will be unfolding how the 5 Marketing Forces (Awareness, Familiarity, Consideration, Purchase and Experience) are used to create a more focused marketing program based on what is working or what is not working within most marketing programs.  While we explore the 5 Marketing Forces, we’ll also discuss how well or not well your sales program is going and where marketing can put significantly more effort to best align with sales to drive more results.  Whether we look at the Volume/Velocity ratio of leads, the ways to identify your brand recognition and how it impacts demand generation needs, or you’re just fighting to the death for your budget and want to wow people into more funding, we’ve got some new stuff you’ll love to hear about!

I’m also going to take a good look at they types of social media programs you may want to have in place based on the weakest areas of your marketing program.

Now you can see why I’m super-excited about my February 3rd AMA webinar. Want to join me? Register now!

Marketers are always looking for the next best way to create buzz around their product and their brand with the right audience.  There are so many promotional outlets in which to market your content, especially on the internet; webinars tend to bubble to the top due to the likelihood of a lower investment and higher ROI.  Over the past few years, many companies have put significant effort into building their following through Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social networks.  Each of these has a different flavor of audiences, including what topics are relevant and which will resonate. Despite the differences, these channels can be a great way to promote your upcoming webinar.

The first step is using social media to get the word out about your upcoming event. After coming up with a catchy title, interesting content, and engaging speakers, you have to get people to care…and then, register!  Posting your event to your company’s various networks gets you there, partly; but allowing your registrants to post to their networks snowballs your efforts even further.

The next step, and probably even more important than the first: tracking the effectiveness of each social media outlet! Which site gets you the most traction, the most bang for your buck?  And, even more so, do you have a few ‘power users’ that are consistently promoting your events, and bringing in a significant number of registrants? If so, you probably want to keep inviting these types of people to your events!

So the moral of the story? Keep up with social networking, yours and your followers…it pays off!

Beth is a Product Marketing Manager and works with our customers to understand their needs as they relate to Event Services and ReadyTalk’s Conference Center, which is used to setup the details of our clients’ upcoming meetings. Outside of the office, Beth loves to spend time with family and friends, cook, and hit the slopes.

• Upload pre-recorded video clips to your access code
• Playback video clips during your meeting for participants to see and hear your content
• Record your meeting with the pre-recorded video content included

To sign up for beta access to pre-recorded video playback please fill out this form. You will receive an email within 1 business day providing you with instructions on how to get started.

Currently the process for uploading and playing back your pre-recorded video clip is a 4 step process (see diagram below). For more information please be sure to view the recorded demo, the Quick Start Guide, and the Best Practices and Known Issues documentation to gain valuable tips and tricks on how to use pre-recorded video playback in your meetings. When this feature becomes generally available (first half of 2012), the process for uploading and playing back your videos in the live presentation will be very similar to uploading and inserting slides into the ReadyTalk Conference Controls.

We’d love to hear about your experience with pre-recorded video in the feedback form or in the comments below. Tell us how the feature is working, if you’re experiencing any issues, or if you have any specific feature requests. If you have any questions about this feature please contact ReadyTalk Customer Care at 800.843.9166.

Paul was formerly an Account Executive at ReadyTalk gaining valuable experience with competitors and the state of the web and audio conferencing industry. Currently in his role as Product Marketing Manager, he is in charge of the competitive landscape, on-demand audio products, and the web meeting interface. Paul loves the outdoors, his pup Huck, his wife Jess, and getting to the ski slopes as much as possible.

Verizon has gotten amazing mileage out of its “Can You Hear Me Now?” campaign. I think it has stuck around because we can all relate; there’s nothing worse than having a conversation with a friend and having their line cut in and out.

Unreliable audio is acceptable among friends. When it comes to business, it’s another story. 

This week, I was on an audio conference with a vendor who sells content marketing solutions. Since we’re mapping our content and identifying next year’s content marketing plan, I was very interested in hearing what she had to say. But, I couldn’t pay attention.

The sales rep was using a free audio conferencing service. With free audio conferencing, you pay for what you get and what she got was static, delay and choppiness. I tried really hard to focus on what she was saying but the poor audio made it really hard to pay attention. Poor audio makes it hard for even the best sales reps to be successful.

Analyst firm, Frost and Sullivan recently put together a white paper on the topic of free services, The True Costs of Free Conferencing: Why Consumer Services Can Hurt Your Business. In the paper, they write, “Anyone who uses free conferencing services with customers puts their professionalism and credibility at risk.”

I couldn’t agree more. What do you think? Is the savings worth the risks?

As the marketing communications and PR manager, Bo gets to wear many hats (but her favorite is a tiara). When she isn’t tackling branding, messaging, social media and collateral, she enjoys skiing with her husband, running with her dog and playing board games with friends. You can find her on Twitter @bo_knows_

Download the AMA and ReadyTalk's guide to planning successful webinars.

Chances are, you are very familiar with the many moving parts that go into setting up a webinar. With assistance from the American Marketing Association, we created a best practices document to offer help sorting through those details.

As a supplement to this document, the members of our Events team came up with the following additional points to consider while setting up a webinar.

• Be sure to schedule your webinar as far in advance of the actual date as possible – ideally, at least 6 to 8 weeks prior – in order to allow enough time for proper marketing of your webinar.
• If you have a custom script, be sure to send it your Event Manager at least 24 hours in advance of your webinar.
• If your participants will be listening to the audio via their phone lines, you might consider adding something similar to the text below to your invitation or confirmation email.

To ensure you are able to join this event successfully, please dial in 10-15 minutes prior to scheduled start time. You will be greeted by an operator. Please be prepared to give them your full name and company name. You will be placed on hold until the call begins.

If you are using the broadcast audio function (allowing your participants to listen to the audio via their computer speakers, you might consider something similar to the text below.

When you log into the web portion, you will automatically be connected to broadcast audio which will allow you to hear the presentation through your computer speakers. Please make sure the volume on your speakers is set appropriately to your location and is respectful to those around you.

• Prepare an introduction slide to show prior to the beginning of the webinar. This slide can include the login information and is very helpful, especially if the dial-in number is listed. Also, if the webinar uses broadcast audio, you can also use this location to remind participants to make sure the volume on their speakers is set appropriately.
• Prior to the live webinar, you might consider sending an email to all speakers with their dial-in and log-in information.
• Prepare a few “canned questions” just in case you need them to fill time during the Q&A session.
• Think about audience engagement!!! Come up with a few ways of interacting with your audience!
• Be aware of your platform’s limitations before the live webinar (participant limit, desktop sharing, video, etc.)
• Find out what type of support you have from your platform provider before, during and after your webinar.

If you use any setup best practices that are not listed here, we would love to hear from you! Please feel free to share your thoughts as others may find it helpful in their webinar setup.

And it keeps. On. Growing.

The three major players, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, continue to garner the most users in both the B2C and B2B arena. ReadyTalk customers often conduct large webinars on a regular basis for several purposes, such as online training, new product launches, and most often, lead generation and qualification.  This is where social media and webinars marry, since our customers are constantly looking for ways to easily engage with their audiences and increase registrations prior to their event, especially with tools they already use.

To continue our focus on the marketing user, ReadyTalk has added the following social media features to Conference Center to help our customers leverage their own social networks, as well as those of their audience) to expand their reach and drive more qualified leads:

• LinkedIn Integration for Scheduled Meetings (ReadyTalk already offers automated promotion through Facebook and Twitter)
• Enable your participants to easily share your upcoming webinar on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn through the registration page and event emails

As a chairperson, you have the option to turn the ability for your participants to share your event on their social networks at any time.

And that’s not all. We’ve also added the ability to add an upcoming meeting to Google Calendar, to help increase the efficiencies for both the chairperson and participants.

Remember to refer to last week’s blog post to learn about some of the user interface changes!

Beth is a Product Marketing Manager and works with our customers to understand their needs as they relate to event services and our conference center, which is used to setup the details of our clients’ upcoming meetings. Outside of the office, Beth loves to spend time with family and friends, cook, and hit the slopes.

ReadyTalk understands that our customers want to concentrate on the subject of their meetings, or content of their webinars, instead of the possibility of the unpredictable costs of their audio and web conferencing use.  We want to provide the highest quality, service and reliability, as part of our pricing.  With that expectation in mind, we introduce our five new web and audio subscriptions:

• Web Meeting Pro (25, 150)
• Webinar (500, 1000, 3000)

What’s unique about these? High-quality audio, included with every package.

The Web Meeting Pro subscriptions include unlimited web conferencing and a bundle of included toll and toll-free domestic audio minutes, at a flat monthly fee.

The Webinar subscriptions include unlimited web conferencing AND unlimited Broadcast Audio, enabling participants to stream high-quality audio through their computer speakers. Again, for a flat monthly fee.

So how do you know which subscription is right for you, or your company?

Do you conduct a fair amount of smaller, internal meetings or  present projects to external clients and vendors where high-quality audio is critical?  Then the Web Meeting Pro options are right up your alley.

Are you managing larger webinars for lead generation, online training, etc, more than once a month?  The Webinar subscription options can give you the cost-effective solution you are looking for.

Interested in learning more?  Contact us today to find out more about our new subscription plans!

Beth is a Product Marketing Manager and works with our customers to understand their needs as they relate to event services and our conference center, which is used to setup the details of our clients’ upcoming meetings. Outside of the office, Beth loves to spend time with family and friends, cook, and hit the slopes.

While we knew that marketers and trainers were tired of the hassle of getting webinar data into their CRM system, we were surprised by the great turnout at yesterday’s webinar on the value of integration. If you had a chance to join us, we hope you found the event worthwhile!

Many thanks to Helena Brito from Mandiant, Jill Myers from OverDrive, and Pat Buchanan and Dave Kornegay from SchoolDude.com for speaking on the event. Each of them shared fantastic insight into how the integration has made a difference in their business and responded to questions from our audience during a lively panel discussion.

Because we had so many great questions, we couldn’t get to them all during the live event. In fact, we had such a high volume of questions that answering them all would make this blog post painful to read.

So, here is my take on the top 5 and you can access a full transcript of the Q&A here. You can also sign-up for a demo and learn more about ReadyTalk for Salesforce here.

1 – Q. How does sales use webinar information to close more deals? Did you face any resistance to adoption within your sales organizations?

A.  By having access to webinar data directly from the Lead or Contact record, sales can instantly see which topics their prospect is interested in and tailor their message to speak to the prospect’s specific use case or pain point. And, because attendance data is captured in Salesforce immediately after an event, sales can strike while the iron is hot and capitalize on opportunities rather than delaying follow up until marketing can do the manual work to get the data into the CRM.

Each of our panelists shared that ReadyTalk for Salesforce has been very well-received by their sales organizations because it:

• Gives them timely and convenient visibility into valuable webinar data right from the Lead and Contact record
• Makes it easy for them to invite prospects and customers to webinars and online trainings directly from the Lead or Contact record

In fact, Helena from Mandiant shared this feedback from one of her account executives during the webinar:

“Awareness of participation in events by potential customers allows me to enter the conversation with relevance and value, thereby earning their attention.”

2 – Q. When I look at a customer record will I be able to see a history of their webinar interaction directly associated with their customer profile?

A. Yes, ReadyTalk for Salesforce attempts to match each participant with a Lead or Contact record in Salesforce based on email address. From the related Lead or Contact record, you can see all of that person’s meeting activity and drill down to the Meeting Member record for full details.

3 – Q. Is there a diagram or goal funnel (visualization) to see drilled down results quickly at a high level?  Will we be able to see a report generated from an event?

In PR, this means connecting with a reporter and sharing valuable information that complements a story he’s already working on. In sales, this can mean giving a salesperson a qualified lead when the prospect is ready to buy.

Webinars already help marketers generate leads that can be converted into sales. Like most leads, webinar leads are time sensitive and need to be acted on quickly. For many companies, quick turnaround can be a problem that looks like this:

1. Go to CRM and pull list for invitations and create campaign.
2. Send out email invitations.
3. Collect event registrations in webinar platform.
4. Take registration data from webinar and merge it with CRM to see how many registrants are net new.
5. Host webinar.
6. Run reports from webinar platform (who attended and how long, who didn’t attend, etc.).
7. Manually merge data back into CRM. Watch out for attendees like Bob Smith who registered as Bob but attended as Robert Smith!
8. Run CRM reports and send out post-event email.
9. Send new leads to sales team for follow up.

Sounds easy right? Sometimes steps 6 through 9 can take days (yes, multiple). The leads aren’t very warm by this point, which means you aren’t getting them to the sales team at the right time.

OverDrive used to have this problem. Now they don’t. Want to know how they solved it? Here’s the answer: Webinars Can Improve Business Processes.

Want a different example? There’s a free webinar today, Convert Leads Faster by Integrating Webinar Data with Salesforce, with cases studies from Mandiant, Schooldude.com and OverDrive.