Webcasting has become a strong part of any online marketing strategy. Companies use webcasts to present services and products, present industry trainings or findings, and present information to existing teams and clients. Webcasts have enabled businesses to spread the message faster, farther, and at a fraction of the previous cost.

Regardless the way you are using webcasting you need to design a system to capture the email addresses of your audience. Email marketing or Data capture is part of any internet marketing plan and webcasting is no different.

WHY:

Capturing the information of your audience will allow you to notify them about upcoming presentations which leverages your marketing efforts to build a stronger and larger audience base over time. You also enable your opportunity to send other marketing materials, ads, and even things as simple as the link to the recording of the presentation they participated in.

HOW:

The key to building your info database is in the registration. Putting a login form or login link to your presentation on your website allows for greater simplicity but prevents you from effectively capturing the information from visitors. Build instead a webcast registration page that requires users to enter their name and email address in order to receive login instructions in their email.

Learn more about Email Marketing Services.

Jacob S Paulsen

I’m assuming that you already know how to record and host your presentation. The purpose of today’s article is to show you the easiest way to set up a post/page in WordPress that will allow you to have a timer / countdown to the next playing of the webinar.

Here is an example of this plugin in use. I have set the date for Jan 1st 2012. I have customized the text around the timer and has specified a message to be displayed after the specified date and time are reached.

After the timer is finished counting down I can have a link to the prerecorded video displayed with a message such as “The Session has begun – Login Here.” If you like you could even have an embeded video appear at that designated time.

The WordPress plugin in use here is called “Easy Timer” and the configuration is relatively simple. There are an array of applications for this WordPress plugin and several ways to utilize it to promote an upcoming webinar or pre-recorded webinar/webcast.

Enjoy!

Jacob S Paulsen

Top 10 Reasons Why You Should Make Your Next Seminar a Webinar

1. Webinars offer a solution that allows businesses and organizations to invite an international audience. The internet has no geographic boundries, making it easier than ever to involve people around the globe.
2. Webinars don’t have the same “room capacity” limits as traditional meeting venues. You may have to pay more for a webcast room that will hold 5,000 people but it will cost much less than renting the local football stadium for the day.
3. Webinars make it much easier to capture contact data. When you sell tickets for your seminar you make find it difficult to capture names, email address, and phone numbers. Webinars make this easy. Just setup a registration page for each webinar.
4. Webinars are easier to record. The cost and time it took to have a professional production company record your seminar and then produce a high quality DVD, were far too high. Webinars can be automatically recorded with most software programs and then sent out to the participants minutes after the webinar ends.
5. Webinars can be broadcasting from the comfort of your home or office. You don’t need to put on the suit or even worry about shining the shoes. Just sit at the desk of your home office, along with a bowl of popcorn and get to work.
6. Webinars can be re-played and scheduled. Instead of doing the same boring presentation once per week, do it just once. Schedule the recording to play back for next weeks registrants! This isn’t always the best way to connect with your audience but it can be done with the help of modern technology.
7. Webinars can be branded by your business. Send clients, customers, or team members to your own website to login to your webinar or webcast room. Services such as WebcastRooms.com allow you to embed your own login forms right on your site. Seminars force you to take your customers into a venue that is rented where they will be exposed to other advertisements, logos, and brands.
8. Webinars make it much easier for you to involve multiple presenters. You were limited in your seminars by the ability to get your speakers and presenters to the venue at the right time. Now with a webinar, not only will you not have to travel but you will be able to involve presenters that were never before possible.
9. Webinars will build your Email List, Social Media Following, and website traffic and all of these are profit centers. In addition to data capture (mentioned above), driving participants to your website is going to increase the number who follow you on Facebook and Twitter. Naturally this will also increase your website traffic, allowing you to increase rates for online advertising.
10. Webinars naturally SAVE you money. Online meetings decrease all the traditional expenses that come with a physical seminar.

Get started today. Setup your webcast room and schedule your first webinar!

Jacob S Paulsen

What format will the recording files take? All to often we have seen various online conferencing programs whose recording files turn into short ads for the provider followed by a glimpse of the recorded presentation. Your focus must be on keeping your audience focused on your presentation and not on the service provider that you utilize.

Webcastrooms.com utilizes VereConference technology to provide versatile recording options to our clients. Every webcast room (including free trial rooms) have full recording options. You will be able to decide if you would like guests and/or moderators to have recording privileges.

The recordings are saved directly to your hard drive so that you can alter and distribute them at your own convenience. You call upload them directly to your online server and provide a link directly to your customers. Be careful in looking for your online conferencing provider

In the industry of webcast and online conferencing we have found that the competition continues to deny their clients the option of having a custom login page for the webcast room login.

Nothing seems cheaper and less professional that when someone invites me to an online meeting by sending me a link in an email. This link usually takes me to a page decorated with the provider’s logos and ads. Instead of being focused on the presentation I’m about to view I’m reading about how I could have my own 15 day trial with their service.

Even worse are the few providers that make you input pin codes, and room numbers. It reminds me of the old conference call systems and it isn’t super conducive to the environment of presenting your opportunity or conducting a training for your team.

Webcastrooms.com provides custom login pages through the Vereconference technology. You can you our custom template and make changes, or you can insert a login form into your existing site or webpage utilizing our custom html code that we provide every customer.

Curious how that might look? Look to your right. Type into the form on the right side of this page. Put in your name and click login. Our demo webcast room will launch and just that fast you can get a feel for how the service works.

Pictures. Pictures are a great way to really interact with people and create friendships. They are also an important way of sharing an idea, event, or place. Social Media sites like flickr, picasa, photobucket, etc help us share photos with our network. Utilizing description and keyword tags also make our pictures a big part of SEO (search engine optimization).

Videos: Video are an important part of social media. Youtube is after the 3rd most popular English website in the world. Short videos make it easy to show people your business, your brand, your personality, and more. Popular sites include Youtube, MetaCafe, Viddler, Blip.tv, Veoh, DailyMotion, etc. The latest excitement in video marketing comes from the unique way that search engines are capturing and listing videos among search results.

Articles. I use the word articles so as to be general in my meaning but I might have said blog posts to be more specific. Posting good content to your blog/website is the best way to build, attract, and maintain a strong network online. Utilizing a good platform such as wordpress you can quickly get listed on search engines and build your following around a specific niche. You can take a step beyond by republishing your content on ezine article websites also. This will increase your internet influence and be a strength in SEO.

Live Webcasts. No marketing or networking can take place without some interpersonal interaction. This is made difficult in our worldwide web of connections. Web conferencing (webcasting) is the solution. Scheduling a private or public webcast will give you time to meet with people and discuss any topic. Push up powerpoints, graphs, images, and videos. Speak through the webcast room with buikt in Voip and even show up on screen via your webcam. Webcasting is a big part of the Social Media world.

Email. Build an email list around your niche and then survey, inform, or even sell your list via email. Use autoresponders as part of a system. Email is the first step in having a one on one conversation outside of the social media sites. This becomes an important medium in our Social Media world.