There are so many marketing channels available in the market. But, the decision to include a content type or not, in your basket of content mix, is always an expensive question. Webinars are climbing the upward curve for obvious reasons. The Demand Wave report shows that Webinars are one of the top content types that prove to drive revenues for B2B companies.
While it is good to know that a certain content type has a high potential to increase revenues, it is also great to know ‘why is it so?’.
To answer that question, we have dedicated this article to explaining the top 5 reasons ‘why B2B companies need to conduct Webinars?’. For each reason, we have also added a few metrics that could be used to measure the worth of your webinar.
We use webinars to meet our new clients and also use them for our clients to help them bring more customers into the funnel. So, here are the reasons.
For Lead generation
The funnel is broader at the top before it closes down towards the bottom to close sales. The top of the funnel comprises the large number of leads that you need. Webinars provide a great opportunity to invite the attention of a broader audience. The webinar registration forms also gate the lead quality by keeping the website invite relevant to your defined target audience. Each form filled as registration becomes a new lead.
In 2017, GoToWebinar discovered that “73% of B2B marketers and sales leaders say a webinar is the best way to generate high-quality leads.
Webinars also come in as inexpensive content when compared to an in-person meeting. If two people from your team worth $100 each are hosting a meeting vs a webinar. The return on that spend is higher with webinars as your brand is exposed to over 10 people than just one person. It is a low-cost marketing channel with a high ROI.
Metrics: Click-through rate (CTR), No.of leads generated, No.of qualified leads generated, No.of leads converted into sales and the ratio of registrants to attendees.
For Customer Engagement
Honestly, webinars got popular for lead generation, but very few smart businesses have kept this channel open for their customers too. Customers can be productively engaged after they have bought your product. Webinars help in strengthening some of the customer relationships into partnerships, and some partners into long-term associations.
Customers interested to know more about the subject matter of the webinar can also be connected to upsell or cross-sell other products. This is actively done by SaaS B2B companies that sell B2B products. They help you achieve a better lifetime value (LTV) for the customer.
Metrics: Click-through rate (CTR), No.of customers registered, No.of customers engaged, increase in LTV, the ratio of registrants to attendees.
For Direct Sales
For Direct SalesMany B2B marketers also use webinars for direct marketing. That is the webinar window is used as a point of sale (POS) for the product. They do not wait for lead nurturing, but rather design the webinar for immediate call-to-action. Marketers who have mastered high webinar conversion rates, use them for this purpose. In this case, you should use direct opt-ins and call-to-actions that say, ‘Pay Now, ‘Subscribe Now’, ‘Get Free Trial’, and so on.
Metrics: Click-through rate (CTR), No.of events completed, No.of sales, increase in LTV, the ratio of registrants to attendees.
For Digital Footprint
A high-converting or engaging or successful webinar has also the potential to be a continuous touch point for a business’s customer experience. Such webinars are used as an on-demand webinars which can be viewed or downloaded any time during the year. The effort invested in creating such a webinar is far less than the magnitude of lead nurturing or customer engagement that you can create.
Some marketers also choose to use convert them into slideshows and use them as gated content. In either case, the gated content helps in gathering some information about the prospect and their intent. Webinars are also used to be stacked as product demos. These are not only easily available to your leads, and customers, but also to your internal sales team members.
Metrics: Click-through rate (CTR), On-demand views, replay view rates, No.of cumulative downloads by month. ROI on original content.
For Brand Resonance
Webinars leave a residue of brand resonance and recognition over every published webinar. With on-demand webinars the contribution to brand equity increases. It reflects thought leadership, your vision for the future, and your empathy for your customers.
Webinars are rarely also used without a call-to-action at the end. It could merely be for continued education which helps in building a strong long-term relationship with your client.
Metrics: Click-through rate (CTR), Total views, attendee stick rate, repeat visits to the new webinars.
There is no magic number to understand how many webinars would build a strong foundation for demand generation. However, some B2B companies host one power-packed webinar each year, while the industry average is 23.
Industry uniqueness can create more reasons for you to host a webinar. For successful webinars, the key is consistency. Consistent webinar sessions hosted at healthy intervals build a strong relationship between your brand and your audience.
