The first national lockdown prompted a rapid and noticeable shift in marketing priorities for consultancies like yours, with the focus for many turning to digital – in some cases for the first time.

This change opened up a new world of opportunity for some firms and breathed new life into some of the lesser appreciated digital marketing tactics – including webinars.

But as we edge towards a year of remote working has ‘Zoom fatigue’ taken its toll on the success of webinars? And are they still an effective tool for your business?

The numbers say yes.

Since the start of lockdown we have helped numerous consultancies host webinars on a range of topics – everything from financial modelling to location strategy to process automation.

For some, this was a first, for others a well-trodden path. But importantly, success was had by all – with attendees ranging from 20 to over 100.

And so far, 2021 is following suit. Just last week we had 247 people signed up across three different webinars.

Of course, numbers are only one measure of success and attendee figures are largely dictated by your choice of topic and target audience. But even if you have 10 people on your session, and those are the right 10 people, it’s worth it.

Should you include webinars in your 2021 marketing strategy?

Based on what we’re seeing from our clients, the answer is yes.

There are still plenty of people interested in what you have to say. And they are happy to give up an hour of their time to listen to you say it.

These people are potential clients of yours. By registering for your session they are showing you that you share a common interest – and that the expertise you have can help solve their business challenges.

Not only that, once they’ve signed up for your webinar you’ll then have their name and email address to reach out to them directly following the session in order to continue the conversion on a more personal level. And that is adding value to your BD pipeline, lockdown or no lockdown!

But webinars also continue to provide value after the live session.

The content gift that keeps on giving

If you’re familiar with our Digital Marketing Framework, you’ll know that we recommend creating pillar content or ‘evergreen’ content that can be reused and repackaged into shorter more consumable content pieces. Think long-tail, detailed content such as whitepapers, research and e-books.

Webinars would also fall into this category. With an hour of content recorded, it gives you the opportunity to use this as valuable content to share with your audience. And this is really where webinars can continue to give your firm value after lockdown ends.

From a single recording you can:

  • Host the recording on your website for prospective clients to watch on demand. We’d recommend having this gated with a registration form so you can still collect lead data.
  • Email out the recording to anyone who didn’t attend the webinar as a way to still reach out and start a BD conversation.
  • Turn your webinar into a written piece of content such as a whitepaper or a series of shorter more digestible blog articles.
  • If your webinar isn’t reliant on visual slides, you could take the audio and turn it into a podcast episode.
  • And lastly, you can create short audiogram or video clips from your webinar to share on social media. Or even a visual graphic of a useful quote.

We know a lot of work can go into hosting a webinar so we would always recommend making as much use as you can out of what you’ve created. And as you can see from this list above, there’s quite a lot you can do with just one webinar!

So if you’ve been questioning whether webinars are still relevant or if you’re worried that you’re a little too late to the party to host your own, we can assure you that’s not the case. Webinars are still alive and kicking and working for consultancies like yours.

If you’re thinking about hosting a webinar series but don’t know where to start, feel free to get in touch for an informal chat.