6 Reasons Why Webinars Deliver Quality Leads

Before we begin let’s start by clarifying the definition of a lead. I’ll use the words of William Wickey (content marketing manager at LeadGenius) to define the definition of a lead.

At its most basic level, a lead is the identification data of a person that has either the interest, authority, means, or motivation to purchase a product or service

Looking to learn why webinars have grown to become a lead generating machine? Well you came to the right post!

Establishing Trust & Credibility

Webinars are a great means of establishing trust and credibility, yielding the potential for your organization to become recognized as the industry authority. Creating a successful webinar is not an easy task, it requires both pre and post marketing efforts to maximize your ROI.

An informational 30 to 45-minute webinar session (not a sales pitch) will help in attaining credibility and aid in becoming the industry authority. Many marketers recycle/reuse their content (audio and/or video), commonly referred to as repurposing content. Repurposing your content is a must. One person who does this extremely well, is Gary Vaynerchuk.

All of the content you release to the market, webinars included, have to be of high quality. Yes, I said ALL. If you had a great dinner experience at your local tapas restaurant (I love tapas style of eating), but the bill took over an hour to pay, was it still a great experience? Every customer interaction point is an opportunity to build your brand to new heights. AND Every piece of content you release is tied to your brand...

Over time the webinar content will be searched and ranked by Google. The webinar you conducted a few months ago will start paying you dividends, aka more inquiries (example: form submits via a gated content strategy). Those qualified leads will then reach out to your organization for more information. OR your sales team may want to proactively reach out to them… More on this topic below.

Investment of a Limited Resource

What is this limited resource I’m referring to? You guessed it, it’s time! Time is precious and we all want more of it. The motto do more with less comes to mind. That being said, don’t waste your customer’s time. They want something in return, and in this case it's knowledge. When someone registers and attends your webinar they are open to listening to what you have to say. Generally speaking, those potential customers that chose to spend time with you on a webinar are of a higher quality lead than those who are solely visiting your website for the first time. The required investment of approximately 45 - 60 minutes weeds out anyone who is not interested in the subject at hand. Ultimately, yielding higher quality contacts and leads.

Partnership Opportunities

Webinars also allow you to partner with industry experts who can speak on your brands behalf. This helps remove any biases from you presenting the topic. This is also a great option when trying to connect your brand to a speaker who is seen as the topic expert, having he or she talk about how your solution has revolutionized organizations across the globe has great value.

The Funnel

We slightly touched on this topic above, but let’s go a little deeper. Like any marketing activity, what is your objective and who is it intended for? Webinars can be utilized to help potential customers move along the lead and sales funnel. If you have a large amount of leads that are aware of your solution but just don’t deem it necessary to grow their business, why not address the topic with a webinar? Something to the effect of “learn how today's software can help reduce your operating costs by 50%”. Tracking your lead activity with a CRM system (Microsoft Dynamics) can help segment your data, potentially creating tailored webinars for various customer types in various stages of the buying cycle.

Measure the Results

You want to make sure your CRM system is capable of handling the data efficiently, allowing your sales team to diligently follow up with leads. Feedback from the CRM will aid in telling you if the webinar produced quality leads, not initially, but months down the line (once the leads are nurtured and verified).

Generating High Quality Leads

One can see how the above translates to delivering high quality leads. Webinars attract an engaged audience, willing to expand their knowledge. If you succeed in providing real value, the brand recognition and goodwill will yield both short and long-term dividends. When your potential customer is in need of a solution, who will he/she be thinking of? There’s a good chance it will be one of the brands that have positioned itself as the industry authority.

In the event you are looking for 2017 statistics related to the success of webinars, check out the ON24 2017 Webinar Benchmarks Report.

Conducted a webinar recently? Or looking to conduct your first one? Let us hear how you implemented your webinar, along with any tips and/or ideas.