1 0 Archive | May, 2010
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Why Live Webinars Are Better Than Recorded Ones

Live webinars are far better than recorded or "replay" webinars that you might see marketers use for many reasons... for starters, a live webinar shows your personality better (and gets you more trust). You can adjust for technical issues going wrong on a live webinar, and you can demonstrate genuine urgency when pushing people to join your site or buy something from you.

Personality is more important than ever on the internet these days because everyone is making videos, gathering a massive social following on networking sites, and so on. If you have a sales presentation and there is a common objection, or even a few jokers and skeptics, you can adjust for this. By running live webinars, I have noticed many holes in my marketing and sales letters that I could fill up. For example, justifying the price or explaining a particular bonus that didn't make sense previously.

Next, technical things can and do wrong when computers are involved. I have tried running a recorded webinar and the recording did not play. Another time, the audio didn't replay correctly and I had to run the webinar live anyway. Even if you trust someone to hit that play button, or you outsource it... it's in your best interest to be present at the webinar so you can adjust if something goes wrong. Your screen might not show correctly, the audio might not look right, and you usually need to be there to fix it.

Finally, live webinars are excellent to get some real urgency going with your offer. I have lost trust with many marketers pretending to run a live webinar, when in fact it was recorded. At the end of that webinar, the marketer told me, "This offer closes this Thursday." But the next week, I saw a link to the exact same recorded webinar with the exact same scarcity... that the offer closed on Thursday. Avoid this by running a live webinar. It will do you some good, it will give you more speaking practice and it will get you more confident in pitching your offer.

You need to run your own live webinars instead of recorded ones because they are easier, show your personality, and show real urgency which will go a long way towards building trust with your subscribers and customers.

Robert Plank is a webinar enthusiast who wants to show you exactly how to use your own webinar to bang out your next product, sell it, and even build trust with your members. Signup below to claim your access to more of his free training...

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14. May, 2010
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Stop Talking After Your Webinar Close

A webinar is a fantastic way to teach people live, by showing your screen and speaking into your microphone, and respond to your students' written questions live. While the training you deliver on your webinar is valuable, the end of your webinar is more important than anything else. It is important in your webinar to show proof and teach a little something, but the majority of webinar mistakes come from the very end.

Just think about some of the best movie series like "The Matrix" or "Star Wars" that started off strong, then petered out at the end. TV shows like "MacGyver" that started off strong, but were on the air a couple of seasons too long. Heck, the show "Lost" only got really good after the creators convinced the network to give them an end date.

You too can learn a lesson about webinars from many of these failures. Know when to stop. Teach something, show proof, show people where to find out more about you, close the heck out of them, then end the webinar. Don't keep them on the call. They should either be gone, or be ordering from you.

I have been in interviews where the person talking to me would tell people what URL to go to, and then continue talking. Huh? Am I supposed to go to the URL or stay on the interview? Make it obvious.

It's even worse when the whole webinar builds to one single pitch, and then the presenter goes back to teaching. Wait, were you in "pitch" mode or "teaching" mode?

Sometimes I will take questions after a close, but after I answer each and every question, I re-close them. I tell people that if the issue we were addressing was the one thing holding them back, and they are now ready to join, to order. And I would spell out the URL, put it on the screen, and tell them to go right now.

Even after all the questions were handled, I would close again and tell people where to go.

This makes the Q&A session part of the close. I don't tell people where to go and then go back into teaching... I teach, pitch, and then sign off. Just like on a sales letter, people know they've reached the end and that it's time to buy. When you're done talking, stop talking.

You see me do this all the time on webinars and I want to show you how to duplicate not only this strategy, but the rest of my webinar success as well. Please confirm your registration below.

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13. May, 2010
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Are You Giving Away Too Many Details on Your Webinar?

Can the live webinar training you deliver over the internet last too long? Those presentations can "feel" too long, that's for sure. Especially when people run webinars that dive too deep into the "guts" of their course.

What do I mean? Every now and then you're going to see someone present a webinar with a statement like this: you're already watching week 1 of the course. Week 1 is free.

Big problem with this. This is just like taking the first chapter of your written report and putting it online in place of your sales letter. It's not exciting. It's also intimidating.

I attended a friend's webinar once. He was teaching list building, and instead of showing how big his list was... how responsive... how to type up a simple email... or even "the big picture" ... he just dove right into it.

He immediately started editing scary and complicated looking HTML code to create a squeeze page. This kind of training is terrible when it's live. People can't rewind, and worst of all, they don't even have the same HTML page on their hard drive, so they CAN'T follow along.

I'm a technical guy and even I was turned off! Sure, you could give them the HTML page to edit but that would count as a free gift on the webinar, wouldn't it? And it would mess up your close.

When you're running a webinar, always be thinking about proof, not necessarily instruction. Give people a few "ah-ha" moments, tell them what they're doing wrong, show that you can help them avoid their problems and get what they want... you are presenting an advertorial in video form.

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12. May, 2010
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Is Your Webinar Too Short?

Back when you were in school, and you were told to write an essay, did you ever write just one short paragraph and turn that in as an "essay?" When you write articles for traffic, do you write just one paragraph and then call it an article Heck no!

I'm all for saying more in fewer words, but there is such a thing as being SO brief, that you really can't say anything. And I see this happen even with webinars.

Much like you, I've been on several webinars -- live training over the internet. And I've made it a point in almost all of my training courses (no matter what the subject) to incorporate webinars at some part of the training.

When I "make" people run a webinar, I set aside an hour to go there... since many of the webinars I've presented lasted 90 minutes to 2 hours.

But it shocks and saddens me when I've gone to some of these webinars... and they're over in 15 minutes! On one in particular, the webinar host introduced a doctor who was an expert in a certain subject. The doctor read word-for-word out of a textbook and then they ended the webinar. All in fifteen minutes.

That's not the point of a webinar... most of my pitches at the end last much longer than 15 minutes. Sometimes people arrive five or ten minutes late... sometimes even half an hour late, to a webinar.

My most profitable pitch webinar lasted over three and a half hours.

You don't have to get that crazy, just make your webinars last at least an hour. Just have a PowerPoint with at least 25 slides. Share 7 tips or 7 mistakes. Take questions as you go along... and you'll find it very easy to fill that hour. Especially with the 20-plus minute close at the end.

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11. May, 2010
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Perpetual Non-Live Webinars

Even though the great thing about webinars is that you can talk to a person as if they were right there with you, looking over your shoulder at your screen, people still try to screw it all up... especially when they run these things called "perpetual webinars."

Here's the idea: you sell a lot better on a live webinar, right? So why not record the webinar once, then play it back later at a given time... so you have the same effect of a webinar, but with none of the work of being there and talking live? This is the problem with faking your webinars... having webinars that aren't live, but look like they are: you are a liar.

I've seen quite a few webinar marketers go to extremes with this. Even the ORIGINAL webinar recording wasn't live. The names of attendees they're responding to are made up. The webinars are shot in such a way that they reference dates like "Thursday" or "last Monday" but never the date, month or even the year.

I'm on a few marketers' lists where their autoresponder sends me an email every Thursday telling me about the next "live webinar" ... except it's not LIVE!

You have two choices: you could pretend it's live and be a liar (and hope someone isn't on your list under different email addresses, because the email follow-up sequence will send them to the same "totally live" fake webinar on two different dates.

Or, the other choice: tell them upfront that it's pre-recorded... and now you're showing them the equivalent of a "non fast forward" video.

Are you starting to see how pointless and silly the perpetual webinar model is?

Just keep it simple... and present your webinars live, for real. You can use the practice.

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10. May, 2010
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Webinar Replay Scarcity

You should run your own webinar so you can show your screen and broadcast your voice to a crowd of people who want your live training. But most webinar marketers (your competition or maybe even you) don't value your content highly enough and seem to be stuck in the habit of giving a bunch of things away for free.

One thing I see given away far too often is the webinar replay. You do record a replay, right? That's great, but just because you recorded it doesn't mean you have to give it away for free... EVEN to the people who attended life.

I realize this is the exact opposite of what most marketers teach. The funny thing is that these marketers are the ones who get terrible attendance rates on webinars, so they need to build a massive list just to get a handful of people to show up to a webinar.

Here's what usually happens: everyone registers just to get the replay. They don't show up to the webinar at all. And when you provide that replay, if it's downloadable, most people will download it and file it away somewhere... never to look at it again. If you don't make the replay downloadable, people will skip around the video and pick and choose what they want.

One of the biggest advantages of a webinar is that, as long as the person is at the computer, they can't fast forward. It's one step away from having a "captive audience" at a live event.

If you have to give away the replay, only make it available for a short length of time such as 48 hours. Don't allow fast-forwarding, and set the video to redirect to your sales letter once the webinar is over.

And even that is just a temporary measure. In order to really push my subscribers to attend my webinars, I've stopped offering a replay out in the open entirely, for any length of time. If they want that replay, it's going to be inside the paid member's area.

You don't want to encourage people to "wait until later" when webinars are concerned. They are the most effective when they are live, so motivate people to attend by being protective of your replay.

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09. May, 2010
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Hard Selling on a Webinar

Webinars are so powerful because you can present anything from your computer to your attendees live. However, t's important that you not only teach something on a webinar, but end it in a way that sends people to one of your web pages to buy something. You went to all this trouble of promoting the webinar and showing up live so you might as well be paid for your efforts.

I've closed as much as $35,000 from a single webinar and I can easily pull $2000 out of thin air in an hour or two. With webinars you have immediate scarcity so people can go now to avoid missing out on your offer.

You can give them that extra push with your voice, with stacking the offer, and you build trust way faster and easier than with regular emails or sales letters.

Think of webinars the same way as you think of pitching from the stage in person at a live event. The whole point of the presentation is to get people to buy something at the end.

Plus, you're doing your attendees a favor by telling them where to get more training from you. If you taught them something and then stopped, you'd be leaving them out in the cold! And on top of all that, when you get used to pitching at the end of every webinar, you'll get the practice you need to make a lot of sales quickly from a live webinar or even from the stage.

From now on, end each webinar with a bang instead of a whimper. Find out exactly how to do that below, and I'll see you on the inside...

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08. May, 2010
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Split Call to Action

When you run a webinar, you can present a PowerPoint or your screen live, and stream that presentation (including your voice) to your attendees as you speak. But with webinars, you aren't limited just to teaching. You can also end with a sales pitch or a close.

What's a close, you ask? It's the sales pitch at the end. The presentation about what deal you are going to cut these attendees at the end of the webinar.

The whole webinar should all be building to one single URL at the end. Preferably, the name of your webinar is the same as the name of the product (it doesn't have to be) and the URL is a .com domain name. Don't give your audience any URLs with folders, give them a top level domain name to type in and go to. You can afford the 8 dollars to get a redirect domain.

I can't be clear enough when I say, at the end, give people ONE place to go. Don't share your email address, phone number, Twitter name, blog URL at the end, just give them that one URL where they can go and buy. Don't toss in "just one extra URL" for something else. One URL, that's it!

When you have this single call to action, your webinar will be extremely targeted. Everything you say will be to tackle one more objection or move everybody one step closer to typing in that URL and going to buy. You're going to reduce the confusion about where to go next and what URL to type in... and best of all, it will make you look more confident to your audience.

Just like your emails, blog posts and sales letters... your webinar needs to point to ONE single URL at the end.

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07. May, 2010
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Avoid Offering a Free Gift for Attending Your Webinars

If you have attended many live webinars, where someone can host a live meeting (showing their screen and hearing your voice) -- you might have seen them run a webinar and promise a gift just for showing up. Whether you buy on the webinar or not. Before the webinar is even over.

Really? You have to bribe them just to come to the webinar? I can understand bribing people to join your list... but another bribe just to be on a webinar? It's free training... the gift IS the webinar.

When you offer a gift in exchange for coming to the webinar, you introduce a lot of problems. First off, it makes you look really under-confident that people will even come to your webinar.

When you're using a gift to build a list, a bribe makes sense. They don't know you yet. There's no trust built yet. But if you start acting like these marketers who bribe people just to read an email... you're training that list to ALWAYS get something for free. And the one time you don't have that gift, your subscribers will be mad and asking, "Where is my free gift?"

Don't offer a free gift at all once they're on your list. Every email you send out IS the gift. Every webinar you run for them IS the gift. It's that simple.

The point where you can really tell the gift gets in the way of your marketing is where to offer the gift. If you offer it at the very beginning, will people have a reason to stay based on your "gift-giving logic?" And whether you offer the gift at the beginning, middle, or end of your webinar... not only will you have to remind people about the gift, it will mess up your close.

I've been on plenty of webinars where they taught something, then transitioned into a pitch explaining where I could go to pay for more training from them. But after spending 15 to 20 minutes talking about it, and telling me the URL over and over again... they would once again remind me about the free gift!

Guess what I did... I didn't even check out his pitch and I headed right for the free gift. I'm guessing most people on that webinar did the same thing.

Those scenarios should be enough of an example to convince you to avoid giving a free gift on webinars. Your webinar is the free gift... the sooner you realize that, the better your close will be, and the more confident you'll become on webinars.

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06. May, 2010
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Never Harvest Your Webinar Opt-Ins

Webinars, or web seminars, are live calls where people can see your computer screen and hear your voice as you speak. They can get you a bunch of quick sales by being a real person. You teach something quick on the live call and transitioning into a way they can find out more about you and what you have to offer.

Webinars are also a great list builders. Think about it: your free webinar is never JUST a hard sales pitch. Blend content and the close.

The free webinar itself is a gift. Does that mean you can approach other marketers in the same niche as you, have them ask their list what problem you can solve for them? Yes. Could you make a post on your favorite forum offering free training (your webinar) to the first few people who sign up? Yes. Can you mail your own list and promote a new product or even one that you've had around for a while? Yes.

You're on my list, you've seen me do this all the time. It's great not just to sell stuff, but build a list too.

Here's an important distinction. People can signup for your list, but they can also signup for your webinar... two separate lists. So does that mean it's perfectly okay to take the list of email addresses of people who registered for your webinar and import them all into your list? Nope.

Don't do it. People signed up for your webinar, not your list and your webinar. And the record of that subscriber is going to show the date you imported the lead, not the date of the webinar. Their IP address isn't even going to be recorded. If you're using a webinar to build a list, send them to a forced optin page that redirects to the webinar registration page after signup. They optin to your list, and THEN they register for the webinar.

Have you been making this mistake? Or were you GOING to make this mistake? Are you now wondering what other mistakes you've been making with webinars... without even REALIZING? Signup below to find out more...

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05. May, 2010
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