5 KEYS TO BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS DURING ONLINE EVENTS

Your organization's growth depends on having sales conversations with the right people. Many of these "right people" show up for your webinars. You invited them. And they—by registering—told you they want to spend an hour listening to your experts.

 What happens next is too often a missed opportunity. Dozens, perhaps hundreds, of attendees arrive only to never receive a one-to-one communication. Attendees will hear a group "hello" at the start of the webinar, but rarely interact directly with an individual.

 Consider how someone usually interacts with a speaker or company during a webinar. He or she:

• Receives a marketing email and registers.
• Receives a confirmation email with login instructions.
• Receives one or two reminder emails.
• Watches the live presentation.
• Receives a thank you email with access to the slides and on-demand recording.

Many prospects can register, show up, and disappear without anyone communicating directly with them. This means most companies could raise the effectiveness of their webinars to new heights.

Here are five action steps you can take to interact one-on-one with attendees, initiate more conversations, and form new client relationships.

ACTION STEP #1: ASK FOR QUESTIONS AHEAD OF TIME

One goal of your webinar presentation is to provide as much value to your attendees as possible. What better way to discover what registrants want than to the ask them beforehand.

ACTION STEP #2:  INITIATE CHATS DURING THE WEBINAR

Many attendees will communicate with the webinar  moderator via chat. But most will not.

The attendees who proactively chat have their concerns addressed. These proactive chatters typically give the webinar a higher rating in the exit surveys and are more inclined to meet for follow-up conversations. Your job then is to create more chats!

ACTION STEP #3:  USE WEBINAR HANDOUTS

Most presentations are one-way communications. The speaker speaks and the listener listens. However, you want attendees to do more than just listen: you want them to take action. Webinar handouts are a great way to prompt action.

A handout keeps attendees focused on the webinar (and our of their inbox); it leaves them with something of physical value; and provides your organization with a good topic for follow-up conversations.

ACTION STEP #4:  HAVE AN EXIT SURVEY

You felt you did a great job delivering the webinar presentation. What did the audience think? Most speakers cannot answer with certainty because they never asked.

ACTION STEP #5:  MAKE FOLLOW-UP PHONE CALLS

Have someone call every attendee and registrant after the webinar. Ask them how it went and inquire about their exit survey comments and any other information you have.

TALK WITH YOUR GUESTS

When you invite someone over for a dinner party, you ask them what they might like to eat beforehand; you talk to them during the event; you have fun things for them to do; you say good night; and you speak with them a day or two later to find out how their evening went. You absolutely call friends who said they would come, but then had to cancel.

Do the same thing with your webinar attendees and registrants! Ask them what appeals to them ahead of time (offer areas of interest). Provide them with something to do (give a handout). Start a conversation (initiate a chat). Ask them how the evening went (provide an exit survey). And call them later to talk about the evening and schedule other events (make a follow-up phone call).

You want your prospects to become clients. Speaking with them is a necessity!