I’m sure you’ve noticed that just about every entrepreneur and their Mama (yup, our mom, too) has started using webinars to grow their business.
And it’s not just the big guns that are involved.
It’s EVERYONE…
From the Fortune 100 companies pitching multi-million dollar contracts, to the solopreneur selling custom jewelry out of his basement, to the Yogis, photographers, stock brokers, you name it.
If you think about it, it’s a natural progression from using video to sell products and services online.
Because what is a webinar but a streaming video?
It’s all the benefits of a regular video sales letter, delivered in an interactive format, with the atmosphere and excitement of a live event.
But hey, this blog post isn’t going to be a soapbox about the virtues of webinars as a marketing tool. We’ve already got plenty of those on our website…
Like this one: https://www.genesisdigital.co/blog/tools/webinar-jam/dont-panic/
And, we can’t forget this one: https://www.genesisdigital.co/blog/tools/webinar-jam/5-critical-steps-awesomely-successful-webinar-offers/
The purpose of this article is different.
You see, over the last few years we’ve inducted over 30,000 people onto our WebinarJam platform and what we’ve learned during that time is that no one is arguing over the pros and cons of running webinars anymore.
PEOPLE GET IT!
Truthfully, there are only two hurdles that prevent business owners from trying webinars. Or, if they’ve tried, those same hurdles then stopped them from making the webinar strategy work.
I’m talking about:
- Struggling to organize and present webinars in a productive manner.
- The ridiculous, OVER THE TOP, prices that webinar software companies usually charge.
The first hurdle isn’t actually too big a deal. A bit of practice, a few tutorials, and everything slides right into place in no time.
But the second hurdle – the extortionate costs – is the one that is REALLY destroying people.
Think about it…
If it takes you presenting, say, six webinars to really start to get good at them, but by the time you’ve done two, you’ve have already been billed hundreds or even thousands of dollars…
Then, you’re stuck.
Or, rather, you’re broke.
Or, at the very least, you’re wondering whether to keep going at all and risk becoming broke-er.
This is the REAL purpose of this article.
No matter how scary you think it might be to conduct a live webinar, you only need to host 1-2 to realize that it’s not the horror show you were expecting. Watch a few training videos, put in some practice, and it becomes startlingly straightforward.
They’ll even become FUN!
Seriously. I’d take conducting a 45-minute webinar over weeks of writing emails and blog posts, any day. Especially when I know the webinar is going to be more productive and more profitable.
Inexperience and lack of webinar-presenting skills won’t be a problem for anyone who has even the slightest bit of entrepreneurial spirit. Which is why two problems are really only one, because affordability IS the primary underlying reason why people are either still holding off using webinars to promote their business, or why people have TRIED webinars and never managed to get the strategy off the ground.
It’s hardly surprising.
You need some breathing room to get the hang of webinars, which is why most business owners can’t AFFORD to take the time to get good.
We’ve seen people conduct ONE webinar – their first – and because the results were only modest, they couldn’t AFFORD to keep practicing.
But the solution, as it happens, isn’t so complicated.
It’s true that some of the big names in webinars are still charging eye-watering prices (we’re talking thousands of dollars per year), but there are a whole host of webinar providers that have sprung up over the last few years that are charging significantly less.
If you shop around, you’ll find some prices that are so low you’ll wonder if there’s a catch hiding somewhere.
And… okay… you REALLY need to do your due diligence. Not every affordable webinar host is good value. Some are grossly feature-light or have heavy restrictions on the number of attendees they can handle.
But if the goal is to get started and find your feet… the most important thing is to find a webinar host that you can afford, right now.
They exist!
Affordable webinar hosting is no longer a pipe-dream, or a bait and switch that gets you in for a low upfront cost and then tries to gouge you with expensive, added extras just so you can get a decent show broadcasting.
Yes, those webinar providers exist as well. But that’s true of any growing, competitive market. Do a little research, read some reviews, and you’ll soon find a decent host to get you started.
From this perspective, two problems very quickly become zero problems.
- Webinar Inexperience
Learn by doing and spend a little time watching or reading some webinar training material. WebinarJam users, for example, get access to Webinar Genesis, a comprehensive webinar training video suite. - Webinar Costs
Shop around to find a webinar platform you can afford and then do some research to make sure that “low cost” isn’t a euphemism for “poor service”.
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I know you’re onto me… I’ve tried not so very hard NOT to turn this article into a sales pitch for WebinarJam. Yes, WebinarJam is one of the most affordable solutions on the market and, yes, it includes comprehensive training. But I figured that if I started off this article with that statement, you might not take me seriously.
And that would be tragic because I really do believe that webinars are a critical marketing strategy for virtually every type of online business. Inexperience and cost concerns should NOT hold you back from getting started (or giving webinars another try, if you’ve experimented in the past).
But there’s another reason why I haven’t pushed WebinarJam hard in this article…
We know WebinarJam. And, we know that if you do some research into affordable webinar solutions, and compare prices and features, it won’t take you long to realize for yourself that WebinarJam IS the right choice.
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If you want to know more about why webinar hosting solutions still charge high prices, even as the technology becomes less expensive, we’ve prepared a video on this subject.