It’s no secret that webinars are an investment of time and resources, but if done right, they can boast huge returns and drive conversion. Ramp up your lead generation efforts by incorporating webinar development into your content strategy. If you’re still on the fence about hosting a webinar, consider these four benefits.
Immediate Lead Capture
You can’t host a webinar without registrants and registrants can’t register without filling out a form. Because webinars are higher involvement than a traditional e-book or whitepaper, asking users to submit a form in exchange for registration is a no-brainer.
Webinars are excellent middle-of-funnel content offers that signify a visitor is showing high interest in what your brand has to offer. This exhibition of high interest allows you to capture essential details about your lead without coming on too strong. Phone number, for instance, is a MOFU detail that allows your team to follow up with the lead in a more personal way. Gathering details like "biggest challenge" allows your team to better understand the problems of the lead and how your business can be a potential solution to that problem. By capturing this type of information, your team can better tailor sales conversions and build rapport post-webinar.
Most importantly, capturing leads through a registration form can enable you to better measure the ROI of your webinar. Directly attribute revenue to your webinar and identify areas for improvement.
Direct Engagement With Prospects
Most webinar hosting platforms come equipped with question and polling features that enable hosts to engage with viewers on a personal level. You have the opportunity to capture extra information from prospects via these features. Holding a quick poll mid-webinar or posing questions and asking viewers to send in their answers can offer valuable insights that a regular form can’t elicit.
Best of all, this personalized interaction gives prospects a firsthand look at what it might be like to engage with the people who represent your products or services. This interaction could be the final push your prospect needs to start a sales conversation.
Low-Cost Implementation
Webinars eliminate the travel and expense of hosting an in-person seminar. All you need to hold a successful webinar is a hosting platform like GoToWebinar and the time to dedicate to preparation and follow up. The real expense of hosting a webinar is attributed to the time needed for planning rather than monetary resources.
Furthermore, the ability to hold webinars remotely opens up vast opportunity to attract guest speakers and registrants from all over the world. Holding an event remotely can drive brand awareness and facilitate beneficial relationships that might not occur had the event been in-person.
Ability to Convey Large Quantities of Information
Hosting a 30 to 90-minute webinar can enable you to convey a topic or idea that might be too dense to compile into a single e-book or whitepaper. By sharing information orally, you can go into greater complexity without the worry of losing your reader in jargon. And if they do get lost, the interactive capabilities mentioned above offer the opportunity for in-depth clarification.
Moreover, webinars offer the opportunity for prospects to learn in a way that can be more engaging than reading a lengthy e-book or whitepaper. Tuning in and listening rather than reading or speaking is often a much-desired change of pace for busy professionals.
Though webinar production may be an investment of time, its benefits are certainly compelling. As long as you follow the requisite steps for webinar preparation and follow up, your efforts can drive lead generation and consequently boost ROI. Incorporate webinar production into your content strategy for positive returns in 2018. 
