Get More Value Out of Your Virtual Events and Webinars

As a Marketer, you put a lot of sweat into attracting leads and building pipeline for your Sales team. Webinars and virtual events are prime examples. You spend hours preparing the perfect event. From ideation, to securing co-presenters, to curating media and meaningful content—the to-do list seems to bleed out into eternity. Fortunately (or unfortunately maybe), the deadline is fast approaching.

The big day arrives. Maybe it was a smashing success resulting in hundreds of MQLs and a highly engaged audience. Or maybe it was a flop, capturing only a few attendees—or worse still, a cacophony of technical difficulties that distracted from your message. Either way, you’re examining what worked and what didn’t in preparation for your next virtual event.

Of course, you probably aren’t conducting only one webinar this quarter. Due to the slow reintroduction of trade shows and in-person events, you’re probably relying heavily on these virtual events to educate the market and generate interest in your offerings.

That’s a lot to chew on. But this isn’t another blog post about tweaking your presentation strategies or how to run a successful Q&A portion—although those are great resources too. Today we are focusing on getting more value out of your virtual events and webinars. After all, you put all that effort into creating and running these events—you might as well ensure the best returns possible. And that’s rooted in pre-event promotions and post-event follow-up.

Getting Your Audience Hyped About Your Webinars and Events

It all starts with getting the word out. Traditionally, Marketers use email blasts, social media posts, and advertisements to alert their audiences about an upcoming virtual event or webinar. These are solid strategies that should continue. But that doesn’t mean they are without their blindspots—namely, these outreach methods aren’t personalized.

People are inundated with messages from every angle. That should come as no surprise. To really cut through the noise, organizations need to deliver personalized and persistent messaging to drive attendance and registrations.

Sure, Marketing might be able to write a few of these emails. But we’ve already established how busy you are ramping up this event. Your Sales Development Reps (SDRs) can help by sending unique messages to targeted accounts. But they too are juggling their own duties.

So, what’s the solution? Offloading pre-event outreach to an AI Assistant. Conversational AI automates the creation of unique and personalized messages, helping to scale pre-event outreach. By persistently pursuing contacts, AI Assistants are your most effective event promoters.

Boost ROI With AI-Driven Post-Event Follow-Up

But getting proverbial butts into seats is only part of the issue. You need a way to follow up with those attendees to determine which leads are sales-ready and which leads need more time and education. This task falls on your SDRs who will make two or three attempts to touch base with your leads before giving up. And who can blame them? Nobody wants to spend hours chasing down dead ends.

But when you consider that the optimal number of touches to convert a lead into an opportunity is eight, you know your follow-up falls short. Not to mention that leads contacted within an hour of receiving an inquiry are nearly seven times more likely to qualify. So, speed and persistence matter.

Supercharge your post-event follow-up with AI Assistants. Only an AI Assistant touch every single attendee—regardless of lead volume—with prompt, personalized, and persistent messaging. This level of unparalleled outreach helps identify intent and accelerate sales-ready leads no matter where they fall in the funnel. Better than an MQL, AI Assistants directly asks leads “are you interested?”, thus eliminating the guesswork by letting leads tell you what they want.

You might already be planning your next virtual events or webinars. Give yourself less to worry about. Consider hiring an AI Assistant to hype up your audience and boost your event ROI.

Ready to find sales-ready leads faster, get more at-bats, and close more deals more quickly? Explore our Data Sheet: Getting the Most Out of Virtual Events Through Pre-Event and Post-Event Activities.