17 Ways to Screw Up a Webinar

Anyone who has ever presented a webinar has been there: the absolute panic of knowing you have to present to a large audience of strangers who are (undoubtedly) judging you. Unfortunately, for some of us, that fear never goes away, and it isn’t helped by the knowledge that there is a long list of things that can go wrong before, during and after the webinar.

While some of these things may be out of your control, most of them aren’t. Here are some things you shouldn't do if you want to have the most successful webinar you can:

1. Book a time that works for you. Make sure you choose a time of day and presentation length that works for your target audience, and, once you've committed your webinar to this schedule, stick to it!
2. Only send out one invitation email, no reminders.  Don’t you want people to show up? Send out reminders! Make sure you reach those people that missed you the first time around and don’t let them forget that your event is happening.
3. Be too busy to practice or do a trial run. Practice makes perfect (and reduces your anxiety). You’ve heard it a million times before because it’s TRUE.
4. Forget to dial in prior to the webinar to ensure that the number is working for participants. It’s embarrassing and time consuming to deal with technical issues during your webinar and it’s disheartening to realize, once you’ve finally sorted them out, that half of your audience has lost interest and left.
5. Leave downloading the necessary software or checking your network connection to the last minute. Make sure that you have logged in, and tested all the necessary software a few days in advance of the webinar and then check again an hour or two before. You can never be too confident that the technical aspects of your presentation are working correctly.
6. Rely on a single communication channel (ie. VoIP and webinar only, instead of including a dial-in option). Tehcnology is fallible. We all know this. Don't put all your eggs in one basket.
7. Forget to determine moderator's duties in advance. Your audience doesn’t want to listen to you scrambling around because nobody knows who’s doing what.
8. Decide at the last minute whether or not your webinar will be recorded. This might seem like an afterthought, but it can actually have a significant influence on the content of your slides. If your slides are abstract, or have little text, then sending them out, or posting them to a site like Slideshare, is relatively useless without a recording attached.
9. Have you partner IM you or your boss publicly berate you. You don't want any distractions or interruptions to get you even more flustered than you already are. Remember to close all other applications (email, IM, Skype etc.) to avoid interruptions when sharing your desktop.
10. Just use text and leave images out of your slides. This is just plain boring. Please—don’t be dull.
11. Use lots of distracting animation. Yes, PowerPoint does have lots of fun animations you can use, and yes, they may be fun to add, but realistically, all they are is distracting and unnecessary.
12. Lose consistency with your company's branding.
    
13. Forget to mute all attendees. Not only is this distracting for you and your attendees, but it can cause embarrassment for everyone involved. Most attendees don't want you to hear what they're doing (whatever that may be) while you present any more than you do. 
14. Leave the phone on mute at the start of the webinar. Following the point above--don't forget to un-mute yourself. It's never pleasant when you realize you've been talking to yourself for 15 minutes and that half your audience has given up and left. 
15. Get locked out of your own webinar. You should be familiar with the different technical aspects of your webinar provider well in advance of your  presentation.
16. Present slides you've never seen before. Be prepared! Nothing is more intimidating (or foolish) than trying to sound knowledgeable about something the first time you read it.
17. Choose not to send out a thank-you email with the slides included.  Be gracious, and offer them resources in exchange for their attendance. If people don’t feel appreciated, or don’t feel like they get value from your presentation, they won’t come back for the next one.

Posted by Amberlie Denny at April 26, 2010 3:00 PM

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