We recently assisted a customer with a webinar that focused on reducing the total cost of support while improving the total customer experience.

 

Our customer had some great graphics and statistics on how customer service affects customer retention, and how companies can serve their customers profitably as we are now mid-way through 2008.  Back in the day, my grandparents knew of only 2 ways to approach customer service:  1:--Go to the store or place of purchase,  2:  Call the company.

Now, there are more options for assistance round the clock:   1-on-line self-help, 2-email Support, 3-Voice support, 4-fee based support, 5-on-site support, and more.

 

Ironically, I was loading his presentation into Brainshark for replay, and while I was timing the slide animations to synch with the audio, it hit me how powerful a Brainshark replay could be in customer service.

 

Searching through a company's online self-help manual can be a daunting task.  It's usually only a couple steps better than  the electronic version of the product manual that comes in the box (or in the contract), anyway.

 

How much better to have access to a presentation--complete with audio and great graphics to illustrate the points.  Because you can pick and choose which slides to view--or watch them all in succession, if you want, you now have a multi-media solution with a human voice attached to help you determine the root of your dilemma.

 

Every company already has the data---all it takes is a one-time presentation with a speaker, and you now have the tools to reach every customer with web access.

You can view sample Webinar for ONE presentations at:  http://www.riceresources.com/webinars/webinarforone_landing.html

 

 

 

In "It's Time for a E-Newsletter Makeover - Part I", looked at what we were doing right with our newsletter design, using the whitepaper published by ExactTarget, Email Marketing Design & Rendering: The New Essentials as a guide.

Now I'll list the improvements I saw fit to make to our email newsletter template.

The main call to action was not formerly visible in the upper left 4-5 inch square of the email, so to fix that I modified the header to include a customizable button that will link to whatever the current call to action is.

Some email clients will not display underlined links automatically, so for maximum consistency in appearance, I set the "text-decoration" property to underline with an inline CSS style in the anchor tag of each link.

According to the Exact-Target's whitepaper, Hotmail will render all text as dark gray unless you set a specific color, so I specified what I preferred, in this case black.

Despite everything we've done to make sure our newsletter displays properly with as many email clients as possible, just in case someone might still have trouble viewing it, I added "Click here to view this email as a webpage" in small text at the top with a link to our online archive.

For comparison, here is a link to the newsletter before the makeover:
Webinar Resources Newsletter Vol 1 No 3

And now here is a link to the newsletter after the makeover:
Webinar Resources Newsletter Vol 1 No 4

When you use the "Embed" command to place a Brainshark interactive web  presentation on your web site, the default background color for the introductory animation is blue, and the default background color for the slide portion of your presentation is gray. These are nice colors, but you might prefer using the background color of your web site instead.

I have made a sample page of a Brainshark presentation with the default colors on a web page with a lime green background. It takes a brave person to use lime green as a background color, but it's definitely good for demonstration purposes!

Here is a second page showing the blue and gray background colors in the presentation replaced by the lime green background color on the web page.

How is this done? First, find out the hexidecimal code for the background color on your web site. If you're not sure, see my article What the Hex?! How to Match Documents to the Colors of Your Company's Web Site for help.

Next, open the html page that contains the embedded Brainshark presentation in a plain text editor. Look for the following code snippets, and replace the highlighted six-number sequences with your chosen hexidecimal color code:
    
    

To see other modifications you can make to the code, click the link "Additional URL Parameters" when the Embed dialog box is open in Brainshark.

Having just recently re-entered the job market at Webinar Resources after a 7-year maternity leave, I have been entertained by many advances in the world of telecommunications and conferencing.  Nothing has amazed me more than the advancement of video technology.  I remember PictureTel pioneer and President, Norman Gaut, telling us that video would become synonymous with the telephone call, and that the day would arrive in which the technology would resemble a tv broadcast.

Well, he was correct on one front.  The technology is astounding.  We use interactive web conferencing on our team all the time, and it does look just like a TV broadcast.  It's a simple click of the mouse, and there's Mark and Carolyn in St. Louis, while I sip my coffee in Simsbury, CT.  Our team meeting is underway, and though I've never met them, I'm part of the team.

Years ago, I always loved the "sell" for videoconferencing, because the technology was so much fun, and it truly helped the customer conduct business.  Now, the technology of video is just a given, and the aid to business is the way that Webinar Resources is able to drive customer acquisition by getting hundreds to attend a seminar that is webcast right to their laptop.  Technology aside, the sheer logistics of assembling a crowd that large, virtual or not, is amazing, but we do it all the time.

Also amazing is how that web conference crowd is a bit fluent through time.  Those who can't attend, live, at the scheduled time, are invited to attend the "webinar for one"--in which they view a video replay from their laptop, at their leisure.

We've come a long way, and who knows, in another 7 years, video may be synonymous with the phone call, but for now, I'm really stoked by the volume of people we can touch with a web presentation because of the effective lead generation we perform weeks before the event.  Seven years ago I thought it was a great time to be working with the technology.  Now, the technology is proven, and it's a great time to share it so easily with so many.

 

In the latest release of Brainshark v.16.2, Brainshark has added the ability to embed your Brainshark presentation in a web page or blog.   This is a capability that we refined while working with a joint Brainshark and Webinar Resources' customer.   Our goal was to embed a Brainshark presentation into a registration page to reduce the use of real estate on a landing page and at the same time add an engaging, interactive web presentation to create lead generation.

The early prototypes were designed to embed Brainshark presentations in different langages to support an International set of events for our customer.  Customer acquisition increased significantly as the registrant could hear and view the online event communication in their own native language.

Through the use of some HTML and Javascripting, we were able to run Brainshark presentations as soon as the landing page was opened.   The ability to appeal to more than one modality at a time (hearing, seeing), gave the landing page a greater impact and increased registration.

Now Brainshark customers can embed their own presentations using an embed command that appears in the Edit Properties window.   By using the iframe code, you can easliy embed a Brainshark presentation into a web page.   We expect to see many more creative uses of Brainshark presentations using this feature.  

You can see how we embed Brainshark presentations in our site by visting our website and selecting the Webinar for ONE tab.

We will have an upcoming blog that will describe how you can hide the borders of your Brainshark presentation so that it will blend in with your website.  For now, try the embed link in your Brainshark sharkive or contact Webinar Resources if you are not a Brainshark customer and wish to test out this feature.

After reading the whitepaper published by ExactTarget, Email Marketing Design & Rendering: The New Essentials, I decided it was time for a makeover of the Webinar Resources Newsletter template. We are already using a lot of the best practices described by ExactTarget, but there is still plenty of room for improvement.

Here is what our current newsletter looks like - Webinar Resources InTouch, Volume 1 Number 3. The following are things we are currently doing right:

The maximum recommended width for an email is 600 pixels. Ours is now 580 pixels wide.

ExactTarget recommends putting your brand and a call to action into a 4-5 inch square (between 288 and 360 pixels) at the upper left corner of the email. This is the most viewed part of the message. Our logo, company name and color scheme are comfortably in the critical area, so I would say our brand is where it is supposed to be.

In order to get viewers to look at the content "below the fold", it helps to include "above the fold" links to the content below, a table of contents, or some other kind of hint of what the newsletter contains so that the recipients will want to scroll down. Our introductory paragraph describing the contents in this newsletter issue fulfills that requirement.

We have kept our branding consistent on the landing pages that viewers will reach if they click on any of the links to our web site.

It hurt to do it, but we removed CSS styles and HTML background images some time ago because many email clients do not support them.

We do not embed rich media right into the email message, rather we provide an image which links to the rich media content. In the example pictured, the featured content is a Webinar for One^SM Brainshark presentation. This is the best way to email a flash movie or a movie clip.

In my HTML coding, I have had the following habits for a long time, for other reasons:

• Providing width and height attributes for all images
• Giving alt and title tags to all images
• Specifying width and height for tables and table cells, unless there is a reason not to

In HTML email, images without size attributes can expand in unpredictable ways, images might be blocked by the email client making alt and title tags useful for helping the viewer to see what the image is supposed to be, and tables can render in unexpected ways without accurate size attributes. These habits are especially good to have when creating HTML email messages, as apparently email clients are generally a lot less forgiving than web browsers.

It sounds like we have all the bases covered doesn't it? In my next post we'll find out when I take a look at all the improvements we can make in our email newsletter template.

Every touch point with a customer or prospect should include a "call to action".   A Call to Action or CTA, as some call it, invites interaction from your visitor and promotes lead generation.  A CTA can be as simple as a form posted on your website, in a blog, and email or in an on demand presentation like a Webinar for ONE.

We always include a call to action in our Webinar newsletters.  The simplest example is to invite your reader to subscribe to your newsletter by completing a simple online form.  You are more likely to have a customer or prospect return to your cross-media communications if you invite them to take an action.  Every customer acquisition program should promote interactivity.

A common error by many who produce web conferences is to post a webcast or webinar replay that does not contain some form of a call to action.   Many web conferencing marketeers do not realize that there are tracking tools that can inform them when a viewer is watching a presentation.  Views of your presentations can take place at any time of the day and in almost any location where online content is available - which is about anywhere in the world.

The goal of any effective customer acquisition process is to connect with your customer or prospect and move them to an action where conversion takes place.  Conversion can be as simple as the completion of a subscription form or as in-depth as completing a live poll embedded in a Webinar for ONE. 

As you create your personalized marketing campaigns, make sure you include several types of call to action best practices and techniques   People like to give their input and like to be involved.  Give your customers, prospects and partners an opportunity to interact with you online and you will produce effective lead generation results.

Feel free to post your comments and/or complete our live online poll

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Corporate Photos:

So, we all do it.  We multi-task, even at inappropriate times, such as during a meeting, or especially during a virtual meeting or webinar.  Who hasn't realized that they missed that key piece of information while responding to the fire drill of the hour, or worse, while checking scores from last night's games.  It's just too easy to claim that extra mile of "productivity" when you're not called on for direct interaction.

As a presenter, how do you get around this?  There're plenty of time-tested techniques that command direct interaction:  polls, directed Q&A, tests, etc.  However, one simple technique may be hanging from your neck:  the corporate photo.  When you attend a webinar, and the presenter's photo is displayed, you immediately have an affiliation with that person you'd never have without the photo.  Instead of tuning out a webinar, you're now turning away from Chris, the guy with the nice voice and the red tie who has all of these great tips on how to market your product.

You spend a lot of time, money and resources in planning and producing your webinars.  However, once the web conference is over, so is the interactivity between you and your prospects.  Many web conferencing solutions provide archival capabilities for replaying the webinar content.  However, the interactivity is lost and the viewer has little, if any opportunity to participate.

Our "Webinar for One" is a unique replay, lead generation solution that engages the viewer provides participation through live polling and surveys and directs the viewer to encapsulated rich media that could include software demonstrations, flash media and live web site tours. The viewer becomes a participant in a Webinar for One.  Your webinar becomes "alive" again while you gather valuable viewing and polling data from prospects that can view and interact with your presentation at any hour of the day.

You can visit our Webinar for ONE landing page and participate in some of our partner "Webinar for ONE" presentations.  

I usually use my MP3 player for rocking out, but the other day I was able to use mine (a Sansa c240) to get some work done.

I needed some voice narration for an instructional Brainshark presentation I was working on. With Brainshark, you can take a PowerPoint presentation, bring it into the Brainshark software, and add things to it such as audio, questions, polls, or guestbooks, and make it into an on-demand presentation that can be launched from or embedded in web pages or email messages. If you would like to see some sample Brainshark presentations, we have several on the Webinar For One^SM landing page on our web site.

I had not used the voice recording feature on my MP3 player yet, so I decided to try using it to narrate the slides. It was very easy to record the audio by speaking into the little microphone on the MP3 player, saving the resulting .wav files, connecting the player to the computer with the USB cable, then dragging and dropping the saved files into sound editing software on my computer. After editing, I added the sound files to my presentation in Brainshark. Now that I know how easy it is, I'll be using narration this way more often!

We provide more than customer acquisition and lead generation services at Webinar Resources.  Sometimes we like to have a little fun and I like to compose music.

I am known for writing parodies of songs for business meetings and parties and have even performed in Nashville singing "O Document Where Art Thou" to a group of customers who really got into the PowerPoint presentation when I gave them their tag line, "We'll help you build your ROI" to the tune of "Man of Constant Sorrow".

Last year's Fall release of ExactTarget's permission-based email platform got me so excited; I composed a song about it.  I should have known after submitting my email and MP3 file to a rep that works for an email marketing company that the song would soon hit the charts throughout the company.

It did and you can read CEO of ExactTarget, Scott Dorsey's blog on my submission, "Ready to Rock and Roll".  Enjoy!

Do you publish an email newsletter as part of your customer acquisition program? Once your newsletter is sent out, you don't have to stop reaping the benefits of your work. I suggest that you make copies of your newsletters as web pages and archive them on your web site. That way they can continue to work for you by bringing in traffic via the search engines. Be sure to put a newsletter sign-up form on your archived newsletters to pick up new subscribers. Here is an example of a past issue of our Webinar Resources Newsletter. The sign-up form at the bottom automatically adds new subscribers to the list as they request to be added to the subscriber list. You can learn more about email marketing by viewing the Brainshark presentation "Beyond Opens and Clicks - How to Use Email to Transform Marketing Performance from Good to Great".

We are glad you stopped by to learn more about our services at Webinar Resources.  This blog was established to provide you industry Thought Leadership content related to lead and customer acquisition solutions.  We are here to help you make your website the "hub" of marketing and customer activity.

Hi, I am Creative Director for Webinar Resources. Welcome to my blog. I will discuss techniques and strategies for web site owners to improve their web sites, ways to  increase the number of visitors and lead generation, and how to use a web site as a tool for marketing campaigns over multiple channels.

Since I'm always eager to spread the word whenever I have something new for people to see, one of the the first things I did upon starting this blog was to find a way to syndicate the RSS feed from this blog to my own web sites. I accomplished that with the help of some free software called RSSinclude. If your own web site needs some more content to keep your visitors coming back, give this or a similar tool a try and include some RSS feeds on your site that your visitors might enjoy.