Online meetings certainly help business grow and succeed. This idea may sound less-than-believable at first but there are real proofs that concretely show how web conferences can be a boon for businesses. If you are one of those who still refuse to believe in the real benefits of online meetings, be sure to go over the real world proofs of achieving success with webinars below.

Before proceeding with the examples, though, here’s a list of the things that explain how webinars create benefits or contribute to the success and growth of a business.

• Shortening of sales cycles– This is about more quickly convincing potential customers to buy or turning current customers into recurring customers or patrons. This is achieved by enhancing customer confidence in the company and the products offered.
• Reduction of marketing costs – Conducting a webinar or web conference is without a doubt less expensive compared to holding a typical product demonstration. A virtual webinar-style product launch is also way more cost-efficient. Microsoft did this and achieved faster return on investment and a wider reach over a significantly shorter period of time.
• Enhancing brand positioning – Webinars have effects comparable to “offline learning” or the experience associated with having personal interaction. The interactive nature of web conferences leaves a greater impact on participants, enabling better brand positioning and a more memorable way of reaching out to prospects.
• Thought Leadership – This is one of the highly effective methods of positioning a company as a leader in its field. Webinars, together with videos, research, articles, and other content can amplify the results of a thought leadership marketing strategy.
• Less Expensive Internal and External Communication – Moreover, the use of web conference software is also a good way for reducing operating costs through the reduction of internal (personnel meetings and trainings) and external (reaching out to customers, business partners, investors, and stakeholders) communication costs.

Proofs of Webinar Success

1. Inspired Marketing

Inspired Marketing is a company involved in the selling of digital materials and online trainings on using social networking to create and promote successful businesses. Around five years ago, the company decided to invest in over 300 webinars to help increase sales. The idea turned into success as more than $2.5 million in sales were generated for 2011 after the webinar strategy was implemented. Inspired Marketing President and co-founder Lewis Howes even claims that they were able to generate sales of around $250,000 from just seven webinar events.

2. Seagate

One of the popular names in the IT business, Seagate is a large company with over 52,000 employees. However, this number of manpower apparently does not need augmentation as the company decided to ditch traditional B2B channels in promoting their products directly to end users. Instead of hiring more people to pursue B2C marketing efforts, Seagate tried using webinars. The result of this attempt was more than what the company expected. The webinar-facilitated B2C product launch conducted by the company brought in more than 1,500 attendees despite having no additional advertising budget. The company surpassed their initial sales unit goal by 300%. This is twice the sales forecast for the launching week. A similar approach was also used in pooling in speakers for webcasts that Seagate saved on travel costs.

3. Marketo

Being a marketing analytics software company, Marketo is no newbie when it comes to marketing strategies. However, it was only some years ago that the company decided to employ webinars in their marketing efforts. The company used webinars as the key component in the marketing toolkit for lead generation and to promote thought leadership. In their case, there was no instant success. Not everyone who registered for the webinars attended. However, the company added a simple recorded reminder to supplement their email marketing content. This allowed the company to consequently get better attendance and eventually an increased conversion among attendees. It’s a significant rise, from a meager 26% to a good 48%. Doubling the conversion rate is definitely a good outcome resulting from Marketo’s good decision to pursue the use of webinars despite the not so encouraging initial results of the undertaking.

4. Avon

A globally known brand, Avon is one of the world’s most successful direct selling businesses. Many would probably think that the company has already achieved the perfect formula for an efficient and successful marketing. It appears that there’s still a big room for improvement for Avon’s system of marketing and operations efficiency. Through the youravon.com website, a webinar channel intended for the company’s reps or sellers, the company was able to help spur increased productivity while decreasing the costs associated with trainings and marketing. According to Avon’s estimates, the company achieved more than $10 million in reduced operating costs after implementing this strategy. This is certainly a major success brought about by the simple idea of using webinars.

5. Pinpointe

Pinpointe is another company that specializes in marketing products but has only belatedly realized the benefits of webinars. Targeting mid to large size enterprises, the company used to rely on its 15-day trial scheme and traditional sales methods to reach out to potential customers. This, however, has somewhat put the company’s sales at a near-stagnant level. They couldn’t find a great way to significantly raise sales. Nevertheless, the company decided to explore the idea of using webinars, a choice they will never regret doing. After using webinars, Pinpointe obtained around a thousand new leads per month, 25 of which eventually become customers who bring in around $200 every month.

6. Lumedx

Healthcare technology company Lumedx is rather small, having a workforce of only about a hundred. For it to credibly compete against larger and more popular competitors, it needed something more than just traditional for its marketing campaigns. That’s why the company tried using webinars. This has fortunately been an excellent decision for Lumedx as the company more effectively established awareness among potential customers. The webinars helped improve lead generation while establishing good customer rapport. Lumedx has since reported having increased contact with more than 500 clients and annual sales improvement to more than $600,000.

These are just some of the companies that have successfully harnessed the advantages of webinars for businesses. These are the real-world proofs that webinars, or web conferencing are not just for internal communication and training. They can also be used in the marketing of brands or products. A lot of businesses have actually started hosting virtual events lately as it is often easier and more cost-effective for them. They can also reach a lot more people, so there are many benefits to hosting and planning these online events. If any businesses are thinking about hosting their own virtual event for marketing purposes, they could always contact Smart Works for help. That would ensure that the event is successful. Of course, it’s just important to choose the right platform that is reliable and with the right functions or features that can help spur significantly better business outcomes.