Webinars occur all over the world at different times of the day, and with the rise of content marketing, there will be no shortage any time soon. And like any event, you must send out the webinar invite. Will it get clicked on, or tossed in the virtual trash? As marketers we aim for this precious click, so here’s what you should keep in mind as you craft your next webinar invitation, and other promotional copy.

Let’s say you’ve put all the programming in place for a great webinar on multiplexed quantitative proteomics. You recruited your speakers, and didn’t miss one detail. How do you make sure people attend?

DO
• Keep your goals for the webinar in mind every step of the way.
• Continuously promote on social media.
• Use print and web ads (print isn’t dead after all). Also ask yourself if there are any underused channels you could be advertising on.
• Highlight your speaker(s) in creative ways beyond the webinar itself.
• Send reminders. A marketing automation program is especially helpful here.

And always include: • The basics! Who, what, when, and where •  Key learning objectives • Who would find the webinar most helpful

DON’T
• Sound like a salesman in your invitation.
• Bog down the reader with too much content. Your content is most likely technical, which would be the reason your audience will attend, but the invitation itself does not need to include the kitchen sink.
• Wait until the last minute to promote.
• Miss your lead generation opportunity.

Some of the do’s and don’ts seem obvious; however, invitations cross our desks all the time that leave such key details out. As you start crafting your email, simply think of your webinar invite like you would a party: Provide the basics – the who, what, when, where, why, – and don’t promote so last minute that calendars will be booked. There are plenty of webinar invite examples out there for inspiration, and ways you can add calendar reminders to your email sends.

More key suggestions on your invitation copy:

• Always be thinking about your audience or defined personas, which will help guide the tone and look and feel of your invitations, and keep your copy from sounding like a sales pitch. All parties should ultimately get something from the webinar: attendees gain invaluable knowledge, while we (the marketers) get potential sales leads. It’s a two-way street.

• On each social media site, tweak your messaging. You don’t want to copy and paste the same language into every update. Mix it up to capitalize on each platform’s strengths: an accompanying infographic about your webinar could do well on LinkedIn, for instance.

• As is often the case with science-focused webinars, the topic or speaker can dictate the look and tone of your invite, as well. Make sure you cover the basics before you start on your template. Do you need to include a company logo other than your own? Is there a picture of the speaker you can use?

• Remember you want to entice, not divulge everything in the webinar invite. Bullet points are quick reads and make information easier to digest. Recipients should learn enough to know whether or not they want to participate, but don’t need to walk away with every last detail.

More key suggestions on your promotion:

• Have your speaker(s) promote the webinar, too. They can tweet about it, post it on Facebook, or anywhere they see fit. But be sure to offer some copy if you ask them to do so. This will ensure your messaging is on target, and includes key details they may not be thinking of, such as time zone or any relevant hashtags. Even better than copy is to create a shareable image sized appropriately for social channels, so they can add to the tweet or update with interesting details about their participation. (Pro tip: We’ve found 1200×627 pixels works well on both Twitter and Facebook.)

• Is your speaker willing to be even more involved in your promotions? If so, have them write a guest post on your blog. This will allow webinar attendees to get a little more information than the standard blurb on the webinar invite, and expands your reach. If time is not on your speaker’s side, consider doing an interview instead. You can send your questions to your speaker ahead of time, and they can respond via email when appropriate for their own workload.

• And because it’s worth repeating, don’t wait until the last minute to promote, and send reminders. Have you ever gotten invited to an event last minute? Don’t make it seem like this was thrown together quickly or that you were a last minute addition. Avoid both and start promoting early – a month out is a good rule of thumb.

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Some webinars will naturally be easier to get registrations due to content, speakers, and so on, so be sure you’ve established realistic goals in the first place. Having a thousand registrants would be great, but quality is important, too. One hundred engaged, relevant listeners will be better leads than nine hundred who are tuning out, or just turn you off.

What are the tips that work best for your webinars or events? Share with us in the comments.