B2B webinars can educate prospects about your product or service, build your authority on industry topics and nurture relationships. They can also lead to nowhere. You want to create a webinar that will inform and entertain prospects — and ultimately lead to a sale.

Research from SalesFuel supports this with its recent findings. The B2B BuyerSCAN study revealed that buyers actively engage with webinars. 31% say they’ve attended a webinar in the past year. And 38% say that a valuable webinar influenced them to consider a vendor’s product or service.

Specifically, Gen Xers and baby boomers are most likely to have attended a webinar in the past year. And baby boomers reported being most influenced to consider a vendor’s solution post-webinar.

Additionally, 45% of buyers from large companies (500+ employees) said a vendor’s webinar boosted their consideration of the product or service. These buyers are also more likely to have attended a webinar in the past year, indicating their use of webinars during vendor evaluation.

It’s clear that webinars can be an effective tool to reach and engage with buyers. But how can sellers turn those attendees into clients?

How can sellers convert B2B webinars into dollars?

The work you do post-​webinar is just as essential as your preparation. In a MarketingProfs article, the professionals at Goldcast report that 73% of event leads go cold within 72 hours if there’s no timely follow-up.

“After 72 hours, the momentum dies,” they write.

“The context fades…And that attendee who was nodding along to every slide? They move on.”

Inspire next steps

Reps should be thinking ahead before they even end a webinar. Before signing off, it’s a best practice to end with a clear call to action (CTA).

"“A webinar shouldn’t end with ‘thanks for joining’'" adds Denise Gibson, director of AdMall Sales. 

"It should end with a simple clear action.”

Ask attendees to take one immediate step while the value is still fresh, such as downloading a whitepaper, scheduling a meeting or call, or joining a community like a LinkedIn group.

Momentum drops fast once the session ends. Within hours, calendars fill up and your webinar fades. Make it easy to act before their attention shifts.

Another pre-​close tip is to segment the attendees before the room empties.

Every audience contains different levels of intent. Fall back on your notes and observations to separate them as the event wraps up, as suggested by Goldcast:

• “Who asked questions (showing high intent)
• Who stayed for the full session (showing high interest)
• Who downloaded resources (showing who's ready to engage)
• Who left early (showing who's low priority)”

This lets you tailor follow-​up based on behavior rather than guessing or leaving it to chance.

Immediate follow-​up

Most sellers know that following up after a webinar is a must-​do. But the key is to do a first follow-​up no later than six hours after the event. And it’s vital that it’s personalized (this is where digital tools can be helpful).

B2BAppointmentSetting​.com encourages reps to mention specifics from the webinar to engage and connect.

“Refer to particular questions or comments whenever you can to demonstrate your attention to detail,” they suggest.

“Call them by their first name and mention the topic they expressed interest in.”

Additionally, add extra value by including the full recording, slide deck, short highlight clips, and/​or a concise FAQ built from live questions.

Additional content, like brief stories or one-​page case examples to show real outcomes, can be impactful, too. The goal is to deliver additional value that includes a personal touch, enticing them to want more.

Follow up while segmenting

During the next day after the webinar, be sure to hop on any leads from the webinar and your immediate follow-​ups. Meanwhile, it’s time to segment outreaches. This requires nurturing the leads that you identified before ending the event.

As you begin this process, once again, personalization and relevance is vital.

As Goldcast recommends, “each segment gets a different message, different timing and different next steps.”

“Trying to follow up with one-​size-​fits-​all messaging is the reason most webinar leads go nowhere.”

As you implement these post-​B2B webinar touchpoints, you’ll find the thoughtfulness pays off. Attendees will see the value you offer, as well as your diligence and interest. You’ll find that following up strong webinar content with timely, personalized outreaches makes it easier to turn that engagement into revenue.

Photo by Jodie Cook on Unsplash