What Is A Webinar And How Experts Should Market Their Webinars

TL;DR: Webinar Marketing for Experts
A webinar is a live or recorded online session where you teach a single topic to a group of people. For experts, webinars are still one of the best ways to show what you know, collect email addresses, and lead people toward a paid course, coaching program, or service.

Steps To Run Successful Webinars
1. Target a single problem
2. Have a clear offer
3. Build momentum before the webinar
4. Demonstrate expertise, show results, teach
5. Make a special limited time offer
6. Record and rerun
7. Repurpose the webinar

Key webinar data you should know about:
– About 48% of people who register for a webinar show up live (Livestorm, 33,786 webinars)
– Half of all registrations come in the final 7 days, and 15% arrive on the day of the event
– Webinars that run 60 to 75 minutes draw the largest live audiences
– Tuesday has the best show-up rate, and July and August have the worst
– Email drives more registrations than any other channel

What to do: Pick one clear problem, promise one result, promote mostly by email in the last week, teach for most of the session, and send the replay to everyone within 24 hours.

Webinars have been around since the 1990s, and many people assume they’ve run their course. Most of us have sat through a dull webinar that was a sales pitch dressed up as training, and few of us want another one.

The data tells a different story.

Livestorm analyzed more than 33,000 webinars from 2025 and found that about half of registrants still show up live. Meanwhile, ON24 reports that the average number of attendees per webinar went up in 2025.

Webinars also have a newer advantage.

AI now produces a flood of written posts and videos, and people trust that content less. A live session with a real expert who answers real questions is something AI can’t fake, and audiences notice the difference.

I’ve run and studied webinars for more than 20 years, through my businesses Tagoras and Leading Learning and here at Learning Revolution. In this guide, I cover what a webinar is, why it’s worth your time, how to plan and promote one, how to keep people engaged, and what to do after it ends.

Compare the best webinar platforms in my full software guide

What Is a Webinar?

A webinar is an online seminar. One or more presenters teach a topic to a group of people who join through their computer or phone. Most webinars last about an hour and happen in a single session on a single day.

Webinars come in a few different formats. The table below explains each one and when it makes sense to use it.

Format	How it works	Best used for
Live interactive webinar	You present in real time, and attendees ask questions through chat, polls, or Q&A	Building trust, answering questions, and selling higher-priced offers
Webcast	A one-way live broadcast with little or no audience interaction	Large announcements or talks to thousands of people
Automated (evergreen) webinar	A recording that plays on a schedule as if it were live	Running the same lead-generation webinar many times without presenting each time
Simulive webinar	A recorded presentation followed by a live Q&A with the presenter	Keeping quality high while still offering live interaction
On-demand replay	A recording people can watch anytime	Reaching people who couldn’t attend live

A webinar is different from a virtual conference, which has many sessions over one or more days. I’ve written separately about how to host a virtual conference. A webinar is also lighter than a paid masterclass or a multi-week cohort-based course, though a good webinar often leads people into one of those.

How Experts Use Webinars

For course creators, consultants, coaches, and trainers, a webinar can serve several purposes at once.

• Introduce yourself to people who have never heard of you
• Deepen your relationship with your current email list or clients
• Build your reputation for thought leadership in a specific niche
• Show how you solve a problem, so people can judge your expertise for themselves
• Create a recording you can turn into clips, articles, and course lessons
• Move attendees toward a paid offer as part of a sales funnel

Webinars are especially useful for experts with a small, specialized audience. For example, a compliance trainer for dental offices might never fill a hotel ballroom in one city, but a webinar can gather 80 practice managers from across the country in one room for an hour.

Are Webinars Still Worth It?

Yes. Webinars are still one of the most reliable ways for experts to turn strangers into leads and leads into buyers. The best evidence comes from the platforms that host millions of webinar registrations each year.

Finding	Number	Source
Average show-up rate (registrants who attend live)	47.7%	Livestorm, 2025 data
Average registrants per webinar	175	Livestorm
Average live attendees per webinar	83	Livestorm
Average attendees per webinar on ON24, Q4 2025	254, up from 219	ON24
Share of attendees who watch on demand	About 43% to 50%	ON24
Average watch time	26 minutes, or 38% of the session	Livestorm
B2B marketers who rank speaking events and webinars among their top 3 thought leadership channels	52%	Content Marketing Institute
B2B marketers who budget for experiential marketing such as events, workshops, and demos	78%	Content Marketing Institute

Two trends make webinars more valuable for experts than they were a few years ago.

First, people are looking for real humans again. A September 2026 Gartner survey found that 43% of consumers now rely more on real people for recommendations because of AI-generated content, and 57% say AI content has made them less trusting of brand messages. A live webinar, where people see your face and hear you answer their questions, is the opposite of AI content.

Second, the technology is better and cheaper. Most platforms now include polls, Q&A, chat, reminders, replays, and AI tools that write summaries and cut clips. A solo expert can run a polished webinar from a home office with a laptop, a decent microphone, and a mid-priced platform.

The catch is that people’s patience is low. In Livestorm’s data, the average viewer stays for only 26 minutes of a 68-minute session. Webinars still work, but only when they deliver real value early and keep people involved.

The Benefits and Drawbacks of Webinars

Webinars are not the right tool for every goal. The table below shows what they do well and where they fall short, based on what I’ve seen across hundreds of sessions.

Benefits	Drawbacks
Show your expertise live, which builds trust faster than written content	Live sessions take preparation, rehearsal, and a fixed time on your calendar
Collect email addresses from people interested in your topic	About half of registrants won’t show up live
Reach a global audience without travel or venue costs	Viewers drop off quickly if the first 10 minutes are slow
Get instant feedback through questions, polls, and chat	Time zones make it hard to serve a worldwide audience in one session
Sell higher-priced offers such as courses, coaching, and consulting	Heavy sales pitches damage your reputation
Create a recording you can reuse for months	Technical problems can derail a live event
Cost far less than an in-person seminar or workshop	Good platforms cost money once you pass free-plan limits

Webinars also help with your reputation online. Google looks for experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trust when it ranks content, and a library of recorded webinars with your name and face on them supports all four. My guide on building a consulting brand covers this in more detail.

Types of Webinars You Can Run

The most useful way to choose a webinar format is to start with your goal. Here are the types I see work best for experts.

Webinar type	Goal	What it looks like	Typical offer at the end
Teaching webinar	Generate leads	You teach one method or framework in 45 to 60 minutes	A course, workshop, or free consultation
Paid workshop	Earn revenue directly	Attendees pay to join and do exercises with you live	A follow-up program or coaching package
Q&A or office hours	Build trust with your list	You answer audience questions on one topic	A membership, community, or course
Panel or interview	Reach new audiences	You host guests who bring their own followers	Your email list or a related offer
Product or course demo	Close sales	You show what’s inside your course or service	Enrollment, often with a deadline
Customer onboarding	Help buyers succeed	You walk new customers through getting started	Upgrades, renewals, or referrals
Evergreen automated webinar	Generate leads on autopilot	A proven recording runs on a schedule	Your core course or service

If you’re new to webinars, I recommend starting with a teaching webinar. The format is the easiest to plan, it gives you a recording you can reuse, and it shows you which topics your audience cares about most.

How to Plan and Create a Webinar

The basic steps for creating a good webinar haven’t changed much since I wrote about them in my book Leading the Learning Revolution. Knowing your subject is one thing. Sharing it in a way that holds people’s attention for an hour is another. Planning comes down to six steps.

1. Identify Your Audience

Start by naming the specific people who will gain the most from your webinar. A clear audience makes every other decision easier, from your title to your examples to your offer.

Also think about who pays. For example, you might teach time management to mid-level managers, but find that HR departments decide who attends. In that case, your promotion needs to speak to HR as well as to the managers.

Consider skipping the word “webinar” in your title. Many people connect the word with long sales pitches. Calling it a workshop, a live training, or a clinic can lift registrations, and my colleague Celisa Steele and I discuss this idea in our webinar strategy episode on Leading Learning.

2. Define the Topic and the Promise

Pick one problem and promise one result. “Marketing for coaches” is too broad. “How to get your first five coaching clients from LinkedIn” tells people exactly what they’ll walk away with.

Even if your webinar is free, aim for the level of value people would pay for. Free webinars compete with every other free thing on the internet, and only the useful ones get attendees to come back for the next one.

Write down two or three learning objectives. Objectives keep you focused, and they give you a way to check, through a poll or a quick question, whether people understood the material.

3. Choose the Length and Structure

Plan for about 60 minutes in total. In Livestorm’s data, webinars that ran 60 to 75 minutes drew the largest live audiences, with an average of 205 attendees. Most viewers still watch only about 26 minutes, so put your most important teaching in the first half.

Here’s the structure I use for a 60-minute teaching webinar.

Time	Segment	What happens
0 to 5 minutes	Welcome and promise	Say what people will learn and why it matters, then run a quick poll to learn who is in the room
5 to 15 minutes	Core idea	Teach the main concept or framework with one clear example
15 to 35 minutes	Teaching in short chunks	Two or three segments of 8 to 10 minutes each, with a poll, question, or exercise between them
35 to 45 minutes	Case study or demo	Show the method working for a real person or business
45 to 50 minutes	Next step	Explain your offer or the next step for people who want more help
50 to 60 minutes	Q&A	Answer live questions, which is often the most valued part of the session

4. Write Your Outline and Script

Start with the end goal. Ask yourself what people should know or be able to do when the webinar ends, then work backward through the steps they need to get there. Those steps become your outline.

Break the content into short chunks of 8 to 10 minutes. Short segments are easier to follow and remember, and the breaks between them give you natural moments to ask questions. I explain this chunking approach in my post on making money from webinars, and my guide to teaching adult learners covers how adults absorb new information.

AI tools can speed up this step. For example, ChatGPT or Claude can turn your notes into an outline, suggest poll questions, or point out gaps in your logic. My list of ChatGPT prompts for course creators includes prompts for this. Keep your own examples, stories, and opinions in the script, though, since those are what people came to hear.

5. Create Simple, Useful Visuals

Slides should support what you say, not repeat it. Use one idea per slide, large text, and images or diagrams that explain something. Decorative stock photos add nothing and can distract people.

If design isn’t your strength, an AI presentation maker can turn your outline into clean slides in minutes. Another option is to hire a designer on Fiverr or Upwork, which usually costs less than the time you’d spend fighting with slide software.

6. Rehearse and Test

Record yourself giving the full webinar at least once before the live date. Watch it back and check your timing, your pace, and any parts that drag. Most presenters speak too fast when they’re nervous, so aim for a slightly slower pace than normal conversation.

Then run it past two or three people from your target audience. Ask them where they got lost and whether they could use what they learned. Hearing this from a friendly tester is much better than hearing it from attendees who leave halfway through. My guide to virtual presentations has more tips on delivery.

Your Webinar Setup: Platform and Home Studio

Delivering a webinar well takes two things, a platform that fits your goals and a simple home studio that makes you look and sound professional.

Choosing a Webinar Platform

The right platform depends on what you’re trying to do. Here’s a quick look at popular options. I compare them in depth, with features and pricing, in my guide to the best webinar software platforms.

Platform	Best for	Starting price
Zoom Webinars	Audiences who already know Zoom	$89/mo
WebinarJam	Marketing webinars with built-in pages and reminders	$49/mo
Livestorm	Browser-based webinars with no download for attendees	Free plan, then $100/mo billed annually
Demio	Simple marketing webinars with strong analytics	$63/mo
ClickMeeting	Teaching webinars with whiteboards and tests	€41/mo

When you compare platforms, check four things. Look at how many attendees each plan allows, whether it runs automated or evergreen webinars, whether it connects to your email tool, and whether attendees must download anything to join. Fewer steps for attendees usually means more people show up.

Setting Up a Simple Home Studio

An expensive studio isn’t necessary, but a few upgrades make a big difference in how professional you look and sound.

Item	Why it matters	What I recommend
Microphone	People forgive average video but not bad audio	A USB microphone or a lavalier mic if you move around
Camera	A clear image builds trust	Your laptop camera works, but a webcam or a Mevo looks sharper
Lighting	Good light matters more than an expensive camera	A ring light or a window in front of you, never behind you
Internet	Dropped connections ruin live sessions	A wired connection if possible, and other devices off the network
Background	Clutter distracts people	A tidy, simple background or a subtle blur

For more detail, see my guides to building a simple home video studio and choosing live streaming equipment.

How to Market and Promote a Webinar Successfully

A great webinar with no audience doesn’t help anyone. Promotion takes as much planning as the content itself.

1. Pick the Right Day and Time

Choose a time that suits your audience’s schedule. Business audiences usually prefer mid-morning or early afternoon on weekdays. People learning a hobby often prefer evenings or weekends. Also check for holidays, school breaks, and the time zones your audience lives in.

The data offers a few useful patterns. In Livestorm’s 2026 Webinar Benchmark Report, Tuesday had the best show-up rate at 51.7%, while Wednesday drew the largest average audience. January, September, and November had the strongest attendance, and July and August had the weakest.

2. Promote Hardest in the Final Week

Most people register late. Livestorm found that 49.7% of registrations come in the last 7 days, and 15.3% come on the day of the webinar itself. Only 16.4% of people register three or more weeks ahead.

For most experts, two to three weeks of promotion is enough, with the most effort in the last few days. Here’s a simple schedule I recommend.

When	What to send or post
2 to 3 weeks before	Announcement email and social posts with the title, the promise, and a registration link
1 week before	Second email with a specific example of what people will learn
2 to 3 days before	Short video or post with a tip from the webinar
Day before	Reminder email to registrants and a last-chance email to everyone else
1 hour before	Reminder with the join link
At start time	“We’re live now” email and social post

3. Use Email First, Then Social and Partners

Email is still the strongest channel for webinars. In Livestorm’s survey, 86.3% of teams named email as one of their top three sources of registrations, compared with 43.3% for organic social media.

Start with your own list, then reach out to partners whose audiences overlap with yours. A co-host or guest with an email list can double your registrations. My guide to email marketing best practices covers how to write promotional emails that people open, and Kit is the email platform I recommend for most experts.

Build a simple registration page with a clear headline, three bullet points about what people will learn, a short presenter bio, and one form. My guide to creating landing pages that convert explains each part.

Paid ads on LinkedIn, Facebook, or Google can work too, but only when you target a narrow audience and already know the topic draws interest. Don’t forget offline channels either. Professional associations, local business groups, and conferences in your field are good places to share a webinar invitation.

4. Ask a Question When People Register

Add one optional question to your registration form, such as “What’s your biggest challenge with this topic?” The answers help you adjust your examples, and mentioning a few of them live shows people you paid attention.

How to Host an Engaging Webinar

Engagement is what separates a webinar people remember from one they leave after ten minutes. Here are the practices I rely on.

1. Start on time and get to the point. Skip long introductions about yourself. Tell people what they’ll learn in the first two minutes.
2. Ask for interaction early. A quick poll or a “type where you’re joining from” prompt in the first five minutes gets people used to participating.
3. Change something every 8 to 10 minutes. Switch to a poll, a question, a short exercise, or a demo. Livestorm found that 90% of webinars use chat and 65% use Q&A, but only 28% use polls, so polls are an easy way to stand out.
4. Leave real time for questions. Livestorm’s data shows an average of 20.4 questions per session. Answering them well is often the most valuable part of the event.
5. Show your face. Keep your camera on when you’re not sharing slides, because people connect with a person more than a slide deck.
6. Use a co-host or producer. Someone else can watch the chat, handle technical issues, and pass you the best questions.
7. Have a backup plan. Keep a second device logged in and your slides saved locally in case your connection drops.

Make your offer clear but brief. If you have a course or service to recommend, explain who it’s for and how it helps, then go back to answering questions. ON24 found that personalized calls to action, matched to what each audience needs, converted 118% better than generic ones. A relevant offer feels like help. A long, pushy pitch feels like a bait and switch and costs you trust.

What to Do After Your Webinar

Many experts put all their effort into the live session and far less into what comes after. Much of a webinar’s value comes from the follow-up.

Send the Replay Within 24 Hours

Email the recording to everyone who registered, including people who didn’t attend. With half of registrants missing the live session, the replay often reaches as many people as the webinar itself.

Consider making the replay public. Livestorm found that public replays got about 3.7 times as many views as replays limited to registrants. Public replays also help your SEO and give you content you can share for months.

Follow Up and Ask for Feedback

Send a short survey with two or three questions about what helped and what didn’t. Then follow up with attendees who asked questions or showed interest in your offer. A personal email to your most engaged attendees often brings in more clients than the webinar pitch itself.

Repurpose the Recording

One webinar can feed your content for weeks. Here are a few ways I recommend reusing it.

• Cut the best 30 to 60 seconds into short clips for LinkedIn, YouTube Shorts, or Instagram
• Turn the transcript into a blog post or newsletter issue
• Use the recording as a lesson in your online course or membership
• Turn common questions into a FAQ page or short videos
• Create a checklist or worksheet from your main framework and use it as a lead magnet

AI tools make this much faster. Descript edits video by editing the transcript and can cut clips for you, and my guide to the best AI video editors covers more options. Use AI for the editing and keep your own voice in the final version.

Measure the Right Numbers

Track a few key numbers after each webinar so you can improve the next one. Here are the benchmarks I use.

Metric	What it tells you	2025 benchmark
Registrations	How well your topic and promotion worked	175 average (Livestorm)
Show-up rate	How well your reminders worked	47.7% (Livestorm)
Average watch time	Whether the content held attention	26 minutes, or 38% of the session (Livestorm)
Questions asked	How engaged the audience was	20.4 per session (Livestorm)
Replay views	How much reach the recording added	3.7x more views for public replays (Livestorm)
Conversions	How many attendees took your next step	Varies by offer, so compare against your own past webinars

How to Make Money From Webinars

Webinars can earn money directly or lead to sales later. Most experts use a mix of these approaches.

• Sell a course or program at the end. A free teaching webinar that leads to a course or coaching offer is the most common model.
• Charge for a live workshop. Paid webinars attract more committed attendees and earn revenue even without a follow-up offer.
• Run sponsored webinars. Companies in your field may pay you to teach a topic related to their product.
• Sell training to organizations. Associations and companies pay for live training sessions for their members or staff.
• Sell the recording. Package the replay, slides, and worksheets as a low-priced digital product.

My post on making money from webinars covers each model in more detail. Webinars also fit into a wider content marketing plan, since each one creates material you can reuse across your website, email, and social media.

Common Webinar Mistakes and How to Fix Them

These are the mistakes I see most often, along with what to do instead.

Mistake	Why it hurts	What to do instead
A broad, vague topic	People can’t tell what they’ll get	Promise one specific result for one specific audience
A long introduction about yourself	Viewers start leaving in the first few minutes	Teach something useful within the first 5 minutes
Promoting only once	Most people register in the final week	Send several reminders, especially in the last 3 days
Reading from slides	People can read faster than you talk	Use slides for key points and talk through examples
A pitch that takes over the session	Attendees feel tricked and stop trusting you	Teach for most of the time and keep the offer short
No interaction	People multitask and drift away	Add a poll, question, or exercise every 8 to 10 minutes
No follow-up	Half your registrants never see the content	Send the replay and a short survey within 24 hours

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Here are answers to the questions people ask me most often about webinars.

What is a webinar?

A webinar is an online seminar where one or more presenters teach a topic to a group of people who join from their computer or phone. Most webinars last about an hour and include interaction such as chat, polls, and a live Q&A. Many are also recorded for people to watch later.

Are webinars still effective?

Yes. Livestorm’s analysis of 33,786 webinars from 2025 found that about 48% of registrants attend live, and ON24 reported rising average attendance. Webinars work best when they teach something useful, include interaction, and follow up with a replay instead of relying on a heavy sales pitch.

How long should a webinar be?

Plan for about 60 minutes. Livestorm found that webinars running 60 to 75 minutes drew the largest live audiences. Most viewers watch about 26 minutes, so put your most important teaching in the first half and save time at the end for questions.

What is the best day to host a webinar?

Tuesday had the best show-up rate at 51.7% in Livestorm’s 2025 data, and Wednesday drew the largest average audience. Mid-week mornings or early afternoons work well for business audiences. January, September, and November had the strongest attendance, while July and August were weakest.

How far in advance should I promote a webinar?

Two to three weeks is enough for most experts. Livestorm found that half of all registrations arrive in the final seven days and 15% on the day of the webinar. Send reminders the day before, one hour before, and when you go live to boost attendance.

What is a good webinar attendance rate?

A show-up rate of around 45% to 50% is typical. Livestorm’s 2025 benchmark was 47.7%. Reminder emails, a clear promise in your title, a time that suits your audience, and a join process with no software download all help raise it.

What is the difference between a webinar and a virtual conference?

A webinar is usually a single session on one topic that lasts about an hour. A virtual conference has many sessions, often with several speakers, spread across one or more days. Webinars are easier to run and work well for lead generation, teaching, and sales.

How do I make money from webinars?

Experts make money from webinars by selling a course, coaching, or service at the end of a free session, charging for live workshops, running sponsored webinars, selling training to organizations, or packaging the recording as a digital product. Most combine two or three of these approaches.

See also:

• Best Webinar Software Platforms
• How to Make Money From Webinars
• 7 Steps to Record a Successful Virtual Presentation
• Best Zoom Alternatives for Creators and Experts