by Matthew Mora

Webinars have been a reliable tool for online learning, but they are not always developed and distributed with the proper strategy. It can be difficult to find qualified individuals with the necessary knowledge in producing a quality webinar. Not everyone has extensive experience in video and audio production. Fortunately, it is not too late to gain the necessary tips to produce your next great webinar. Here are five tips that can help you produce a quality webinar.

Choose a topic that appeals to your target audience.
It’s no big secret that the key to creating any kind of educational content that an audience would like to view would be to choose topics they’d be interested in, and deliver them in a way so that your target audience will actually want to view them. It is best practice to ask for thoughts and feedback from your target audience about what they want to learn instead of assuming the topics of interest for them. You can do this by networking with colleagues, sending out surveys, or taking constructive feedback from the viewers of your previous webinars. Remember to always be open to the constructive criticism.

PowerPoint Presentation Madness.
If you choose to use PowerPoints in your webinar series make sure that you keep the layout and theme consistent throughout the entire webinar. This means: fonts, colors, backgrounds, and transitions must remain consistent and in-line so the viewer does not perceive poor quality. Prioritizing images for a more visual presentation. For example, having images inserted throughout the presentation to convey the meaning behind the dialogue better captures the attention of the viewer.

Equipment is KEY!
Users appreciate attention to high-quality production. While some equipment and software can be costly, there are creative ways to use affordable equipment and software to create high-quality webinar productions. The Blue Snowball –iCE Condenser Microphone, typically priced at $50, is a plugin ready microphone that captures high-quality audio.

The Microsoft LifeCam HD-3000, usually priced at $28, is a great affordable option for video capture. This camera is also plugin ready and compatible with different types of computers.

Create Understandable Sections.
In any lengthy or wordy presentation it is important to break the information up into digestable sections. While presenting your webinar make sure to focus on the one topics or concept at a time. The average duration for one topic should be around 10 – 15 minutes. Your webinar should allow for interaction to engage the audience, so putting a multiple-choice quiz that goes over the material presented after every topic will help engage and keep your audience intrigued with your content.

Always Call for Questions.
Allowing for questions makes the webinar more active and less passive. Most webinar software features forum widgets that a presenter can monitor throughout the presentation. You can use social feeds or group messaging apps as an alternative to answering questions from the group. You can also make calls for questions prior to the webinar, and provide detailed answers through email as a follow-up.