3 Uses for In-house Webinars

Webinars have become a staple of modern business, especially when communicating with customers. Travel time and expenses have been drastically slashed and client face-time dramatically increased. All through consistent use of video conferences and conference calls. However, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Webinars can help your business in many other ways, especially within your company.

Even if all of your employees are in one building – or in one office – using webinars in-house can help your business. Video conferences, web conferences, and audio conference calls have both obvious and obscure features that are an improvement over traditional office methods. Three prime areas that benefit due to webinars are collaboration, support, and training.

1. Collaboration
Collaboration is an excellent example where webinars can improve the status quo. Normal communications -- even in a large office -- are face-to-face conversations, email, instant messaging, and phone calls – which includes intercom. In each form, there are ways to bring in another person into the information loop. The most limited is the phone call which can be “upgraded” to a three-way call. The most expansive is the face-to-face conversation which of course can include everyone in the office if you have a room large enough.

With each form of communication you have limitations. The big meeting requires organization, time to prepare, and travel. Phone calls can only have three people on at a time. Instant messaging can bring many people into one chat room, but this is tedious to accomplish. Emails, while easy to CC and BCC large groups of people, are difficult to conform to a cohesive and understandable group dialog.

Webinars allow mass communication in a way that combines the best of typical interaction benefits while limiting or even precluding the worst. Everyone in a webinar sees and hears the same thing at the same time like a face-to-face meeting, three-way phone call, or chat room. More importantly, they can respond in real-time, unlike email. It’s easy to pick up the phone, mass outdial, and get everyone in a meeting. There’s no time or effort wasted.

Meeting frequency is increased with webinars. More importantly, meeting efficiency is increased as well. If meetings are held more often, they don’t go on as long and they can be task specific. One short, purpose-driven meeting a day is far better than a long, all-inclusive monthly meeting. Think about your last meeting. If you knew it would be quick and to the point – and you didn’t even have to leave your desk to attend – would you be more or less excited about it?
2. Support
Your employees work hard for you and you want to give them as much support as you can. Sometimes however, good support can be difficult to achieve if you have limited managerial staff, time, or resources. Webinars are perfect as a “force multiplier” for your company.

Your sales staff is a prime area where a quick word at the right moment can make all the difference. Typically though, sales managers are salespeople themselves and have to wear at least two hats. This can severely limit their availability for either sales or support. Webinars allow them to be in two places at once. Without ever leaving their desks, they can coordinate, mentor, and advise.

If a salesperson is on a conference call with a customer and has a question, he can easily bring his manager into the call. The manager can then answer the question, or even get someone else with the answer to join the call. The point is, the salesperson has virtually the whole company at his fingertips and can get quick help to close a sale.

For the manager with many salespeople beneath them, a conference call is a great benefit. If one salesperson calls in with a question that could affect the entire team, the manager can bring everyone into the call. They can address the question, discuss possible solutions, and have a game plan in no time. More importantly, the manager has updated their entire team in one call. Without a conference call, they would have discussed it with one salesperson, and then made many more calls to bring the rest of the team up to speed.

3. Training
Using webinars to eliminate repetitive tasks -- like the example above – can be extended to the training of your employees. Whether you want to bring new hires up to speed, or keep existing employees current, using a webinar will allow you to train multiple people at once. As an added bonus, you will also only have to do it once.

Recording your webinars is very simple and using them is even simpler. Let’s say you do a training webinar, complete with PowerPoint presentations and video. With a webinar, you can make these available for future employees. They can call into a previously recorded conference call and hear your lecture. They can follow along with the downloaded copy of your PowerPoint or watch your video as you lead them through their new duties. The best part is, like your training manual, once you set it up, you won’t have to touch it again except for updates.

Training is best when everyone is on the same page, using the same materials, and learning the same things. Interchangeability is vital for a healthy company, but more important is flexibility. To be flexible, a company must be able to disseminate information rapidly. Webinars are the fastest way for a company to bring everyone up to speed on new events. When vital news happens, you can get everyone on a conference call quickly. It doesn’t matter if they are in the office or not. If they are in the field, they can simply join the call from wherever. If they are at the office, they won’t even have to leave their desks. You can make your announcement, deliver marching orders, and answer questions; all in record times.

Technology advances and businesses need to embrace and exploit it to stay competitive. Traditional office methods of communication are fine; they have worked faithfully for years. However, as your company uses newer and better techniques – such as webinars – you’ll find your costs go down, efficiency goes up, and your business will be far better off than it was before.