Webinars have become an extremely popular tool in B2B marketing. In Marketing Sherpa’s 2011 B2B Marketing Advanced Practices handbook, 92% of respondents indicated that webinars were one of the most effective means of generating high quality leads (second only to website design and optimization).

Because of this, I believe it is imperative to get an audience to show up for a webinar presentation.

One of the many tasks I take on as an account coordinator at Canyon Communications is to moderate webinars for one of our clients. For the past few weeks, I’ve been trying to think of ways to increase webinar attendance due to the fact that registration doesn’t necessarily lead to attendance. In the course of some research I came across a great article at Marketo with some even greater tips.

Top 5 Ways to

Increase Webinar Attendance:

1. Give webinar attendees access to the speaker
2. Have a prize draw during the webinar
3. Give attendees access to other attendees
4. Have an exclusive offer for attendees
5. Call attendees to remind them

It’s difficult to get an audience to show up for a webinar presentation so it’s important we provide people as many ways as possible to attend  a webinar despite their busy schedule. After all, webinars are a great way to build a prospect relationship and generate leads.

Do you think webinars are an effective tool to use in B2B marketing? Do you have other ways to increase webinar attendance?

Image courtesy www.immaccpresentation.com

Growing up in Wisconsin, I’ve long had a sense of loyalty to my home-state airline, Midwest. For those of you not familiar with this carrier, it built its name on spacious business-class seating, affable service and warm chocolate chip cookies. Over the past couple of years, an attempted hostile take-over, as well as two acquisitions has left both the cookies and loyal passengers – well – burnt.

Most recently, Frontier Airlines acquired the company.  Along with the name Midwest, many of the amenities the carrier became known for are gone (though the cookies allegedly remain). I noticed not too long ago that Frontier Airlines was running a new ad campaign – presumably in an attempt to win-over passengers – on Wisconsin’s most prominent online newspaper, JSonline.com about “free” checked baggage.

My assumption is that the airline was trying to draw eyeballs to rival Southwest Airlines “Bags Fly Free” policy.

Accompanying the headline on the banner ad was an asterisk – further review showed the promotion was only good on certain types of seats/tickets, which were linked to more costly airfare. In the end, the deal was only as good as a passengers willingness to pay for their “free” bag one way or another.

In today’s B2B and B2C marketplace, companies find themselves relying on giveaways and special offers to vie for the attention of the prospects and customers they seek to engage. The Internet boom over the past fifteen years has swung the transaction pendulum clearly in the buyer’s favor.

People have far more options and much more information at their fingertips. If a company, or the products and services it offers doesn’t seem authentic, customers will click to the next option until they find an organization they want to do business with.

The problem with most offers is the conditions that are attached, something I call the “Asterisk Offer”. In my opinion, the asterisk is the blemish on what should be a genuine opportunity to create a customer relationship.

An asterisk screams “this offer is too good to be true”. Frontier Airlines is not alone in its use of the asterisk. Many companies (some of our clients included) are eager to promote a snappy headline offer in order to generate excitement and instigate action. The fine print, however, reads like tax code and leaves people feeling deflated – victims of attractive bait that leaves a bitter taste.

B2B transactions are more complex in nature (enterprise technologies, multi-year service contracts, etc.) and inherently lead to long-term customer relationships, and it’s important to instigate that first purchase or trial. However, if takes longer to read the restrictions on your promotional offer than it does to actually execute the purchase transaction, it probably isn’t going to lead to a conversion rate you were hoping for.

To be fair to Frontier Airlines, Southwest’s offer also comes with an asterisk, although they offer the service at all ticketing levels. The right approach is to develop an offer that sets up a genuine two-way value exchange. Extend the offer that demonstrates to prospects that you have skin in the game, and make sure it is unconditional. Create simple steps for acceptance. Make it easy for a prospect or customer to participate.

If you make an offer seem too good, and it ends up being too good to be true, it will have the opposite affect you had intended, and you might end up repelling people in droves.

What was the last authentic offer you accepted? Do you have any examples of a promotion that fell flat once you read the fine print?

First off, I want to point out how excited I am to be writing this blog. For those who haven’t noticed, I’m new here at Canyon and this is my first post. I am super-excited to be a part of this great and talented team, and I look forward to posting more in the future.

There has never been any real doubt that social media is big. However, recent valuations of some of the social media giants provide us some insight as to just how big they really are. While it does not come as a shock to most to see the values of social media bigs like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Groupon to be substantial, the fact these companies have annual revenues that are a small fraction of what they are worth is intriguing.

Facebook received a recent valuation of $75 billion, making it more valuable than Disney. This is despite the fact that Facebook only has an annual revenue of $2 billion, while Disney on the other hand has pulled in over $38 billion in 2010.

To see these companies valued at so much more than their revenue is confusing for some. Marketers however, should be enthused by this. The valuation of these social media giants is reflecting their utility. Facebook may only gross $2 billion a year, but how many other mediums allow you to engage, interact, and network with over 700 million people?

The fact that these social networking mediums are growing not only by users but also by value, is testament to the fact that marketers are on to something when then invest in social media marketing. They have recognized that social networks have extreme value and potential in regards to connecting with consumers on multiple levels, and it appears that financial investors have jumped onboard as well.

These extremely high valuations and bubble margins exemplify the effectiveness of social media, and represent just how much potential they have (an apparent potential that is worth about 50 times the annual revenue).

So what are you waiting for? Social media is booming, you don’t want to be left out. While some of these companies like LinkedIn are publicly traded (and trading for a solid $100/share), I don’t mean join into a piece of shareholders pie, but rather, become active in the extremely successful, scalable, and ever-catchy social media world that nearly 10 percent of the world’s population is already involved in.

For some B2B marketers, social media can be a new and unfamiliar, so they have been avoiding it, or afraid to try it. However, there is so much material and guidance available, than anyone can dive into it and with a little research and effort, become effective at it.

The beauty of social media is that there is plenty of room around the fire for whoever wants to join in.

There is so much opportunity and room for growth. This is why investors recognize the immense power and potential that social media has, and why they are willing to place such a large price tag on it. Is your latest B2B campaign tapping into the power social media? Can 700 million people be wrong?

My name is Brad Whitford, I’m 25 years old and I am a Google-holic.  Wow, it feels good to get off my chest!

But seriously, I find that most of my online activity stems from some sort of Google function.  I indulge in many of the Google offerings, including email, calendar, maps, pictures, documents and of course, the original Google function, search.

Google’s description on its own search site claims you can, search the world’s information, including webpages, images, videos and more and that Google has many special features to help you “find exactly what you’re looking for.” I can’t think of a better single source to find any piece of information I need.

And I’m definitely not in the minority.  Many people worldwide have discovered the power of Google, and not just the functionality of its applications, but the power of the brand as well.  In fact, Google has become such a powerful name that it has reached the echelon of elite brands where the name is often times used as a verb (Rollerblade, Xerox, etc.).

Just think – how many times have you asked someone a question and gotten the reply, “Just Google it?”  I’ll bet it’s more times than people say, “I’m going Rollerblading.”

But the real purpose of this blog post is not to gush over the seemingly endless awesomeness that is Google (even though the awesomeness is seemingly endless).  It is more-so to provide an example of an innovative brand that has somewhat of an identity crisis and uses that issue in a creative way to enhance its brand equity.  Just to show you how strong Google’s brand identity is, the company alters its logo on a daily basis and people across the globe still recognize it.

Now that’s brand equity that even Apple can be jealous of.

By continuously changing its logo, Google is committing one of the cardinal sins of marketing that usually makes professionals such as myself cringe – and it’s awesome!  Referred to as “Doodles,” these artistic logos provide a way for the company to celebrate unique events and people worldwide, while also “illustrating the creative and innovative personality of the company itself.”  The history of these little gems is quite fascinating as well.

Google Doodles range from static images to animated pieces to video clips to interactive games (I know there are some of you out there who were much less productive the day of the PAC-MAN game logo).  But this past Thursday’s “Les Paul’s 96^th Birthday” doodle was by far my favorite of the bunch.  I think I recorded enough songs to fill an entire box set of albums.  You can check out all the Google Doodles online.

Google admits to having an identity crisis, and claims that “having a little bit of fun with the corporate logo by redesigning it from time to time is unheard of at many companies but at Google, it is a part of the brand.”  I can’t think of any other company that has successfully implemented this tactic.  After all, it goes against everything we marketing folks were ever taught.

But in a time when the margins of competitive advantage are becoming thinner and change seems to happen at the speed of light,this kind of innovative thinking is what keeps companies like Google ahead of the curve.  And let’s face it, you can’t argue with a brand that gets stronger by continuously changing its identity.

Can you think of any other company that has been successful in continuously changing its brand identity?