Webcast Checklist

Webcasts (aka webinars, micronars, ’nars, etc) are a great way to grow your email list. Here’s how I set up my monthly webcasts:

General Setup (one-time)

This is the stuff you do once:

  1. Put monthly recurring webcast event in calendar
    • I do every third Wednesday of the month at 1pm ET
    • Block out three hours
      • One hour before for prep
      • One hour for the event itself
      • One hour after for follow-up activities
    • Set reminders for 2 weeks, 1 week, 2 days, and 1 day ahead
  2. Create a Crowdcast account (affiliate link - thx!)
  3. Create a Drip account
  4. Create a Zapier account
    • Set up a zap that listens for the New Event Registrations trigger in Crowdcast and will run the Create or Update Subscribers action in Drip
    • Zapier setup

1-2 Weeks Before Event

  1. Come up with a title, description, and photo for the event
  2. Create a new event on Crowdcast
    1. Paste in the title and description on the Basic Info panel
    2. Upload a cover photo on the Cover panel
    3. Bonus points: add a Facebook pixel on the Advanced panel
  3. Drive traffic to Crowdcast event page
    • Email your list (and invite them to share with their networks)
    • Social media (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn)
    • Groups (Slack, FB Groups)
    • PPC (FB Ads, Google AdWords)
  4. Start drafting an outline for the talk

1-2 Days Before Event

  1. Check Crowdcast page (and elsewhere) for questions
  2. Flesh out the talk outline (incorporate questions if you found any)
  3. Put together a slide deck for the talk
  4. Include detailed speaker notes in the slides

Day Of Event

  1. (T-minus 90 minutes) Print out slides (with speaker notes!) on paper
  2. (T-minus 60 minutes) Get your desk/computer/mic organized
  3. (T-minus 30 minutes) Log into Crowdcast green room and make sure everything looks good
  4. (Liftoff) Go live! Welcome people (on webcam)
  5. Ask people to let you know in chat that they can see/hear you
  6. Switch to slides (no webcam)
  7. Present slides for 15-45 minutes
  8. Switch back to webcam
  9. Answer questions until they are exhausted (or 90 minute limit is reached)
    • Make sure to click on the Answer Question button in Crowdcast
    • Make sure to read the questions aloud (for future audio-only version or transcript)

Post Event

  1. Download the registrant list as CSV from Crowdcast
  2. Download the video recording from Crowdcast
  3. Create PDF of your slides with speakers notes
    • FYI - it’s a print option in Keynote, not an export option
  4. Upload PDF of slides (I use Dropshare + S3 for this)
  5. Create a campaign in Drip named “Webcast: [CROWDCAST TITLE]”
  6. Create a rule in Drip to subscribe any newly tagged subscribers to the webcast campaign
    • Automation > Rules > New Basic Rule
    • Automation > Rules > New Basic Rule
  7. Create a bulk action to subscribe people tagged with the webcast title to the webcast campagin
    • Subscribers > Import/Bulk Ops > New Bulk Operation
    • Subscribers > Import/Bulk Ops > New Bulk Operation > Step 1 of 2
    • Subscribers > Import/Bulk Ops > New Bulk Operation > Step 2 of 2
  8. Create an email on the webcast campaign that links to the slides
    • Slides Email
  9. Optionally create a couple follow up emails specific to the event
  10. Create an “I’m moving you to my main list” email
  11. Create a rule in Drip to move people who finish the webcast campaign to the main list
    • Make sure you MOVE them, not just subscribe to main list
    • Do not send a double opt-in confirmation email
    • Change “Perform immediately” to a 1 day delay

Yer Done

At this point, any new registrants to the webcast (Crowdcast requires registration even just to view the recording) will get:

  1. Added to Drip
  2. Tagged appropriately
  3. Subscribed to a short and highly specific webcast campaign
  4. Moved into your main list for nurture and sales

You should not need to touch anything related to this webcast ever again - it’ll just sit there attracting subscribers to your list on its own.

Fun Optional Stuff

  1. Submit video recording to rev.com for transcription
    • $60 for an hour long recording
    • My last webcast came out to almost 12k words (!)
    • Get it edited (I use Sarah Greesonbach)
    • Use as a huge article or series
    • Use as an ebook
    • Use as a book chapter
  2. Create mp3 file of just the audio
    • Clean it up a bit
      • Trim front and end
      • Add intro and outro
      • Maybe add music
    • Publish as a podcast episode (or episodes)
    • Use as a lead magnet
    • Send to email list as a bonus

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