With the coronavirus outbreak disrupting the usual flow of work, the demand for web conferencing software has increased considerably.
It has forced many companies to make arrangements enabling remote working for its employees. This has helped to reduce the spread of corononavirus by staying at home without impacting their productivity.
In this article, we’ll discuss best webinar software platforms in 2020 that you can use to grow your small business allowing you to work remotely from anywhere while still be able to communicate and collaborate with your customers.
Before we proceed further, let’s first see what is a webinar?
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What is Webinar software?
A webinar is a video conferencing tool that is designed to deliver the content via Internet in an engaging manner. It allows you to connect with one or more individuals anywhere in the world.
In a nutshell, webinar allows business to connect with their audience irrespective of their location.
To run or conduct a webinar, you need a webinar software that helps you to make your webinars more interactive, engaging, and flexible.
There are various webinar software platforms available in the marketplace, such as WebinarJam, GotoMeeting, and so on.
The best part of using these webinar software platforms is that they’re easily customizable and allow you to modify the webinars according to your requirements.
Benefits of Webinar
Here’re few benefits of conducting or hosting a webinar:
1. It is cost-effective and affordable
This is an important feature for many small business owners as you need not be worried about any infrastructure. Also, you’re not concerned with any other logistics requirements to host a event. The only things you and your participants require is a device like laptop, computer or mobile, a webcam, Internet connection with good bandwidth, and required webinar software. The cost of webinar usually ranges between $100 and $3000 depending upon the size of audience.
2. It can be recorded
This is another feature of webinar software that you can record the meetings or sessions you conduct or host. Unlike traditional face-to-face conferences, the video recordings help you to analyze and understand the content as thoroughly as possible.
3. It helps you to generate leads
According to a survey, there’re over 73% B2B marketers who believe that webinars are a great way to generate high-quality leads.
You can turn your webinar into an automated machine churning out leads over time with an appropriate strategy on place. These webinar software platforms allow you to send automated follow-up emails, and communicate with your customers before and after the webinars. You can even customize your messaging.
4. It allow you to position yourself as an expert
Webinars have such an impact on your brand and reputation that people begin to consider you as an expert in your field or area. A webinar helps you to expand your reach and puts you a step ahead in the competition.
Best Webinar Software Platform Reviews
Here’s my pick for the best webinar software platforms for 2020 along with a detailed review of each platform.
- Zoom
- WebinarJam
- EverWebinar
- ClickMeeting
- Webex
- GoToWebinar
- Adobe Connect
- Google Hangouts
- AnyMeeting
- Livestorm
Now, lets go through each of these in detail.
1. Zoom
Zoom is one the best webinar platforms available in the market, and is mostly used today by many corporate and even schools. It is intuitive, cloud-based, and has a user-friendly interface that makes it simpler to the users. Also, it offers an array of features that makes it an asset for corporate or institutions.
Key features:
- Offers HD video and audio with screen sharing facility
- Provides desktop and app sharing capability.
- Allows public and private chats that lets your audience to communicate during the webinar.
- Keeps a backup of all the sessions in the cloud to access them later on.
- Provides integration with Google Calendar and Microsoft Outlook that lets you to schedule your meetings or events, and send emails and reminders.
- Provides free access for up to 40 minutes and 100 participants
2. WebinarJam
WebinarJam is one of the top pick when it comes to webinar software platform because of its features that it offers.
Key features:
- Provides built-in email marketing integrations, and it can also be integrated with email marketing software like ConvertKit and so on.
- Allows you to record the webinar automatically without having you to do it manually.
- Provides you with a built-in page builder that allows you to customize your registration pages.
- Handles up to 5000 attendees simultaneously and can accommodate up to 6 co-presenters.
- Provides an easy to use as you can get started in few minutes and it also offers top-notch customer service to resolve any queries.
3. EverWebinar
EverWebinar is promoted as the most powerful automated webinar platforms, and is the most popular tools in this list of webinar software platforms. This webinar software provides integration with WebinarJam although the parent company sells them separately or in a bundle. EverWebinar is best suited for small and medium businesses who’re looking to generate leads and boost sales via the webinars.
Key features:
- Provides a one-click platform to swap between EverWebinar and WebinarJam
- Offers unlimited free hosting using reliable and cloud-based servers
- Allows you to start the webinars just in time upon registration
- Provides an advanced scheduling system that helps to block out unavailable dates
4. ClickMeeting
ClickMeeting is also one of the popular web conferencing software platforms that provides impressive and easy-to-use interface.
Key features:
- Is best suited for small and medium businesses
- Provides analytical insights regarding the past webinars and audience of the upcoming webinars
- Allows you to connect to Facebook and Youtube to enhance engagement among the audience
- Offers capability of polls and surveys to get feedback from the participants
- Allows more than one people to host the sessions with HD video during the webinar
5. Webex
Webex, which is a product by Cisco, is another cloud-based web conferencing software platform that provides a host of impressive features allowing you to conduct meetings and trainings. Note that this tool is more suited for in-house team collaboration than webinars.
Key features:
- Helps in collaboration and teamwork among the team members
- Provides integration with popular marketing platforms, such as Salesforce
- Allows you to host a minimum of 50 participants via a basic plan of $13.5 per month.
- Provides facility of Q&A session, polls, and surveys to engage the audience during the event.
6. GoToWebinar
GoToWebinar is another popular web conferencing software platform on my list. With GotoWebinar, you need not worry about anything relate to organizing a webinar and just focus on reaching out to more people and grow your business. Like other webinar software platforms, it provides a host of features that helps you to improve the experience of your webinar ranging from flexible scheduling to automated email reminders and customizable webinar invitations.
Key features:
- Provides access to built-in webinar templates that in turn provide ultimate business environment.
- Allows you to generate reports to capture different kind of information, such as source tracking, number of attendees, and so on.
- Allows you to record and pre-record events for reference purposes.
- Offers in-built polls and surveys to engage the audience.
- Provides 24X7 customer support and seamless integration with various tools like Zapier, Salesforce, Unbounce, and so on.
7. Adobe Connect
Adobe Connect is another tool that comes in my list of webinar software platforms as it allows the marketers to generate leads and measure content effectiveness. It is an ideal solution for small businesses to showcase their products and services in an impactful manner to their intended audience. Like other webinar platforms, Adobe connect also consists of a host of features.
Features:
- Enables you to customize the hosting room ad optimize it as per your requirement.
- Provides capability of creating registration pages to allow participant registration.
- Offers robust analytics for better insights.
- Allows integration with various CRM software like Eloqua and Salesforce
8. Google Hangouts
Google Hangouts is one of the most acclaimed names in this list of webinar software platforms as it is completely free of cost. It is easily integrated with Google Chrome browser and Gmail. Since it is free, so it caters every business size whether small or medium-size business or large corporation.
Key features:
- Allows you to conduct meeting with up to 30 people
- Allows several speakers can speak and share their screen during the webinar, and even record the meetings
- Offers automatic recording of the session and upload it on YouTube channel
- Provides capability where no additional software download is required
9. AnyMeeting
Anymeeting is another web confereing software platform that is perfect for small organizations, start-ups and educational institutions. This tool provides a user-friendly and an intuitive interface that allows you to host your webinar effectively. Also, this tool offers with some amazing features.
Key features:
- Provides capability of up to 6 live speakers and up to 1000 participants or attendees
- Offers in-built Q&A sessions, polls, and surveys to engage the audience
- Provides a feature of following up with your participants via emails
- Provides a capability of real-time chat with the audience or participants
10. Livestorm
And, finally, Livestorm is an efficient webinar software platform in my list that is built to provide strong video communications. It is a strong tool that can be easily accessed from any device, such as mobile, laptop or desktop. Using this tool, you can run live, on-demand or automated webinars. This tool is especially helpful for small business owners as it helps you to improve your sales by conducting 1:1 meetings with clients. Like other webinar software platforms, this tool also consists of a host of features.
Key features:
- Offers an unlimited storage of webinar recordings.
- Provides a suite of options to engage the attendees, such as live chat, polls, and so on.
- Enables you to use Zapier and integrate with more than 1000 apps.
- Provides comprehensive and multi-language customer support.
- Comes with features like a one-click invitation, screen-sharing, the ability to embed registration forms, and more
Wrap up
Therefore, these are some of the webinar software platforms available in the market today owning to their remarkable and user-friendly features.
But the question you may ask is which one is better?
To answer this question, you need to take several things into account like what is your budget?, what is size of your audience?, and what are the features you may require to engage them?
Also, you need to consider your ultimate goal of conducting the webinar befire choosing the webunar software platform.
Now the best part is that all of these webinar software platforms come with a free trial or a money back guarantee. This allows you to test the product before purchasing or upgrading to a paid plan. Once you’re satisfied with the features, then you can make the final purchase.
