Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us for another episode in our webinar best practices series. This week we're looking at moderation and it's quite apt that this week I'll be taking the role of moderator and we've brought in guest speaker Lev Cribb who is our resident host and hosting and moderation expert here at Webinar Experts. Lev, just to start us off, first of all why is it so important to have a moderator and what can that bring to a webinar?

Speaker 2: Well first of all, moderator and host often are used interchangeably. Sometimes it's the same, sometimes it can mean slightly different things. But for all intents and purposes for us today we're talking about moderators for webinars and a moderator, a good moderator can instantly make your webinar sound a lot more professional. That's for sure and it adds more of a dynamic between the speakers and a moderator by having that go back and forth a little bit by having a bit of a conversation. It saves having to listen to one or two speakers present for half an hour, 45 minutes or up to an hour and it just creates a bit of a better delivery overall. It also adds consistency of format so you would for example have the same moderator and the audience will come back for that and audience like consistency in webinars. So having a consistent moderator presenting and moderating in a consistent way helps the overall format of your webinars as well. And I suppose most importantly it allows speakers to focus on their content. That's what they're there for. They are the experts in that so that's a really important role so that the moderator can take some of the housekeeping items away from the speakers as well.

Speaker 1: Okay brilliant. So with that in mind, how does a moderator help with engagement? You know particularly the engagement tools you might use throughout the webinar. You know specifically we might look at the Q&A. How does a moderator help push that forward and help the speakers in what they're doing?

Speaker 2: It comes back to the point about speakers focusing on content. They shouldn't have to worry about how the platform works, what housekeeping items to cover at the beginning, how to cover the Q&A at the end. That's the moderator's role and really that's what they're there for is to make the speaker more comfortable in addition to obviously creating that consistent format. And then it helps when moderator and speakers take it in turn. So for example as a moderator I would come in from time to time to remind the audience that they can ask questions, remind them that there is a Q&A, refer perhaps to some resources that lead on from the subject be it in a webinar series, white papers that are related or certain parts of the website as well. And that's a lot more dynamic as a webinar delivery as opposed to just having a long monologue for example.

Speaker 1: So talking about guests, not all speakers are natural at what they do. You know a lot of these are experts in their fields and speaking doesn't always come naturally to them. So what do you do as a moderator to make the speakers feel comfortable and energetic in what they're doing when they're working with you on a webinar?

Speaker 2: Yeah a lot of that work is done up front before the webinar actually goes live and there's quite a few hours involved typically to prepare for that, prepare for the speakers for example and you know that could include for example walkthrough of the logistics. What will happen on the day of the webinar? When do we dial in? What do we do in the pre-call? What will be the format and who does what during the webinar? Speakers don't like surprises. They want to focus on the content so they should. So covering that to begin with is important and make sure that you're familiar with that as a moderator and as a speaker. So knowing that things will work well, that there is a purpose to everything that you do during the webinar is important and it puts the speakers a lot more at ease.

Speaker 1: So talking about preparation before a webinar, what do you like to do as a moderator before the webinar begins both in the short term and the long term in that little bit of time just before the webinar starts and in the weeks preparing for a webinar, what are the things you like to do to help that webinar run smoothly?

Speaker 2: It's very important to connect with the speakers in advance, get to know them a little bit. That relationship will be audible and visible on the webinar itself. If you've only just met in the pre-call it can make the overall delivery quite stale and familiarise yourself with the content. You're not presenting it but you will certainly be moderating a Q&A on that. So knowing where to position certain questions for example, in what order, what it relates to helps again with the overall delivery and the experience for the audience. And I typically prepare a script without it sounding scripted. So it's actually written out, I will read it out and even having done hundreds of webinars, there's always going to be something specific to that webinar that will be different and in the heat of the moment you can easily forget that and it could be a very important call to action for example that you haven't included because it's different for this webinar than it was for the previous one. So it's important to prepare that because you will in the heat of the moment forget something. And it provides that consistent experience, a consistent delivery, a consistent format. And last but not least, thank the speakers afterwards, follow up with them. Often they will have put hours into the preparation, you know, they probably were quite nervous perhaps as well. So follow up, say thank you, give them a bit of a summary of the performance of the webinar, they'll appreciate that and then you can give them feedback as well if you feel there was something that was particularly well or perhaps that they can improve on, I'm open to that always. But most of the speakers that we have hosted always ask, you know, how can I improve, was everything okay? And it's important for them to learn as well and for you to help facilitate this perhaps new format for them as well and how they can improve going forward.

Speaker 1: Brilliant, well thank you so much for joining us today and just sharing some of your tips and tricks that you've picked up over a number of years now doing webinar hosting so I really appreciate you joining us today. Thank you very much. So thank you out there as well for joining us for this short video. Please tune in for the next one that'll be coming up and please sign up to us and subscribe on YouTube, on LinkedIn and make sure you subscribe to us over on Twitter at WebinarEXP. Thanks very much for joining us.