Webinars are now becoming popular considering that face-to-face seminars is now limited and difficult because of the pandemic. According to Company Webcast, webinar is a term that is derived from "web" and "seminar" which pertains to a virtual event which is attended by online audiences. Webinars now become an alternative way of delivering the knowledge and messages of the speakers. What are expected with webinars?
Topic. Just like the typical seminars, there is a topic of interest for the said event.
Speaker/s. There are speakers that would deliver about the topic. There are webinars that have multiple speakers and others have only one.
Moderator. There is a moderator that will moderate the flow of activities and see to it that parts of the program are in place.
Online platform used. This pertains to the tool used for delivering the webinar. It is usually a video conferencing platforms like zoom, lark, google meet or even social media with live audiences.
Interaction. There is an interaction among audiences through chat or even through speaking when using video conferencing apps.
Knowing the elements of webinars, now let's go to the pros and cons.
Pros of Webinars
Less Cost. Compared to face-to-face seminars that you need to have a physical venue, meals, hotel accommodation for the speakers, tokens and physical certificates these are almost omitted in webinars because audiences and speakers just meet on the virtual space.
Wide Coverage. Everyone who have access to webinars can participate regardless of location as long as there is an internet connection.
Convenience. Audience can attend seminars wherever they are, at the comfort of their homes or offices or even at the beach relaxing.
Chance of viewing it again. There are also those that gives a recorded video of the discussions that the audience can view again whenever they want.
Cons of webinars
Less interaction. Unlike the physical seminars that you can directly interact with audiences, webinars offers limited way of interactions like chat or conversations.
Less focus. This one depends on the audience. Since it is a webinars, the organizers are not sure if the audiences are still listening or are they doing something else during the conduct of the webinar. And based on my experience, there are really audiences that have less focus on the webinar, some do multitasking.
Technical problems. Technical problems include but not limited to loss of internet connection of the speaker, moderator or audience, audio not functioning well in the side of the host, video not displaying well or too laggy, compatibility issues.
Limited activities. Compared to physical trainings and seminars that you can do team building or team activities for participants , the virtual activities can be limited. You need to use other applications to enable the team activities and sometimes, those applications are also new to participants and they would not like to use it at all.
CONCLUSION
Webinars exist even before the pandemic time and its popularity and use is much appreciated now because of the limited face to face activities. Just like onsite seminars, webinars have pros and cons but I believe that making most of a webinar is still a choice of an audience. Every webinar has an objective, a goal and may it not be in vain by taking responsibility in participating and attending it.
Thanks for reading this article. On my next article I will be sharing on what are the ways on how to make interactive webinars.
How about you? have you attended webinars? What are your experiences? I would love to know in the comment section below.
Notes:
Lead Image: Image by Alexandra_Koch from Pixabay
Reference articles:
https://www.webinar.nl/en/webinars/what-is-a-webinar/
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webinar na ata talga ngayun.. new normal na