10 Things That Help When Everything Goes Wrong With Your Webinar

“Please welcome, Tim Miles!”

“Thanks, Tina, and thanks everyone for joining us today. Before we start looking into the 9 hidden keys to meaningful communication, I want to ask you—”

—INTERNET CONNECTION LOST—

And it was about this time that our lightning-fast, super-high-speed, super-reliable internet connection went down… which, really, is about the only prerequisite for conducting a webinar.

Thus began yesterday’s dumpster fire of an experience for our global attendees to our inaugural webinar hosted by a $3,000,000,000 international corporation.

I’m exaggerating, but only by a little. We got through it. 85% of attendees stayed for the whole thing, so it couldn’t have been that bad, but it sure felt like it.

Sometimes… in life… and notably in live events… crap happens. A chain reaction of suck happened between 2:00 and 3:00 central time yesterday, and yet, at 3:05, our host received the following email from one of the attendees:

Hi Tina,

I want to thank you for the webinar, it was awesome and full of interesting information that for sure we need to apply in our professional and personal lives. Thank you for doing this for all of us. I’m looking forward to share the main ideas with the local employees.

Kind regards,

A.

What the heck?!?! Well, to make a long story short, we didn’t give up, and in retrospect, I believe there are ten things that helped make it right when everything went wrong. I suspect these ten tools will help you, too, whether or not there’s a webinar involved.

1. Practice, Prepare, and Preview

Before I was a public speaker, I spent several years doing live theater. It was there I learned the 3 P’s. I knew my webinar material cold. I could deviate from the plan if necessary. I could do the entire talk without the 65 powerpoint slides if necessary. I tested all my equipment. I knew how everything worked. On Monday, I did a private preview as a live dress and tech rehearsal for friends. It went flawlessly. If you’ve ever spent time with theater folks, you know that should have been my warning. You never want a flawless tech rehearsal!

2. Have A Contingency Plan

Our internet never goes down… NEVER… but what if it did? Our city had hellish storms go through less than 36 hours ago and power had been down at our house the day before for more than 12 hours. I had my cell phone that I could use as a hotspot if necessary. Turns out it was necessary.

3. Perservere

These people had invested their time in the afternoon and in this session. Their employer had invested considerable money in us to deliver. Although the switch to mobile wireless internet set off the aforementioned chain reaction of suck, I wasn’t about to stop. We owed them the best we had given the circumstances. I wasn’t about to quit, and I wasn’t about to give half a performance. I did everything I could to block out the distractions and try and give my very best.

4. Know Where & How To Modify On The Fly

The version of the talk I give on stage includes four videos. In the tech rehearsal Monday, these worked well (though we had – and fixed – an audio quirk). I tried one video on the hotspot’s internet, and it was a disaster. I immediately knew I’d go right past the other four, and in my mind—because I had done so much practice—I calculated how to transition around those videos.

5. Don’t Keep Apologizing

Yes, technical problems are distracting, but if you keep alluding to them, you absolutely repel anyone from losing themselves in your message – which is the whole point of attending the webinar in the first place. Yes, when we first encountered the first problem, I apologized profusely and sincerely without making excuses. Then, when each of the next three problems sprung up, I addressed them, fixed them as best I could, and moved on. I made every effort to make the focus the story, not the tech.

6. Apologize

The back-half of the presentation apparently went off very well. No, it didn’t have the videos, and my video monitor crapped out so I couldn’t tell if my slides were actually advancing to the audience, but I kept going… until the end, when I sincerely and graciously apologized first to my audience, and then to the woman who hired us.

7. Make It Right And Then Some

Immediately, we offered to build a resource page on our website that included the slide deck and the videos they were able to see. I wrote introductions to each video to give them context within the presentation – illustrating why those videos were where they were in the presentation. I spent the two hours following the presentation building it and had it to the client before 5p her time.

Additionally, we offered to re-do the webinar, record the webinar, and refund 100% of their money. We also gave every attendee a copy of our bestselling book and a copy of our new eBook.

In our minds, it’s not enough to say “sorry,” and it’s not enough to offer a mulligan, and it’s not even enough to offer to return the money, we had to give them all three PLUS more, and we had to do it right away.

8. Debrief

Once the shock and horror wear off, but while it’s still fresh in my mind, I need to evaluate all the processes and develop more contingencies for future webinars. Where, in the workflow, can we optimize and refine and prepare (see step #1).

9. Throw Up

Not metaphorically. I literally threw up afterward. It helped.

10. Go Play

You know what else helps? Knowing people love you and have your back, and at the end of the day, no one was hurt. After step #9 (and subsequent toothbrushing), I played with daughter, and as soon as I type these last few words, I’m going to play golf with my son.

Even though a metric ton of stuff that was out of our control went wrong today, we did all we could. We prepared as best we could, we didn’t quit, we gave the very best performance we could (of a very good message), and we made every effort to immediately make it right plus some. We’ve learned how to be better next time, and I’m eager to get back in the saddle.

Speaking of which, if it’s not full (and it almost is), we hope you’ll join us on Wednesday.