“Only about 20–30% of [webinar] registrants were actually attending.”
So says Kody Duncan of Growth Tools (a service for helping coaches and creators increase their revenue through marketing tools and training).
Here’s how his team discovered a communication strategy that not only doubled their webinar attendance, but unexpectedly opened up a brand new marketing channel…
…allowing them to reach thousands directly on their phones.
“People were dropping off”
According to Kody, their webinars were getting strong registration numbers. But somewhere along the line people were dropping off.
The team at Growth Tools realized the biggest gap was between webinar registration and webinar attendance.
Kody says, “We believed many more people would show up if they received better, more timely reminders.”
This hypothesis led the team to a simple idea…
“What if we could text?”
“What if we could text each person their Zoom link just a few minutes before the webinar?”
The logic was that, “People may not be checking their email at that exact moment, but a text is a much more direct way to get their attention.”
Growth Tools ended up using Mobile Text Alerts to help them send text message reminders to webinar registrants…
And the results were immediate.
“Mobile Text Alerts pretty much doubled our webinar attendance overnight. Instead of seeing only 20–30% of registrants attend, we began seeing substantially stronger show-up rates whenever SMS reminders were included.”
When asked how much their boost actually was, Kody says, “We went from an average of 25% attendance up to basically an average of 50% attendance overnight.”
And this wasn’t just a one-time gain. It turned out to be a dependable pattern.
Kody says, “That impact has remained remarkably consistent over time. When we use text reminders, attendance is significantly better. When we don’t, the difference is obvious.”
What does “significantly better” attendance actually look like? “Ongoing, it averages between 40% to 60% with text reminders.”
“Gives people an easy way to join”
The team at Growth Tools finds that sending text reminders is especially valuable immediately before the webinar begins.
“Our most important SMS is typically sent about 10 minutes beforehand and includes the recipient’s direct Zoom join link. It removes friction and gives people an easy way to join at the exact moment they need it.”
One thing in particular that really helps Growth Tools see success with their SMS is the Mobile Text Alerts Zoom integration.
“Whenever we created a Zoom webinar, it automatically generated the necessary text reminders and merge fields without requiring additional setup. Most importantly, each registrant could receive their own individual join link by text about 10 minutes before the webinar. That worked fantastically for us.”
“Grown into an entirely new marketing channel”
Besides the higher webinar attendance, implementing SMS reminders also brought a benefit Kody and the Growth Tools team didn’t expect…
They found themselves with another marketing channel to take advantage of.
“Another incredibly valuable result is that, over time, we’ve built an SMS list of nearly 15,000 people. What began as a way to increase webinar attendance has grown into an entirely new marketing channel for our business.”
The result: “Now, whenever we have a promotion or something important to share with our broader audience, we’re no longer limited to reaching people through email alone. We can also communicate with them directly through SMS.”
And the team has found that “it has consistently driven a measurable increase in the number of people who take action on what we’re promoting.”
In fact, Kody says that “a single text we sent to our list last week generated $20,000 cash collected in under 7 days.”
“We consider text reminders a must-do”
Kody and his team, who advise on marketing for a living, now say, “We recommend [text messages] constantly to our clients and partners. If you’re hosting webinars or any kind of live online event, we consider text reminders a must-do.”
After all, “You’ve already done the hard work of getting someone interested enough to register. A timely text . . . can make the difference between that person intending to attend and actually showing up.”
You can see better webinar show-ups (and maybe a new marketing channel opportunity) like Kody too!
Try SMS free now to get started with sending SMS reminders for your webinars today.