If you're looking for a way to engage with your audience and grow your brand, live streaming may be the answer.
While it can be intimidating at first, live streaming is actually easier than it sounds and there are plenty of ways to make sure that your audience will enjoy watching it!
Here are 10 tips for making the most out of live sessions:
Set a Realistic Goal.
It's important to set a realistic goal before you start your live session.
Your goal should be something you can achieve in three months or less, and it should be related to your business and not just for the sake of achieving it.
If you're unsure what goals would be appropriate for your live sessions, ask yourself these questions:
- What do my customers want?
- What do I have time for?
- What do other people in my industry/niche have time for?
Be Organized.
You should be prepared for anything. Your live session may go wrong in some way. A technical glitch, an internet outage, or a malfunctioning camera. It may also be that you get more questions than you anticipated or comments and requests that you didn't expect.
Be ready to improvise on the fly so that your viewers don't feel like they're getting jerked around by a bad showman.
Some other tips:
- Make sure your chat window is visible on your screen before starting a stream so that you can see what people are saying in real time and respond appropriately.
- You should also have a list of topics or questions in front of you so that you don't get caught off guard. If someone asks a question, you can look at your list and see if it's something that needs to be addressed during the stream.
Be Prepared for the Unexpected.
You should also be prepared for the unexpected. When planning your live session, make sure to have a backup plan in case something goes wrong. You don’t want to find yourself in an awkward situation where you’re stuck without a solution. This could include having a back-up location ready in case there are last minute issues with the venue or having someone standing by with equipment at all times if something breaks down.
If something unexpected happens during your live session (such as breaking a glass), you should have some sort of response planned out so that viewers don't feel like they're watching an episode of The Office (where Michael Scott made everything worse).
Make sure that when things go right, you take advantage of them! If people are engaged and interested in what they see on their screens, keep going! Don't let them get bored or lose interest; instead use this opportunity to engage them even further before ending your live session.
Interact With Your Audience.
The chat feature is an excellent way to interact with your audience. Use it to ask questions and respond to comments, or as a way to promote your business or products and services.
Remember that people have questions about what they see online, so take advantage of this opportunity.
Show Personality and Emotion.
Keeping your audience engaged is crucial to success. To do that, you have to show personality and emotion.
- Be yourself—This may seem obvious, but it can be easy for people who are new to video or social media marketing to try too hard or overdo things. The most effective content is often the most genuine, so don’t be afraid of being yourself!
- Use humor when appropriate—Humor is an excellent tool for connecting with your audience, building trust and showing off your personality. Humor also makes even the driest topics more interesting! Just make sure it's appropriate (and not offensive) before recording any videos or live sessions!
- Be informative and engaging—A good rule of thumb is that you should aim for 50% education/informational value in a video/live session vs 50% entertainment value (including humor). Not only will this help keep viewers engaged throughout the entire video/live session; it will also reduce their frustration level if they find out there's no clear-cut answer at the end of said video/live session!
Use Tools That Help You Engage With Your Audience.
Engaging with your audience is the most important part of using live sessions. Even if you have an amazing brand and a stunning product, if people don’t know who you are and what you stand for, they won’t buy from you.
The tools that help people engage with social media content include:
- The ability to ask questions or participate in polls
- Adding comments or direct messages (DMs)
Do Market Research on Other Popular Live Streams.
If you're going to live stream, you need to do your homework. Researching the top-performing live streams will show you what they're doing right—and where they can improve.
Take a look at the most popular channels on Twitch and YouTube, as well as other platforms if applicable. Watch their first few broadcasts and see what works for them: how do they handle technical issues such as lagging or poor sound quality? How do they engage with their audience? What kind of content does each host produce (often referred to as "content creators") typically offer in their streams? Do these things align with how YOU want your channel's content to be perceived?
Offer Exclusive Content During Your Live Stream.
In addition to offering a live stream of your service, you can also give away exclusive content during the live session. That could include:
- Free content or discounts
- Free trials (after the session)
- Free gifts for those who RSVP or show up in person at your physical location.
- A free consultation (post-session)
Promote Your Live Session on Multiple Channels.
A lot of people are on social media, which means that the more channels you use to promote your live session, the better. You could put a post on Facebook and Twitter, but don’t stop there; use email marketing too! Write blog posts about your upcoming live session, and make sure to send an email newsletter out announcing it as well.
If you really want to get creative with how you promote your live sessions, use landing pages as a way of enticing viewers who have signed up for notifications about them. You can set up an email capture form so that people who sign up will be sent a link they can share with their friends (make sure this link is unique from all other links so that no one is confused).
If possible, include a countdown timer on these landing pages so potential viewers know exactly when your next one will be happening; this helps build anticipation and gives them something to look forward to.
Add Value to Your Livestreams.
When it comes to livestreaming, there's no question that the goal is to entertain and engage your audience. But there's one thing you can do that goes beyond just making people laugh: give them something they can use. Whether it's a free guide, an in-depth video tutorial, or a useful resource like a cheat sheet for writing headlines or a list of top tools for social media marketers, giving away content is going to help you drive more traffic back to your website and keep people coming back for more.
Give Your Audience Something They Can Use to Build Their Businesses
One great way of doing this is by using your livestreams as promotional opportunities for other businesses and offering discounts on those businesses' products or services during streams.
For example, if you're running an hourlong Facebook Live session on Tuesday morning at 9am EST, why not offer 20% off any product in their store? You'll be helping both parties: firstly, because they'll get customers who want what they're selling; secondly because people will tune in just because they heard about the discount! And since most people don't necessarily think about buying stuff online until right before lunch (when they're hungry), this could even boost sales later on in the day.
These tips will help you create great live sessions for your social media accounts.
Create a consistent schedule.
It’s important to create a schedule that your followers can count on and plan around. This will help them know when to expect the next session, and it will also make it easier for you to keep up with live sessions throughout the week.
You might want to do a daily or weekly session, or perhaps have special events planned for specific holidays or seasonal changes (for example, Easter). Once you get into a routine, stick with it! If people know what days they can find you online, they’ll be more likely to follow along regularly throughout the year.
Ask questions that encourage engagement.
People love talking about themselves—so ask questions that encourage engagement from your audience members! T
his can be as simple as asking who their favorite movie director is or how often they go bowling (and maybe even inviting them out on that date sometime) …or something else entirely unique depending on what kind of industry you work in yourself whether its sports, technology, or entertainment there's always something interesting going on somewhere out there too so don't forget those opportunities either!
Conclusion
We hope these tips help you improve your live sessions. If you need more guidance, check out our previous article on how to use social media for your live sessions and what they mean for businesses today. Good luck!
