According to a survey conducted by Russell Research, 90% of audio conference attendees say they multitask and do other things – in short, aren’t paying attention at all. Hmmm… really something to think about isn’t it especially these days in the Internet Marketing scene when everyone who’s anyone is holding teleseminars.

Let’s do some simple math. One of the cheapest teleconferencing services I’ve come accross is $0.10 per minute per participant. If you only had 50 people, that would be a whopping $300 bucks for a 60 minute call. Now, if only 10% are actually paying attention that means you only really have 5 people who are qualified prospects (assuming you are making a call for prospecting). $300 for 5 people? Whoa is right! Ok so you may disagree some with me about the rest whether they are qualified or not. After all, they took the time (and expense) to call in, they must be interested. True but how many times have you signed up for a call just to see if you can get to take away something with no intention to buy whatsoever? I’ve been guilty of that. I’ve also been guilty of doing everything under the sun but pay attention. Lot’s of times. Mostly because I know the call will be recorded and I’ll get to listen anyway. Even so, out of 10 calls I’ve been sent recordings for I think I’ve only listened to 1.

What is my point? Just like someone coming to your website, you need to get them NOW. You’ve got to sell it to them on the call or the call is going to make your ROI plummet faster than the Titanic. But what can you do to make people pay attention? One ingenious thing I learnt lately from the gurus is to giveaway something and tell those on the call to send a specially formatted email to claim the prize or to be on the drawing lot for the prize. That ensures people who do register actually turn up and that they are paying attention to some degree.

My thoughts are, do away with audio calls. Use web conferencing instead. I may be wrong and people may pay less attention. I don’t know at this point but theoretically, when you involve someone rather than say hey you sit and listen to me, people are more likely to pay attention. So can web conferencing achieve that? To a certain degree. You cannot get everyone to pay attention all the time. You don’t even get that in a face to face meeting. Humans are restless by nature but you could reduce that percentage.

You see in a web conference setting, there are usually slides for people to follow along. This points to another finding of the research that “69 percent said they spend time during the call looking for the materials under discussion”. Using web conferencing, your material is in front of them and you give them no excuse to go hunting. Not to mention, how often had you heard about a website being mentioned on a call and think “What is that? How do you spell that?” and there goes your train of thought. Many web conferencing services today offer a follow me function that means you load up a web page on your screen and everyone on the conference sees the web page. Some even allow for desktop sharing that means whatever you see on your computer whether its your browser or a software, your attendees see it too.

Then there is the white board feature also common on many conferencing services. It allows you to illustrate your ideas, thoughts and presentation for everyone to see. Web conferencing does in a lot of ways mimic a real life presentation. The best part is, there are no long distance calls for you or your attendees. There are many other benefits too but hold your horses. Web conferencing in many cases can be more expensive than teleconferencing. Until now. Before you go, if you decide to get it, I can save you the setup fee due to a special arrangement. Just contact me to find out how.