In 2025, delivering an outstanding customer experience is the gold standard for webinars. Audiences expect far more than a basic slide presentation, they want sessions that are interactive, valuable, and engaging. The fastest way to lose them? Make your webinar feel like a sales pitch.
Professionals say that overly promotional content is their number one turn-off. In their eyes, being too promotional is worse than content that isn’t actionable or doesn’t deliver on its promise. While it’s important to align webinars with your goals, the most successful ones are always built around audience needs first. Fail to do that, not only will registrations suffer, but your brand’s reputation could take a hit.
Today, the most effective webinars are focused on building community, nurturing prospects, and welcoming new customers, all while leveraging the latest technology and engagement trends. Ready to create a truly audience-centric webinar experience? Here are five proven ways to put your audience at the heart of your next event.
1. Let Your Audience Guide the Conversation
Customer experience starts before the webinar even begins. Give your audience a voice by inviting them to submit questions or tell you what topics they are most interested in. Use tools like registration pages and emails to let your audience tell you what they want to talk about. Engaging your audience from the start builds excitement and ensures your content is relevant and valuable.
Trend Alert: Personalized content has become an expectation in 2025. When your customers feel seen, they’re more likely to join, participate, and return.
2. Boost Engagement with Polls, Breakout Rooms, Live Q&A, and More
Engagement is at the heart of top webinars. Features like live polls, chat, quizzes, emoji reactions, and breakout rooms are now standard. Let attendees help direct the conversation by voting on what’s discussed next, joining focused breakout sessions, or participating in live challenges with rewards.
Avoid treating a webinar like a stage, where all communication flows one way—boring! Instead, make the most of interactive elements such as polls, hand raising, and group activities in breakout rooms. These tools create space for real conversations and active learning.
Ask your audience about their pain points, challenges, goals, and experience with the topic. Fun icebreaker questions are also a great way to build rapport and get everyone comfortable. Finally, take advantage of AI summaries that automatically capture the main points of your session. This makes it easy for attendees to review and share key takeaways after the webinar.
Melanie: our resident webinar pro and Senior Engagement Program Manager, explains how customer engagement behaviors are changing when using GoTo Webinar:
“We’ve seen a real surge in people using our breakout rooms lately, and it’s been wonderful to watch. Breakout rooms offer attendees the chance to connect in smaller groups, share ideas, and really dig into the topics that matter most to them. It adds so much depth and energy to webinars.
Polls continue to be a crowd favorite, too. They’re a great way to gather instant feedback and keep everyone actively involved. I find that people enjoy seeing their input reflected in real time, and it helps ensure that we’re focusing on what the audience cares about most.
Hand raising and live Q&A sessions are also consistently popular. These features give everyone an opportunity to join the conversation, ask questions, and share insights which always leads to a more dynamic and engaging experience for everyone.
And I’m especially excited about our new AI summaries. The feedback so far has been fantastic, attendees really appreciate having a concise recap of the session’s key points. It makes it so much easier for everyone to review what was covered and share the main takeaways with their teams. Overall, any features that encourage real-time, two-way engagement make webinars more valuable for everyone involved.”
3. Be Flexible and Mobile-Ready—Meet Your Audience Anywhere
Remote and hybrid work are here to stay, and attendees expect to join from any device, anytime. Ensure your webinars are mobile-first, browser-friendly, and offer seamless switching from phone to desktop or tablet. Visuals, chat, and polls should be optimized for every screen.
Audience-centric webinars mean providing easy access for your participants no matter where or how they are joining the webinar. Mobile access has become increasingly important, with nearly 10% of GoTo Webinar attendees coming from mobile devices, accessed through the handy mobile app.
What does that mean for you? Make sure the webinar solution you’re using is optimized for mobile attendees and that it’s simple to join the webinar and participate from their mobile device. Flexibility is key to helping keep your audience engaged in a hybrid environment.
Industry Insight: In 2025, more than 50% of webinars are accessed on mobile, so flexible access is no longer optional.
4. Encourage the Audience to Ask Questions
Interactive webinars are more engaging, and Q&A is one of the most effective ways to involve your audience. According to The Big Book of Webinar Stats, 78% of marketing webinars and 82% of training webinars include Q&A sessions—and for good reason: participants love having their voices heard.
During your webinar, actively invite attendees to submit questions. Respond to questions by having a co-organizer or moderator reply to questions in real time via chat, while the presenter can answer selected questions live for everyone to hear. We recommend combining both approaches for the best experience.
When answering questions live, prioritize those that are common or particularly interesting to the whole group. And remember, don’t leave any attendee behind—follow up after the webinar to address any questions you didn’t get to during the session.
5. Keep the Conversation Going
Don’t let the connection end when your webinar does. Follow up with your attendees right after the webinar—send an email with the recording of the session, the slides, and any other relevant resources. Thank them for participating and invite them to share feedback or suggest topics for future webinars and be sure to log and address any feedback and complaints that arise.
Finally, let them know how to keep the conversation going and make it easy for attendees to stay in touch. Can they follow you on social media? Is there a hashtag to join the conversation? Share how they can continue to engage with your brand and community, or where to go to learn more.
For marketing webinars, don’t forget to use all the insights you’ve gathered from the webinar—such as poll responses and submitted questions. You can use these to segment your audience and nurture them with targeted follow-ups.
The next time you are planning a webinar, just follow these tips and put yourself in your audience’s shoes, ensuring every attendee feels valued and heard.
Elevate Your Next Event with GoTo Webinar
Ready to level up your webinars? GoTo Webinar puts your audience first, offering intuitive tools and powerful features to create a standout experience your attendees will remember (and love). Discover the GoTo Webinar difference and make your next event your best yet.
Whether you’re a seasoned expert or just getting started, it’s easy to see why professionals around the world trust GoTo Webinar for engaging, professional events.
Want to learn more? Explore our Resource Center for more tips and tricks or get started for free today.
