I had the honor of interviewing Clive Shepherd a couple of weeks ago for a podcast on the subject of using synchronous online communications for learning or, in more friendly terms, live online learning.

It was a fascinating discussion because it made me realize that we tend to take things like web conferencing for granted and probably don’t dedicate the resources we should to optimize this communication channel.

Clive argues that despite the fact that web conferencing has been around for over 10 years, companies are still in the early stages of effectively utilizing this medium – essentially trying to copy what is done in the real classroom and make it as similar as possible in the virtual classroom. What happens over time Clive states is that we begin to appreciate the unique benefits of the new medium and try to capitalize on them. He gives webinars as an example using the analogy of a conference presentation. During webinars, text chat now becomes a back channel where people discuss, interact and exchange views, contacts and links in a way not possible in a face-to-face event. As a result, we now start to use web conferencing by preference, not just due to economic reasons.

Clive and I ended our discussion with what it takes to facilitate a successful online event and while he gave tremendous advice, one thing struck a real chord with me:

“Accept the fact that it’s likely that your audience will be distracted and work on other tasks if you are not fully engaging them, so you have to work doubly hard to make sure what you present, what you say and the interactions you use make an impact and earn you the audience’s engagement.”

As someone who puts on a fair number of webinars, I am painfully aware of the multi-tasking audience and their tendency for distraction. Over the past couple years we have tried a number of things to create engaging, interactive events for our audience, some more successful than others. Based on this experience, here are some things we tend to keep in mind when preparing our online events.

Think hard about poll questions: Polls are just terrific little tools because good questions keep viewers engaged and can provide some really good, albeit informal, industry statistics that your audience will appreciate and value. A mistake that I feel is made repeatedly is that people are putting poll questions in as an after-thought instead of thinking hard about what value the information resulting from these polls can provide to the audience. Furthermore, often presenters are not willing to go off-script and discuss poll results and their potential implication in real-time, and therefore miss a key opportunity for discussion.

Consider Q&A anytime: A couple of times we have just answered questions as they arise instead of waiting until the end of the presentation because it keeps the discussion more interactive and more free-moving. This may not seem very revolutionary, but it takes some real coordination and the ability to make lightening fast decisions. Unlike face-to-face, you generally have a bigger audience online and therefore more questions and comments flowing in – both positive and negative. So you have to know when to stop your cut into the presentation and which questions to address so as to provide the most value to the audience. Also, you run the risk of getting off topic quickly and not being able to get back on track.

Open mic night anyone? Last year, we held a webinar that consisted of a 15 minute conversation starter followed by opening the audio for people to speak freely and make comments or ask our facilitator any question they wanted. The point was to make the next 45 minutes a free-flowing discussion capable of going in any direction the audience desired. While we had a lot of comments and questions, sadly, almost none came via audio but instead were typed into the chat box and had to be read out loud. Admittedly, I am still trying to figure out how to encourage people to talk because I really believe that an audio (coupled with text) discussion can be significantly more engaging than using chat alone. Perhaps it is like Clive says and that it just takes time for people to get comfortable with and capitalize on the uniqueness of new channels of communication.

Should we let them Tweet? Using the Twitter hashtag, we always encourage the use of Twitter as a informational and conversational channel pre- and post-event. Tony Karrer has an interesting blog post called Twitter and Webinars that has some insights on this subject and his views on coupling social media with web conferencing technology. While I really like this post and think it provides some excellent insights, I am on the fence with his assertion that “The use of Twitter as a true chat channel is a bit annoying.” Yes, he’s correct when he says Twitter chat can turn into noise, but in my personal opinion, there is no better compliment to your webinar than your audience wanting not only discuss what is being learned, but also sharing that info with their followers, many of whom may not have previously been aware of you and your event. Don’t forget that it also can get you new and relevant followers.

Incorporate other new technologies: After the success of incorporating Twitter into our webinars, we are always on the lookout for new technologies to incorporate as well. My newest fascination after reading Jane Hart’s pick of the day is AllPlayWeb. This looks wildly interesting and I am curious to know if anyone has any experience with it and what the results were for them.

Anyway, these are just a few thoughts spurred on by my discussion with Clive and his posts from his terrific new Onlignment blog.

Technorati Tags: online learning, Twitter, web conferencing, webinars

Dawn Executive Perspective, Learning Technologies online learning, Twitter, web conferencing, webinars