A Quick Step-by-Step Guide

We’re trying something innovative with our new Art of Photography online class – as far as I know, we are the first to try this.

For the previous one, we used GoToWebinar, which had the downside of being expensive and a Limit of 1000 people.

Using a combination of unique steps, we can scale a paid webinar to well beyond 1,000 people (unlimited, in fact) and it’s totally free.

Background

My team has figured this out, mostly because we’ve been really hitting Google Hangouts hard. I have a weekly show that goes out for free called “Trey’s Variety Hour” – go subscribe on YouTube! Very early on, I made friends with a genius named Dave Veffer, who is now my producer and has been doing all the heavy lifting on the logistics of that weekly show and the live webinar. Dave and Curtis Simmons worked together on the complete solution for this process, so a big thanks to both of them!

Note: we use e-Junkie for a payment system so that people can register and pay for the live Webinar.

Benefits of this Method

– It’s Free
– No Limit on Registrations
– Users can watch the video in 720p or 360p
– We can control the entire user experience
– We can show pre-canned videos live at a very high frame rate
– With everyone watching these pre-canned videos at the same time, it increases the excitement of the live event, it compels more people to stay with the event in real-time, and it keeps the Live questions in sync since everyone will be in the same place
– When we are done, the entire video is recorded so we can provide a URL to any registrants that missed the live broadcast.

The How-To

Step 1: Set up the page that the viewers will visit

1) We make a branded special page on StuckInCustoms.com. This page is password-protected.
2) On that page, we include the YouTube Live Event broadcast (embedded video player)
3) We also include the Google Moderator embed code (for Live questions during the event for our moderator to handle). How to Embed it.

Step 2: Set up your eCommerce solution

1) We set up an account with e-Junkie
2) We created a product inside eJunkie so people can sign up for the Webinar for $149.
3) After they register and pay, we have an email address that we will use to send them a link to the page with password we created above.

Step 3: Tell people about your Webinar and link them to your sales page.

1) We created a sales page at https://stuckincustoms.com/art-of-photography
2) On that page, use the code that you get from e-Junkie so people can buy a seat at the webinar. (basic shopping cart embed code)
3) After people make the purchase, they will receive a confirmation email automatically through e-Junkie.

Step 4: Run the Live Webinar

1) My producer, Dave, creates the Event (which is set to “Unlisted”) on my YouTube Live account, configures it for 720p and 360p, and notes the YouTube embed code.
2) Dave starts a Google+ Hangout with a limited audience of me and Karen Hutton who will be asking me all the questions.
3) Dave uses Wirecast to capture part of the screen where the Hangout window is, which he then streams through my YouTube Live account to the Event via 720p and 360p as well as recording a local copy to his hard drive.
4) Dave verifies that the broadcast does NOT appear on my YouTube live channel (it’s unlisted).
5) Dave takes the unlisted video embed code and places it on our private webpage on StuckInCustoms.com that we set up in Step 1.
6) We do live introductions and whatnot through the Google Hangout for everyone to see.
7) (optional) Dave can then play a pre-canned video on his computer and Wirecast can pipe that through to YouTube Live.
8) We then begin the detailed Q&A and take live questions through Google Moderator. I can answer on video and screenshare my computer to show how to do certain tricks or whatever in Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop.