The final item listed in a good communication concept is EVALUATION. Be it through assessments, survey, interviews, benchmarking etc. We want to know if we have reached our target audience, if the message arrived at the receiving end and if the money spent on the respective communication measures turned out to be a fruitful investment.
How will we know? And how can we evaluate the use of a webcast? As soon as your video is published on the Internet, be it Live or on Demand, your external streaming provider can begin logging the traffic generated, as well as the hits and clicks of the webcast watched.
Facts and figures
The good news is, you don’t have to do anything. Take a live webcast, for example. Instantaneously you can track the users on your webpage anonymously and report back what peaks, highs and lows there were during a specific time period. The tracking tools are so sophisticated, that you yourself don’t even need to install expensive software yourself. Leave it to those in charge on the technical side and they will deliver the results first hand while the event is ongoing or immediately thereafter. What more do you want?
Do statistics really tell the truth?
If you are working with an experienced and reliable streaming partner, such as Solutionpark, you can only expect top notch reporting on the facts and figures of your webcast. Every aspect is measured and recorded, tracked and identified – if you so wish. It actually is their general working procedure to observe the user’s movements on the Internet while one of their clients’ webcasts is taking place.
From a communication perspective such statistical information can only be helpful. How many people watched the webcast? At what time? For how long? All good information not simply for justifying the costs but also for explaining their necessity. Look at the cost per user: One can calculate that for an event with a live audience, for the extra cost of a webcast, up to double the number of people will watch it in the following month compared with the number of participants that attended the actual event. Imagine, double!! Most probably the extra cost for producing the webcast was a fraction of what the event cost anyway.
Feel at ease
I always found it helpful to know how many viewers had attended a live webcast session online and was always grateful for the respective evaluation and interpretation provided by Solutionpark. One thing I do want to add is that the technical support throughout the entire project is just as important as the analysis thereafter. I was definitely never left hanging throughout the whole communication-webcast process. And that was much appreciated.
The place was full of interesting equipment they had built into mobile trolleys themselves as they explained how they’d go on location and record, encode and stream a company’s investor presentation, press conference or other live event onto the web. So how would this work for us? Basically we wanted to replace the old way of recording a staff event on VHS cassettes (!) which would be copied manually and then sent by mail to the various offices around the world. How endlessly tedious and time-consuming!
The good thing was that our streaming provider has their own encoding center where all the equipment is permanently installed on site. This means that they are always ready with many encoders and backup devices available, a redundant and reliable Internet upstream, optimized connectivity to Akamai (a 
Set realistic expectations, allow yourself enough time for the preparation and testing phase. Take the lead in organizing the location and briefing the speakers. It helps to clarify the logistical details in advance, to make sure you have things in place before you get started. Once the camera is rolling it’s much harder to fix something that isn’t already working.
I truly enjoyed working with ‘my personal webcast team’ and we all shared in the success of making ithappen every time no matter what. Despite a little adrenalin rush before the start of every recording or even the live transmission, I was always excited to work with the team and have the people from Solutionpark come by with all their sophisticated equipment. Actually, that was the best part of it all. Who doesn’t like new gadgets, ha?! It seemed as though they brought a new piece of hardware every time. They use some really cool stuff. Plus, the technological advances simply make it easier to get the job done.
What is a webcast?
