Meet GoToWebinar
GoToWebinar is a platform for hosting one-way webinars to share with large groups of people. With up to 1000 attendees, GoToWebinar is the perfect way to host your less interactive meetings.
Positives
As one of the original webinar softwares, GoToWebinar has been around for a while. Here’s why we recommend it.
Audience Interaction
GoToWebinar allows hosts to interact with the audience, even though attendees cannot actually speak throughout the meeting. By setting up polls ahead of the webinar, the host can gather data on the audience and ask questions throughout that guide the direction of the discussion. However, you cannot create a new poll during the webinar, only launch pre-made ones.
Email Features
The GoToWebinar platform comes with several email features. After registration, attendees can add the webinar to their calendar through the email. You can schedule reminders before the webinar and follow up emails. You can also automate different emails to attendees and no shows, making it a more personalized experience.
Compatible on Mobile Device
Anyone can join from their desktop, laptop, or a mobile device. By downloading the app, it’s easy and flexible to join from wherever you are.
Multiple Organizers
You can add simultaneous hosts and panelists—up to 6 of each. Organizers have complete control over the webinar, managing the video, audio, and engagement functions. The panelists are like guest speakers. They can share their screen and video.
Edit Recordings
Webinars are automatically recorded. After it has ended, organizers can edit recordings. One new feature is that you can trim webinars to cut out any unnecessary sections before sharing it.
GoToMeeting
With the GoToWebinar package you get their sister software GoToMeeting included. This allows you to host smaller, more interactive meetings between teams or departments. It’s more flexible for collaborative meetings.
Negatives
What are GoToWebinar’s limitations?
Download an App
All users, whether an attendee or host, has to download an app in order to join the webinar. For the business running the webinars, this might not be a problem. However, users considering attending just one or two webinars might be put off by having to download an app.
Interface
The interface and controls are slightly outdated and hard to use. Competing webinar software is often more intuitive and user-friendly.
Limited Customization
There are limited opportunities to customize the reminder and follow up emails, and the registration page. On the registration page you can add your logo, a 200×200 featured image, and your brand colors. You can add a small custom message into the emails, however, the bulk of the message is taken up by standard introductions on how to join.
No Chat
There is no public chat function to allow the audience to discuss points between themselves. There is, however, a Q&A section. Attendees can pose questions for the organizers or panelists to answer, but they cannot see which questions others have asked.
Is it An Effective Choice?
GoToWebinar is a fully functional, simple platform for small to medium businesses to host with. Although some features are limited, the software is designed for ease of use.
