AnyMeeting: How to Turn Your Next Webinar into Cash As costs rise and profits get pinched in today's still weak economy, here's how to drive more revenue to your business.
By Jonathan Blum •
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Need an extra revenue resource? You can now sell tickets to your next webinar.
Huntington Beach, Calif.-based AnyMeeting recently launched a Web-conferencing tool that uses an online ticketing system to turn any webinar, meeting or collaborative event into a paying gig.
Through a PayPal merchant account, AnyMeeting lets users charge for access to a web demonstration or Webinar -- giving businesses and organizations a relatively painless option to getting paid online.
Though the service has a number of applications, AnyMeeting president and CEO Costin Tuculescu said the service is ideal for training courses and online education. A marketing company might, for instance, use the service to provide prospective clients with a social media bootcamp.
What it is: AnyMeeting's ticketing service lets users charge a flat admission fee to their AnyMeeting conferences. For the ticketing service, users link their PayPal merchant account to their AnyMeeting conference and specify that a PayPal payment is required from conference participants when they register for the conference. Users can then set the meeting price (minimum $5) and program in any discount codes. Conferences can also be recorded and accessed later -- and you can charge for those, too. Conferences, which are password-protected for paying users, can be shared via Web link or through social media.
What you might like: AnyMeeting's ticketing system offers a surprisingly easy way of turning online content into a paid event. AnyMeeting boasts some impressive features, including conference call lines, screen sharing, the ability to broadcast live video and capacity for up to 200 attendees. For more on the service, check out this (free) tutorial.
What you might not like: AnyMeeting and PayPal both get a cut -- which adds up to a little less than 25 percent. While those deductions are clearly listed when setting up a conference, that can add up to real money. And, as always, while these tools are great in theory, you are still stuck with the hard part of getting people to pay for an experience on the Web.
Bottom line: AnyMeeting supplies a relatively easy way to get paid for online content. Getting people to pay for that content, however, is solely up to you.
What unexpected ways have you managed to generate added revenue streams? Let us know in the comments section.
