Goldcast

As part of a seven-person marketing team, Validere’s Tamara Teofanovic says when it comes to events, it really is all hands on deck. 

In her role as Demand Generation Manager, Tamara is responsible for designing and executing key campaigns, owning the MarTech stack, and overseeing all lead management and qualification processes.

Tasked with a mission to educate prospects on the evolving emissions and regulatory landscape for the energy industry, Tamara is tapping into the power of webinars to build greater demand. With Validere’s product and event managers taking charge of execution, her role in the event experience focuses on increasing registrations, optimizing the overall user experience, and ultimately driving pipeline.

We sat down with Tamara for an inside look at how Validere’s webinar series went from simple content consumption to a memorable experience in a matter of months with a little help from Goldcast and a completely revamped webinar strategy.

Validere’s webinar program delivers one to two events a month covering top trends in energy and data management — everything from day-to-day operational efficiency to the world’s greatest carbon reduction challenges.

“Part of our effort is educating our audience that they have a problem to begin with—it's quite a new space we're in. Webinars are key in this education process, but they need to happen in an engaging and memorable way which supports the brand image we want to create.”

While registrations, engagement, and pipeline are all central components to Validere’s event marketing success, the educational role events play is a major factor in and of itself.

The goal of Validere’s webinar strategy is to position the brand as the thought leader in the energy MRV industry. Tamara realized that to achieve that status, she’d need to take their webinar experience from “basic” to “professional and polished.”

After a year with GoToWebinar, she knew it was time for a change.

“Our strategy at that point was more pre-recorded and edited webinars. So, more of a ‘sit and watch’ info session. It worked to an extent, but I think there's only so much you can get out of that. Our attendance rates definitely dropped, and there was not a lot of engagement. We were starting to see dwindling returns.”

Additionally, the Validere demand gen team had lost confidence in their ability to host live events. From platform reliability issues to a lack of opportunities for the audience to engage, GoToWebinar was no longer a good fit for Validere’s webinar strategy, and Tamara was ready to level up the entire experience.

And as they say, the rest is history Goldcast. 😉

People have become used to consuming content digitally, so we're continuing to find good engagement with our webinars. They’re one of our main tactics for hitting pipeline goals, so they’re very important for us.” — Tamara Teofanovic, Growth Marketing Manager, Validere

When Tamara signed up for a Goldcast webinar and instantly received the calendar invite, she immediately forwarded it to her director. “I was like, ‘How did they do this?’” she laughs.

After some rough experiences in the past, she says the biggest change for her team was simply having the confidence to run live webinars. “We had the ability before, but now we feel comfortable and confident enough to actually want and prefer to do it.”

With polished customizable features worthy of Tamara’s executive audience, it took virtually no time at all for the event team and speakers to learn how to use Goldcast.

“The ease of use has been amazing. We've had different speakers each time, and being able to really quickly get them up to speed with the platform has been very helpful. It’s so easy to figure out on the fly.”

Speaker prep time isn’t the only area where Tamara’s team is now more efficient. While her past platform provided limited analytics — basic attendance and engagement rates — Goldcast’s data-driven platform gives Tamara and her team deep, account-level insights they can actually use.

“The fact that we can bring in engagement data is helpful because it feeds into my lead scoring, forecasting, and then also to the business development team who will know what each person did within the webinar. For example, if they asked a question or accessed a document.”

With Goldcast’s seamless Hubspot integration, Tamara and her team have access to deep attendee insights at their fingertips, in real-time, with no manual effort required.

By uploading previous webinars to their resource hub and gating the content, the team at Validere can increase engagement with interested prospects.

With the right platform powering their webinars, Tamara and the team at Validere could turn their attention to what really matters — creating an unforgettable attendee experience.

And when it comes to education, Tamara knows the key to winning hearts and minds is all in the engagement — an element that she and her team have just started to unlock since making the switch.

“The ability to upload documents has led to lots of engagement, as well as the format of the polls. The way they pop up on the side while the conversation is happening is much better for engagement.”

But sometimes, it’s the little things that have the biggest impact. For Tamara, automated calendar invites that not only remind attendees about the event but also contain a Magic Link for instant event access, were crucial to their success. 

“Automated calendar invites are a big one. They’re something that sounds so simple, but that makes a really big difference. It's just so much more streamlined.”

Goldcast’s branding capabilities have also played a big role in elevating the attendee experience in Validere’s webinars.

“Given the industry we're in and our goal to be known as the trusted expert, we need our webinars to be as polished as possible. The ability to customize gives it that professional look.”

With her past platform, engagement mainly came from post-event surveys — not exactly what you want when your goal is to become the authority on important topics like carbon reduction. With one simple change in vendor, Tamara was able to provide an interactive and value-led experience for both her team and her attendees.

And when it comes to proof, it’s all in the numbers. 👇🏼

Goldcast allows us to deliver a live webinar that looks polished. It’s completely branded and looks so good, we actually take the recording and use it again elsewhere with no additional editing required. This is something that was missing with other webinar platforms.” — Tamara Teofanovic, Growth Marketing Manager, Validere

Although education was a key driver behind their webinar revamp, with a platform that tracks actionable data, Tamara was able to deliver tangible results, including:

• A 20% jump in attendance rates from Q2 to Q3
• An engagement rate increase of over 18%
• A 6% increase in MQLs directly related to the uplift in attendance
• Positive qualitative feedback from internal directors, speakers, and attendees

While webinar results like this are more than enough to thrill the boardroom and keep attendees coming back for more, Tamara is convinced there’s so much to come from Validere’s refreshed webinar program.

As the webinars are wrapping up, we're getting a lot of ‘thank yous’ and positive feedback, which we weren't getting before. That’s great qualitative feedback. And the fact our attendance rate has stayed strong over the quarter means that those returning are having a positive experience.” — Tamara Teofanovic, Growth Marketing Manager, Validere

In under six months, Tamara and her team of event extraordinaires at Validere have taken a plateauing webinar program, revived it, and are now watching it thrive.

Because while the potential has always been there, it’s never been better optimized.

Validere’s webinars have gone from a sit-back-and-watch format to a hands-on experience that attendees are eager to be a part of. With their faith (and digital event strategy) restored, Tamara and the demand gen team are ready to face whatever challenges come next.