Goldcast

Drift’s bright colors, bold design, and breezy tone of voice combine to create an unforgettable brand experience. And that makes sense, considering they’re in the business of humanizing customer interactions.

As a “conversation company,” Drift knew from the get-go they needed a striking online presence to separate themselves from the competition. They succeeded in many ways, but there was one clear gap in an otherwise complete brand package.

Webinars play a key part in Drift’s marketing strategy, but their standard platform wasn’t delivering an experience consistent with the rest of their brand.

Finding an alternative fell on a team that interacts with just about everyone at Drift: event marketing.

Sara Lieber, Director of Event Marketing, shares how Goldcast not only made weekly webinars both scalable and brand-friendly, but also the surprising ways it’s helped move events beyond the marketing department.

Events and webinars play a central role in Drift’s marketing strategy. Sara and the event marketing team, including Content Marketing Associate Delaney Adams, started with two webinars per month. 

Thanks to Goldcast’s scalable and customizable platform, two became three, three became four, and today, Sara and her team have created a suite of event programming options with specific purposes for each.

But it wasn’t always so easy. When they first launched their webinar program, the Drift marketing team relied on Zoom for their live broadcasts. It served its purpose at first, but when the time came to scale their webinar strategy, Sara saw a missed branding opportunity. Developing informative entertainment just wasn’t feasible with an off-the-shelf solution.

What’s worse, their attendance took a dive as Zoom became the default web conferencing software. Their content became just another meeting to attend.

Luckily, that’s when they found Goldcast.

Drift’s webinar program today has vastly expanded thanks to the flexibility and versatility of Goldcast. 

“We’re all trying to get a lot done, and Goldcast adds some time back to your day. Scaling up your webinar series is so much easier when you can copy and paste, change the dates and times, and keep the same format.”

This scalability has contributed to an increased number of webinars with minimal effort. A simplified workflow also makes it possible to proactively plan ahead and boost the brand experience for Drift’s attendees.

Drift’s customers and event attendees now enjoy:

• Product Deep Dives: Customer-only sessions led by Drift’s product team.
• Drift In Action: 30-minute sessions on the basics of Drift Conversation Cloud.
• Demo Day Live: Demos highlighting product capabilities that impact businesses right away.
• Sales User Training: Sessions featuring best practices and configuration tips for selling with Drift.

With the ability to easily execute one webinar per week, the increased volume and variety of Drift’s webinars have been directly linked to a more engaged prospect and customer audience. New webinars have opened up new tools, resources, and opportunities for the sales team to interact with Drift’s prospects in meaningful ways.

Drift partnered with Goldcast in 2021 and immediately noticed several benefits:

• Drift has a bright, personable brand that matches its products. Goldcast allows that brand to shine through customizable invitations and emails that stand out from cookie-cutter Zoom invites.
• Interactive polls and Q&A keep the audience engaged on the content, not checking their phones and email.
• Metrics like time spent watching a webinar offer critical insights into what’s grabbing the audience’s attention.
• Add-ons like speaker names and titles card add a touch of professionalism missing from other platforms.
• Registration analytics are simple in Goldcast. No-shows are automatically recorded, and user-friendly interfaces streamline webinar follow-up communications.

“Branding is so important to us, and Goldcast lets us put our personal stamp on all communications. That level of customization is a great feature.”

While Goldcast started as a marketing tool at Drift, it quickly proved its value in other departments, too. Drift now has three separate teams fully onboarded to host webinars in Goldcast: Marketing, Product, and Sales.

“Other teams are excited to be able to get out in front of our audiences and speak to things that are top of mind for them. Enabling other teams to use Goldcast has been a huge help in empowering them to do the presentations they want to do.”

Sales took advantage of Goldcast’s professional look by using it for one-on-one meetings as well as internal kickoffs. The simplicity of the platform means that other teams can handle much of the setup on their own, with Sara and her team providing additional support when needed.

Change can be tough, and bringing new software on board is no exception. Sara was relieved to discover Goldcast seamlessly integrates with their current Marketo Webhooks for streamlined registration. A landing page on Drift’s website easily syncs up with Goldcast to send a confirmation email to webinar attendees without lifting a finger.

Deep integration between Drift and Goldcast also allows the event marketing team to keep strong tabs on audience behavior. Analytics like time spent watching a recording offer insight into which webinars are keepers.

Sara and her team also build a strategy around Goldcast’s analytics into real-time attendance of live webinars (e.g., how many people are dropping out) to guide the team’s post-webinar follow-up.

Combined, that data offers a critical window for sales to see which attendees are actively engaged and possibly in need of more support.

Drift stands out from the competition thanks to a carefully curated brand identity. When a humdrum webinar platform threatened to water down that look and feel, Goldcast came to the rescue with a unique, customizable solution. But for Sara and her team, it’s not just about the tech.

“We can trust Goldcast as a platform. Beyond what you offer as a tool, it's the relationship that matters.”