CPD accreditation for webinars

This article provides a simple introduction to CPD accreditation for webinars. With a growing demand for professional online learning and the ongoing improvements of eLearning software and available resources, webinars are becoming an increasingly popular way to deliver valuable learning to a target audience across different locations.

What is a webinar and how does it work?

A webinar is considered as a type of an online learning event held virtually that is typically hosted by either one person or an organisation, and is then promoted to a group of attendees via the Internet, known as an online audience. A typical webinar will allow for a speaker to present their learning content to a specific audience, as well as share videos, presentation slides, and any other multimedia to support the purpose of the overall learning activity. Because the webinar is managed and run over the Internet, the audience can be located anywhere in the world.

Webinars have the opportunity to be very interactive, and will often contain both video and audio elements to help support the learning content and objectives. Webinars will also often allow for the participants to discuss subjects, interact with each other, review parts of the learning in more detail, ask questions, and send messages to each other, all designed to help make the learning as professional and effective as possible.

What are the benefits of webinars?

Webinars can be a highly effective way of delivering certain types of training and learning. Webinars can be run in real-time, or recorded for future and repetitive use. Another of the benefits of webinars is that you can invite people from all around the world to attend, record the sessions and then send the learning content to the attendees once the event has finished. Other benefits of webinars as a training and learning tool include:

• Webinars are a great and affordable way to build brand reputation, increase trust between the organisation and its interested audience
• Webinars allow you the opportunity to share information and documentation in real-time, discuss the subject matters and provide any solutions to questions and queries
• You can create online surveys and feedback loops on what went well about the webinar, what could be improved and what your attendees would like to learn next in the next webinar session
• You can build lists of attendees, see who is interactive during the training and use the contact information for future sales opportunities.
• You can record the webinar sessions, and upload the training sessions on your website as a platform for additional learning for other potential clients and attendees in the future
• If you sell other products, you can use the webinars sessions as an opportunity to promote and provide further information on your range of services available
• Webinars do just have uses for external audiences and attendees. Webinars are a great business learning tool to provide ongoing and regular training to employees and internal staff who may be based in a range of different locations and offices. 

How to make the most of your webinar training

Webinars are a cost-effective way to promote your brand to larger audiences. Often there is no limit on how many people could attend a webinar training session, and so you could be providing information and knowledge to thousands of people at once, which would be very difficult to do in face to face training, where classroom size may limit attendance capacity.

What are the different types of webinars?

Webinars can come in a wide range of formats. The main types of webinars are either using (1) presentation slideshows supported by tools such as presentation slides, (2) live video streams which can be very personal and helps build an increase level of rapport with the audience, and (3) whiteboard webinars which can help to outline and visualize complex subjects as well as provide diagrams to take your audience through processes and procedures, for example.

What are webinars used for?

As well as for educational learning and training sessions, webinars can also be used to provide demos of products, on-board existing clients onto your services, run customer sales meetings and internal management meetings. Webinars are an extremely versatile tool that many organisations can make the most of their versatility.

Simple tips when running Webinars as a CPD training session

If you are using webinars to deliver training sessions some important factors are worth bearing in mind. Here are some simple tips to consider when creating and developing your webinars. Remember to keep you webinars educational, information-led and value added learning. Always look to promote your service through expertise and knowledge provision using best practice guidelines.

Ensure your webinars have clear learning objectives, outcomes and a summary of key information from start. Follow a structured, logical and methodical approach to knowledge acquisition. Think of the learning journey of your audience.

If appropriate for your subject matter, use examples, case studies, facts & stats to help put the information into context. Always remember that audience participation helps to embed the knowledge, and so looks to find ways to make your webinars engaging with your attendees.

Webinars have the opportunity to be interactive. Look to see if there are ways to use Q&A, quizzes, and group discussions. And lastly, feedback loops are really helpful to find out how you can make the learning activity better if you intend to run the webinars again in the future.

We hope this article on what is a webinar and how does it work was helpful. If you are looking for relevant training courses, educational events, online learning and webinars to support your Continuing Professional Development requirements please visit our CPD Industry Hubs section of the website for more information.

CPD accreditation for webinars

We hope this article was helpful. Established in 1996, The CPD Certification Service has over 27 years’ experience providing CPD accreditation. With members in over 100 countries, our CPD providers benefit from the ability to promote themselves as part of an international community where quality is both recognised and assured.

If you are interested in offering training courses, seminars, workshops, eLearning, or educational events suitable for Continuing Professional Development, please visit the Become a CPD Provider page or contact our team to discuss in more detail. Alternatively, if you are looking for a free online CPD record tool to help manage, track and log your ongoing learning, as well as store your professional training records and attendance certificates in one simple place, go to the myCPD Portal page.