TBT - A mystery, a scenario, and some subtitles, oh my

Welcome to this week's installment of Throw Back Thursday. Today you get a three-for-one deal as I look back at some comments I made about webinars. The first one will also be of interest to the gamifiers out there. Gamification is as much a mindset as a method. Sometimes it just takes a little tweak to the conventional path to create a much more engaging and memorable experience.

Adding a little mystery kept me curious

I attended a webinar recently where the presenter did something pretty clever. Instead on an agenda slide … yawn … he put up a slide that had an acronym spelled out vertically. Ooooh, so it’s five letters. I’m curious.

He asked us to write down the five letters so we could fill in the words in our notes as he went through the content. Clever. Not only do I now know, without him having to say anything, that there are five key points but I have a basic progress bar as we move along. And bonus points for the call to action of having me interact by writing something down.

Now I’m invested. I can’t leave those letters hanging out by themselves. I need to pay attention and complete the puzzle. Of course, he still had to provide relevant, interesting, and engaging content, but the acronym agenda was a nice technique.

Wouldn’t you start a webinar about scenarios with … a scenario?

Listening to a recording of a webinar about using scenarios in elearning and I’m a little surprised/disappointed/confused by the fact that the presenter started with an objectives list and then a description of their company and then a definition of a scenario and … still no scenario. Hmmm. Just a suggestion, starting with a story would certainly have engaged me more.

Does the audience need subtitles?

Then why are all of your words on your slides?

So what do you think? How can we make webinars better? Or even what is your nightmare when it comes to webinars, whether you are a participant or the speaker? Talk to me. The more this is a conversation, the better I can meet your needs.

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