Hosting a live webinar

This guide covers the live part of a built-in webinar: the host studio, going live, what attendees experience, and finishing so the replay shows up. Setting up the event itself (type, registration page, emails, offer, replay settings) is in Creating events.

Before the day: run a rehearsal

Open the event, choose Host studio, and join the stage. Check the microphone and camera pickers, share your screen, and try each layout. You can even press Go live and open the attendee page in a private browser window to see exactly what registrants will get.

When you press End webinar before the scheduled start, the studio asks whether this was the real webinar or a rehearsal. Choose Just a rehearsal, keep the schedule: registrants keep their countdown, nothing is emailed, and the rehearsal recording is not attached to the event.

The studio at a glance

Prepare moments and feedback

Open the webinar setup in the event editor and use Moments to prepare material that appears inside the room:

• a message, tip, agenda note, or quotation;
• a poll with up to six choices, optional multiple selection, and an option to show results to attendees;
• a page or file link;
• one question that saves an attendee's phone number, company, or a selected contact field; or
• a featured offer with its own button.

For a live webinar, the moments wait in the studio cue sheet until the host pushes them. For an evergreen webinar, choose the point in the recording when each moment appears and, when useful, when it disappears. An optional end-of-session rating asks for one to five stars and can collect a short comment.

Going live

If the studio still says Starting after about 90 seconds, the broadcast did not connect. Press Cancel start, check your camera and connection, and press Go live again.

What attendees see

• The live room in their browser, with the video and, if enabled, chat and questions beside it. No downloads and no meeting link.
• Their registered name on anything they post. Guests who registered with just a name and email can chat, ask, and vote without creating an account.
• Your notices as a banner over the player, and the offer in the rail when you show it.
• A reassuring waiting screen if you drop off: "The host lost their connection, please stay on this page." They are never sent away.

If your connection drops

Losing wifi does not end the webinar. The broadcast stays open for up to 30 minutes without you, and attendees see the waiting screen rather than an ended screen.

• You lose your connection or refresh the studio tab: the studio shows You are live but off the stage and rejoins on its own once the network is back. If it does not, press Rejoin the stage. Attendees pick up where the stream resumes.
• The stream itself drops: a red banner appears with Restart broadcast. Press it; attendees' players recover automatically and the recording continues as one file.
• Switching to a phone hotspot works the same way. Send a notice such as "Give me two minutes, reconnecting now" so attendees know.

If nobody rejoins within 30 minutes, the webinar ends by itself and the recording archives as usual.

Website administrators receive an email when the broadcast feed stays interrupted, the studio has not heard from the host, the feed recovers, or an abandoned webinar is ended automatically. Use the link in the alert to return to the studio or event without waiting for someone watching the page to report the problem.

Use Leave stage when you want to turn off your camera and microphone while the broadcast keeps running. The studio shows who remains on stage and gives you a clear rejoin action. If you close the studio while live, choose explicitly between ending the webinar for everyone or exiting while the broadcast continues; attendees see an empty stage until a presenter rejoins.

Ending the webinar

Press End webinar. Attendees see the ended screen, the recording archives to your video library, and when automatic replay publication is on, the replay appears on the event page a few minutes later with the follow-up emails sent according to the event's email settings.

Keep the event page available while processing finishes. Hiveality finalizes the completed recording, attaches its finished duration, and publishes the replay automatically when that setting is on. A temporary processing delay does not require ending the webinar again.

If you end before the scheduled start time, the studio asks:

• This was the webinar, end it for good. The event's date moves to when you actually went live, attendees see the ended screen, and the recording becomes the replay.
• Just a rehearsal, keep the schedule. Registrants keep their countdown and the recording is not attached to the event.

After the webinar: results

The event's Results tab shows how it went: the funnel from registered to attended to stayed to the end to clicked the offer, with where the registrations came from; the audience over time, minute by minute, with your offer and message moments marked; how each email performed; and, for evergreen webinars, which session slots people pick and actually show up for. A recurring series adds a per-date roll-up.

When the webinar used interactive moments, Results also summarizes poll answer counts and shares plus the average session rating, its star distribution, and attendee comments.

When a purchase can be connected to a registrant's webinar visit, the roster marks the purchaser and the results include order and revenue totals. Use the watch-time bars, offer activity, and purchase outcome together when deciding which parts of the webinar or follow-up need attention.

Review monthly webinar usage

After the first webinar activity of the month, the Events manager shows a compact usage card with webinars run, attendee-hours used, and the room's seat limit. Hover or focus the card for the live, replay, and evergreen portions plus the peak audience. When usage warnings are enabled for the website, review them before scheduling another large session.

Related

• Creating events for webinar setup, registration pages, emails, offers, and evergreen playback.
• RSVPs and attendee experience
• Managing events