# How do I get more people to show up to my webinar? > Justas Butkus is a fractional AI officer based in Vilnius, Lithuania, founder of AINORA, MB – the company behind the Ainora and Impetora brands – and a graduate of Vilnius University. Justas Butkus is a fractional AI officer based in Vilnius, Lithuania, working with mid-market companies and scale-ups across the UK, EU and US at two to four days a month. He builds and operates the production AI systems he advises on, and takes no commission, referral fee or revenue share from any vendor. Video: How To Make More Money From The Webinars You Already Run (https://youtu.be/cpE80ZUHBww) **You raise a webinar show up rate by talking to each registration personally between the moment they sign up and the moment the session starts, rather than sending everyone the same reminder. A short conversation that confirms they have the link, asks why they signed up and checks whether they can still make it will move more people into the room than any change to the ad that brought them. The same applies after the session: the people who attended and did not buy are a list you have already paid for, and almost nobody works it. Neither of those needs additional advertising spend, which is why they are usually the cheapest revenue available to a business that already runs webinars.** Canonical: https://justasbutkus.com/answers/increase-webinar-show-up-rate/ Last updated: 2026-08-19 --- ## Why do so few registrations actually turn up? Because registering costs nothing and forgetting costs nothing. Between signing up and the session starting there is usually a gap of days, and in that gap the only contact most businesses make is a scheduled reminder that reads like a system talking. It is easy to ignore because nothing about it suggests a person is expecting you. The gap is also where the money already sits. You paid to acquire every one of those registrations. If the advertising worked and the attendance did not, the problem has moved downstream of the thing most businesses keep spending on. That is the whole argument for working the gap first. Improving the offer or raising the budget both buy you more registrations at the top. Lifting attendance converts registrations you have already bought, at your existing close rate, which means the arithmetic works without anything else changing. ## What actually lifts attendance? Personal contact, on the channel people actually read, in the days and hours before the session. In practice that means a short exchange rather than a broadcast. 1. **Message every registration individually, not as a list.** Confirm they have the joining link, and ask what made them sign up. The answer is useful on its own, and the exchange makes attendance feel like an arrangement with a person. 2. **Ask a question instead of announcing a time.** "Will you be able to make it?" invites a reply. "Your session starts in one hour" does not, and a reminder nobody answers tells you nothing. 3. **Contact them again as the session approaches.** A call a couple of hours before, then shortly before it starts, catches the people whose day has moved. 4. **Treat a no as information rather than a loss.** Someone who tells you they cannot make this one has just qualified themselves for the next one, at no further acquisition cost. 5. **Keep it on one thread.** Reaching people from the same number they were already talking to reads as a person following up. A new sender reads as a broadcast, whatever it says. None of this changes what happens on the session itself. Attendance is the only variable being moved, and it is being moved on people who are already paid for. ## What about the people who attended and did not buy? They are the second list, and they are usually worked less than the first. Someone who gave you an hour of attention and did not buy has a reason, and that reason is worth more to you than another impression. The useful message is short and asks the direct question: we saw you were there, what stopped you. Some of those replies are objections you can answer immediately. Some are people who wanted to speak to a human and never had the chance to ask. Handing those to a person on your team is where the conversion actually happens, and it works because the list has been filtered down to people who are still interested. Being honest about the limits matters here. Reaching out by phone after a session works, but it lands as less personal than a written exchange and people treat it accordingly. It is a real channel, it simply performs worse than the one that reads like a conversation already in progress. ## Does this work on webinars we ran months ago? Yes, and this is the part most businesses have never touched. Every previous session left behind the same two groups: people who registered and never came, and people who came and did not buy. Those lists do not expire the way an advertising audience does, because the interest that produced them was real. Worked properly, an old list produces two things. It fills the next session with people who cost nothing to reach, and it tells you why the previous one did not convert, which is information you cannot buy. This is the sense in which the work is not marketing at all. You are not buying attention, you are recovering attention you already bought and never finished using. ## What will this not do? It will not sell for you. Getting people into the room and following up afterwards are both mechanical and repetitive, which is exactly why they can be systematised. What happens during the session is neither of those things, and treating it as though it were is how businesses end up automating the part that was working. It also will not rescue an offer nobody wants. A higher attendance rate multiplies whatever your close rate already is. If that number is close to zero, more people in the room changes very little, and the honest first step is the offer rather than the funnel. ## Frequently asked questions ### What is a good webinar show up rate? The number varies so much by traffic source and by how long the gap between registration and session is that a benchmark from someone else’s business is close to useless. Measure your own, then measure it again after you start contacting registrations individually. The change in your own number is the only figure that tells you anything. ### How soon before the session should we contact people? More than once, and closer than most businesses do. A message when they register, one in the day or two before, and contact in the couple of hours immediately before it starts. The last of those catches the people whose plans moved, which is most of the people you lose. ### Is a reminder email enough? Rarely, because a scheduled reminder announces a time rather than expecting a reply. The thing that moves attendance is a message a person would answer, sent on a channel they read quickly, from a sender they recognise. ### Should we call people or message them? Message first. Written contact reads as more personal and gets better engagement, and calling works as a follow-up rather than as the main channel. Calls do convert, they simply land as more mechanical and people respond to them accordingly. ### What do we send to people who attended but did not buy? A short, direct question asking what stopped them, from the same thread they were already in. It gets replies because it is specific and because it does not pitch. Anyone who wants to talk it through should be handed to a person immediately. ### Can we do this with our old webinar lists? Yes, and it is usually the fastest thing available. Everyone who registered or attended previously is still reachable and cost nothing further to reach, so working those lists fills the next session and surfaces the objections that stopped the last one. ### Does any of this need more advertising budget? No. Every person involved has already been paid for once, at the point they registered. That is the entire reason attendance and follow-up are worth fixing before the budget, rather than after it. ## Related - [Before hiring an AI team](/answers/before-hiring-an-ai-team/) – What to establish before you add any headcount. - [Is this vendor legitimate?](/answers/is-this-ai-vendor-legitimate/) – Ten questions in order, and the test buyers say works. - [Implementing without getting burned](/answers/how-to-implement-ai-without-getting-burned/) – What to check before you commit budget or headcount. ## About the author **Justas Butkus** – a fractional AI officer based in Vilnius, Lithuania, founder of AINORA, MB – the company behind the Ainora and Impetora brands – and a graduate of Vilnius University. ## If your sessions fill and the room does not A look at where the registrations are being lost, and which of the two lists is worth working first, is a short conversation. Contact: justas@ainora.lt · [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/justas-butkus/)