Introducing Webinars in Microsoft Teams: Easy, professional webinars to engage customers

Over the last year, we have found new ways to create engaging virtual experiences at work. We’ve transformed spaces in our homes to offices, developed new skillsets for remote collaboration, and in some cases, adopted new technology to get work done.

Beginning this week, Webinars and PowerPoint Live are beginning to rollout in Microsoft Teams. Additionally, Presenter mode will begin to roll out later in May. With these capabilities, you have new ways to deliver polished, professional presentations in meetings of all sizes, from small internal meetings to large customer-facing webinars and events—all from a single application.

What’s even better? You don’t need to purchase a new license or product. These new capabilities are included in many of the Office and Microsoft 365 plans your organization uses today¹. There are no hidden costs or charges for overage fees with plans that include these capabilities—period.

Full-featured webinars for rich customer engagements

Now you can organize and hold interactive meetings and webinars for up to 1,000 attendees with Teams. Use end-to-end webinar support that’s as simple as setting up a Teams meeting—including custom registration pages and attendee emails, rich presentation options, host controls, such as the ability to disable attendee chat and video, and post-event reporting to understand participation and to follow up with attendees.

If you need to reach more than 1,000 attendees, Teams meetings can seamlessly scale to accommodate a 10,000-person view-only broadcast experience. During this time of increased remote work, we’ve expanded the attendee limit to 20,000 through the end of this year.

Everyone can present like a pro

With PowerPoint Live and Presenter mode in Microsoft Teams, anyone can deliver more impactful and engaging presentations to show up in a more polished and professional way with your audience.

By bringing together Microsoft’s rich history with presenter experiences in PowerPoint and the collaboration power of Teams, presenters can feel more confident and capable during online presentations. You can view upcoming slides, notes, meeting chat, and the audience in a single view while presenting.

Meanwhile, attendees can personalize their experience by privately navigating the content at their own pace or using high contrast mode and screen readers to make content accessible. Coming soon, slide translation capabilities allow attendees to select their native language and automatically have slides translated for them—without changing the view for other attendees.

Presenter mode empowers presenters to customize how their video feed and content appear to the audience. The first of three options, Standout mode, shows the speaker’s video feed as a silhouette in front of the shared content; Reporter mode shows content as a visual aid above the speaker’s shoulder, similar to a news broadcast; and Side-by-side mode shows presenter’s video feed alongside their content as they present. Standout mode will be available later in May, and Reporter and Side-by-side will roll out shortly after.

Continue to engage with attendees after your webinar

A webinar is just one touchpoint in your customer engagement efforts. After the event ends, easily access reporting to bring attendee information into your customer relationship management (CRM) applications for lead management and follow-up.

And, beginning this month, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Marketing customers can export attendee data directly from Teams to automatically create campaigns and customer journeys for ongoing nurture streams. The Microsoft Teams and Microsoft Dynamics 365 Marketing integration gives webinar hosts more ways to drive engagement, increase conversion, and build loyalty with your attendees.

Not sure how to deliver your next webinar or event? We can help

We know that technology is just one piece of the solution. Microsoft services like the Live Events Assistance Program help customers set up, manage, and deliver events spanning from townhalls to webinars and everything in between. Microsoft Consulting Services for Virtual Events provide strategy and delivery support for organizations that want to move their large conferences and custom events online. And Microsoft trusted partners provide solutions to envision, develop, integrate, and deliver your virtual event at any size.

Get started with Webinars in Microsoft Teams today

Since the new webinar capabilities are already included in many of the Office and Microsoft 365 plans your organization uses today¹, there’s no reason to not start using them now.

Learn more about how to use these new capabilities in Microsoft Teams with this Webinars quick start guide and PowerPoint Live overview.