If my webinars are failing due to technical mismanagement, what are the best ways to avoid technical failure?

You need to practice the webinars alone but in record mode. Using GoToMeeting/GoToWebinar you can practice presenting to yourself or others in your organization. The benefit is you get used to the technical tools to prevent those technical mismanagement issues as well as practicing your pitch. I also mean practice them all the way thru completely. With the proper tools you can and should record them so you can review yourself and/or distribute them as branding materials.

Most webinar platforms have a support service. If you are using GoToWebinar, then you can contact them directly and let them know of the technical difficulties you'd experienced.

It's always best to practice prior to the webinar (as suggested by Randy Tucker). This will help you spot any problems ahead of time. You could even record the practice and then use it as an automated webinar (if done well).

Technical issues are inevitable, so don't feel bad about the setback. Just plan well ahead and ensure the tool you are using is working well.

I'm not a technical person, but if you need any help on webinar strategy and marketing, feel free to reach out.

All the best!

The tough thing is that much of this comes the hard way by learning as you go. But, you can avoid this by learning from the mistakes and making a checklist or procedure for each webinar you run.

For example, I have had issues where the presenter could not get the presentation to load. So, we make sure there is a downloaded copy as well as a cloud version on ALL staff computers. We had one webinar where the internet connection could not allow the presenter to show the slides so we improvised and controlled them from a staff computer while the presenter spoke. Another issues is restarting computers a few hours before the webinar. Have you ever restarted and forgot there was a software upgrade set and it happens to install right before your webinar?!?! Yikes! Another issue is internet speed if there is a chance someone is on WIFI. Are you running a speed test before to make sure the connection is optimal? Do you have live support on the checkout page and having them prepared and trained prior to the webinar to answer sales questions? These are just a few of the things I do now as a routine for each webinar and all come from experience. I find that taking some of the advice you find here in these answers and from your own lessons, you can turn this into a procedure that you and your staff can use for each webinar. If you need help thinking through all the possible failure points, please reach out!