Webinars are a convenient and cost-effective way of information-sharing to enhance business practice, making them ideal for the current economic climate.

That is the opinion of Austen Hawkins, managing director of F2F Events and chief executive officer of the Association of Event Organisers, who will be hosting a free webinar via the TSNN.co.uk website on December 2nd at 15:00 GMT.

"[Webinars] enable people to get information without having to travel to the live event, so they don't incur the costs and time of travel, but they get information delivered in an accessible, informative and hopefully entertaining way," he said.

"We're all capable of searching on the internet and reading material but we also all know that conversations, or the spoken word, [makes it] much easier to take on information, assimilate it and then act upon it," he added.

Mr Hawkins commented that webinars extend individuals' learning by allowing them to gain knowledge about important aspects of their profession while sitting at their desk.

The webinar he will be hosting for TSNN is entitled Planning Your Way to Exhibition Success, looking at how to get the most out of events.

"So many companies don't do it as well as they could do and [yet] they're spending a lot of money," Mr Hawkins commented.

"We all need to improve our marketing and if we excel at marketing then our businesses will excel with it and webinars are a fantastic media or mechanism for getting information across in an easy, palatable way that people can take on board," he said.

Mr Hawkins will discuss the "awesome power of exhibitions" in the online presentation, examining how and why a particular medium works as a marketing strategy.

"If you understand the particular elements of a medium, then when you're planning your exhibition presence, you'll make sure that you're stimulating that medium," he said.

The webinar will also look at the importance of stimulating the senses.

"Because exhibitions and live marketing are the only media that does that, it's very important that you do stimulate one of these senses," Mr Hawkins explained.

"The reason for that is, if you stimulate a sense, you make yourself much more memorable, you hardwire the brain to remember your brand and your brand identity," he continued.

Planning an event will also be discussed during the online presentation.

"In most forms of business, planning is the most important [issue], but has the least time spent [on it]," Mr Hawkins said.

He insisted that the webinar will have something to offer both experienced exhibitors and those who are new to events.

"If you're never done it before, it'll give you the confidence to go ahead and do it and make sure you've put the right disciplines in place," he said. "If you've been doing it for years, it will remind what you already knew, make sure that you're doing the right things."

"There will be a little golden nugget in there that will help multiply the value of the next event you participate in," he promised.

"Twenty minutes of time could actually add significant profits to your company," Mr Hawkins concluded.

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