What is a deminar and how does it differ from a live webinar?
A deminar is a pre-recorded, gated demo or seminar available for on-demand viewing. It is ZoomInfo's term for a format that combines the production value of a live event with the lead-generation shelf-life of always-on content. Every replay is a registration event, which means every view generates a new contact record and feeds your follow-up automation.
If you want to organize on demand deminars at scale, understanding how the format differs from a live webinar is the right starting point. Per Influno research, 58% of webinar hosts already make their live webinars available on-demand, but most treat the on-demand version as an afterthought rather than a primary lead generation channel.
Dimension | Live webinar | On-demand deminar |
|---|---|---|
Scheduling requirements | Fixed date and time; audience must attend live | No fixed schedule; registrants access when convenient |
Audience reach | Limited to attendees in compatible time zones | Global, asynchronous; no scheduling barrier |
Lead generation window | Closes at the end of the live session | Remains open for the full availability window |
Production effort | High; live delivery with real-time Q&A | Moderate; record once, distribute continuously |
On-demand deminars let marketing teams capture registrant data from every replay view, not just the live session.
Why on-demand deminars belong in your demand gen mix
Most demand gen programs are built around live moments: a webinar date, a conference, a product launch. The problem is that live moments only convert the people who show up. For global or distributed buying committees, scheduling friction alone kills attendance rates before a single slide is shown.
On-demand deminars address three specific gaps in the demand gen calendar.
The first is lead shelf-life. A live webinar generates leads on the day it runs. An on-demand deminar generates leads every day it is available. Per LiveWebinar's 2026 State of Webinars report, 73% of webinar attendees can convert into leads, but that conversion rate only compounds when the content is accessible beyond the live window.
The second is audience reach. Distributed buying committees rarely have six people who can attend the same live session. On-demand removes the scheduling barrier entirely, letting decision-makers in different time zones, business units, and roles engage on their own schedule.
The third is content ROI. A single recorded session can fuel display ad retargeting, email nurture sequences, and SDR outreach for weeks. The recording you produce once becomes the asset that runs your multi-channel campaign for the full availability window.
That said, on-demand only delivers these outcomes if the gating, promotion, and follow-up automation are configured correctly. A recording sitting behind a broken form or routed into a generic nurture sequence produces none of the above. The rest of this article covers how to set each piece up.
How to set up and run an on-demand deminar: a step-by-step workflow
Running a successful on-demand deminar is a production and operations exercise as much as a content one. Here is a seven-step workflow that covers the full process from planning to promotion.
Plan and script your content. Define the audience segment, ICP fit, and key message before you record anything. A deminar aimed at VP-level buyers in financial services needs a different frame than one targeting marketing managers at SaaS companies. Specificity at the planning stage prevents reshoots.
Record and produce. Capture the session with production quality appropriate to your audience. For most B2B deminars, a screen share with a talking-head overlay is sufficient. Audiences care about the content, not the production budget.
Edit and add chapter markers. Trim dead air and add timestamps for key sections. Chapter markers improve on-demand completion rates by letting viewers navigate to the parts most relevant to their evaluation stage. A viewer who skips to the pricing section is telling you something worth capturing.
Choose your platform and upload. Select a platform that supports registration gating, view analytics, and integration with your marketing automation platform (MAP) or CRM. Your choice here determines what data you can capture and how quickly it flows into follow-up sequences.
Configure registration gating. Set up the registration form with the minimum fields needed for routing: name, business email, company, and job title. Additional fields add friction without proportional routing value at this stage.
Set access windows strategically. Consider making the deminar available for a defined window (30 days post-launch is a reasonable starting point) rather than defaulting to always-on. Restricting access to a 30-day window can increase engagement by creating a sense of exclusivity. Registrants who know the content disappears are more likely to watch it promptly, which gives you a stronger engagement signal and a tighter follow-up window.
Build your promotional distribution plan. Map out the display ads, email campaigns, and targeted outreach to ICP-matched accounts before the deminar goes live. For on-demand demo automation at scale, GTM Studio's codeless play builder lets you build the ICP-matched audience, configure the multi-channel promotion sequence, and launch without filing a RevOps ticket.
Gating, registration, and lead capture strategy
The registration gate is where most demand gen teams make a trade-off they do not fully think through: ask for too many fields and conversion rates drop; ask for too few and you cannot route the lead correctly. The right answer depends on where the deminar sits in your funnel.
Three gating approaches cover most B2B scenarios:
Full gate (name, email, company, title, phone): Best for high-value deminars targeting late-stage buyers who are already evaluating vendors. The friction is acceptable because the audience is motivated.
Email-only gate: Best for top-of-funnel awareness deminars where volume matters more than qualification depth. You can always enrich the record after the fact.
Progressive profiling: Best for multi-session deminar series. Collect two or three fields per registration and build the full profile across multiple touchpoints.
A quick reference by funnel stage:
Top of funnel (awareness): email-only gate
Middle of funnel (consideration): name, email, company, job title
Bottom of funnel (evaluation): full gate including phone and company size
Per LiveWebinar's 2026 State of Webinars report, 73% of webinar attendees can convert into leads, but that number assumes the registration experience does not kill conversion before the viewer reaches the content. For gated webinar lead generation programs, form friction is one of the most common conversion killers.
FormComplete shortens registration forms while automatically enriching submissions with verified firmographic data, so you capture the routing fields without asking for them. Smartsheet increased form fills by 40%+ and MQLs by 84% using FormComplete, a result that reflects what happens when registration friction drops while data completeness stays high.
Automating follow-up and routing high-intent registrants to sales
Most teams add deminar registrants to a generic nurture sequence and move on. The opportunity is to treat the registration event as the start of a qualification signal, not the end of a campaign.
ZoomInfo's approach to webinar follow-up automation starts with the data layer. The moment a registration form is submitted, ZoomInfo's verified contact data fills in missing firmographic fields automatically. Routing rules fire correctly from day one because the record is complete before it enters your MAP or CRM, not after a manual enrichment pass.
The second layer is engagement segmentation. The GTM Context Graph reasons across registrant behavior, including which sessions they watched, how long they stayed, whether they clicked through to a CTA, and whether they returned for a second view, and combines those signals with firmographic data and account-level intent to separate high-intent registrants from passive viewers. This is not a simple completion-rate threshold. It is a reasoning layer that fuses behavioral signals with what ZoomInfo already knows about the account's buying stage and research activity. On-demand demo automation at this level means your follow-up sequences are differentiated by signal strength, not by arbitrary time delays.
The third layer is seller routing. High-intent registrants get routed to GTM Workspace for immediate seller follow-up. Sellers see the full account context: what the registrant watched, how long they engaged, the company's current intent signals, and any open opportunities in the CRM. No manual research, no list exports, no leads going cold while a rep tries to figure out what the prospect actually cares about. Seismic saved 11.5 hours per week per rep using GTM Workspace, a result that reflects what happens when sellers receive routed leads with full context rather than a name and an email address.
The three pillars work together here. Verified data powers enrichment so routing fires correctly. The GTM Context Graph identifies which registrants are worth routing to sales versus which belong in a longer nurture sequence. And universal access through GTM Workspace and GTM Studio means marketers and sellers are working from the same signals in the tools they actually use.
See how ZoomInfo's AI GTM Platform connects deminar registrant data to your full GTM motion, request a demo.
Promoting your deminar: display ads, email, and targeted outreach
Getting the deminar in front of the right accounts requires a multi-channel promotion plan that runs off a single, consistent audience definition. The most common failure mode is running display, email, and SDR sequences off different audience definitions. GTM Studio's unified play builder ensures all three channels target the same ICP-matched account list, so a prospect is not seeing an ad for a product they have already been suppressed from in a different channel.
Display advertising. Use ZoomInfo's verified account data to build ICP-matched display audiences that target decision-makers at in-market accounts. This is a different approach from retargeting everyone who visited your website. You are reaching the right titles at the right companies based on firmographic fit and intent signals, not just cookie-based behavioral history. Redwood Logistics cut cost per click by 99% and saved 25 hours per week using ZoomInfo Marketing, which reflects what happens when display audiences are built from verified account data rather than broad demographic targeting.
Email campaigns. Segment your outreach list by intent signal and persona fit before sending. A single blast to your full database treats a VP of Marketing at an in-market account the same as a coordinator at a company that has never shown a buying signal. GTM Studio lets you build this segmented audience without waiting on a data analyst or filing a RevOps ticket.
Targeted outreach to ICP-matched accounts. Surface high-intent accounts showing research behavior to SDRs via GTM Workspace so outreach is timed to buying signals, not arbitrary cadence. When sales reaches out to an account that has already registered for the deminar and watched 80% of the content, the conversation starts in a different place.
Frequently asked questions about on-demand deminars
What is a deminar and how is it different from a webinar?
A deminar is a pre-recorded demo or seminar made available on-demand. It is ZoomInfo's term for a gated, replayable session that generates leads from every view, not just the live event. Unlike a live webinar, a deminar has no fixed schedule: registrants access it when convenient, and their registration data feeds directly into your follow-up automation. The format works especially well for B2B demand gen teams running multi-touch campaigns where the live event is just the first touchpoint.
How do I automate follow-up for on-demand webinar registrants?
Connect your registration platform to your MAP or CRM so every new registrant triggers an automated enrollment in your follow-up sequence. With ZoomInfo, GTM Studio can enrich the registrant record with verified firmographic data the moment the form is submitted, then route high-intent registrants, identified by GTM Context Graph engagement signals, directly to sellers in GTM Workspace for immediate outreach. This eliminates the manual list-export step that lets high-intent leads go cold while a rep waits for a list pull.
How do I create an on-demand webinar from a live recording?
After your live session ends, export the recording, trim dead air, and add chapter markers for key sections. Upload to your hosting platform, configure a registration gate, and set an availability window (30 to 60 days is a common starting point) to create urgency around viewing. Re-promote to everyone who registered for the live event but did not attend: the on-demand format gives you a second conversion opportunity with the no-shows who represent a significant portion of your registered audience. Update your promotional campaigns to drive new registrants to the on-demand version.
What registration fields should I collect for a gated on-demand deminar?
For most B2B on-demand deminars, collect name, business email, company name, and job title at minimum. These four fields enable ICP scoring and basic routing without creating enough friction to kill conversion rates. If your deminar targets late-stage buyers, add phone number and company size. Avoid asking for budget or timeline at registration; those questions belong in the follow-up sequence after the registrant has engaged with the content. ZoomInfo's FormComplete can shorten the visible form while automatically enriching submissions with the firmographic fields your routing rules need, which directly addresses the gated webinar lead generation trade-off between form length and data completeness.
Can on-demand deminars replace live webinars for pipeline generation?
On-demand deminars are not a replacement for live webinars; they are a multiplier. Live sessions create the urgency and real-time engagement that drive initial registrations. On-demand extends the conversion window for the 40 to 60% of registrants who typically do not attend live. The highest-performing demand gen programs run both: a live session for the initial audience, then an on-demand version promoted to non-attendees and new prospects for weeks afterward. The key is connecting both registration streams to the same follow-up automation so no high-intent registrant falls through the gap. Smartsheet increased form fills by 40%+ and MQLs by 84% using ZoomInfo's FormComplete, which shows what optimized registration and follow-up automation can deliver when the two are connected.