ePublishing has partnered with BeaconLive and integrated their BeaconConnect webinar solution (formerly known as "Cinchcast"). You can find more information about BeaconConnect on the BeaconLive website. If you'd like to explore using BeaconConnect, please contact us.

With this integration, you can present BeaconConnect webinars directly on your site. Create your new webinar within ePublishing's Events Manager, and it will automatically be created within BeaconConnect. As people register for your webinar on your site, their attendee information is sent to BeaconConnect. No manual data entry is required. You also have the option to embed the Beacon registration form on your website landing page, with pre-filled registration fields for logged-in users(coming Q1 2023).

There are three system settings provided by Beacon that will need to be added to the system settings as follows:

cinchcast.api.key - provided by BeaconLive, the API key is required in order to create events and register attendants in BeaconLive from your ePublishing website

cinchcast.user.id - provided by BeaconLive, the user id value is passed to BeaconConnect to create your virtual event

cinchcast.event.registration.enabled - set to true to send registration information from the website's event registration process to BeaconConnect. Set this to false if you don't want the information sent automatically, or if you are embedding BeaconLive's registration form on a landing page

1. Create an event in Continuum
2. Tag the event with Classification > Events > Cinchcast Event (this will kick off the integration)
3. Save

After you save, the integration will send information that will create your webinar in BeaconLive, and populate the custom Cinchcast event ID field on your event ID. This will be used to create your webinar landing page.

Create an Event Product(s) to sell tickets to the webinar - see How do I create an event product?

When a user registers for the event, the registration information will be stored in the Attendance tab of the event in Continuum and in the Order Manager,  and it will also be sent to BeaconLive to create a registrant for the webinar.

Registrations can also, or instead, be taken by creating a landing page with the Cinchcast Event ID (see below) which will embed the BeaconLive Registration form in an i-frame within the page.

If a user is logged into your site, the relevant registration information from the user's profile will pre-fill into the BeaconLive form. (Coming Q1 2023).

This information is sent to BeaconLive when the user clicks Submit to create a registrant for the webinar.

To set up your webinar landing page, click on the custom link in the event manager menu and copy the BeaconConnect event ID. Be sure to copy the entire ID including the tildas at the end.

Now go to the Continuum Pages Tool and create a new page. Paste in the event ID as the page’s URL. Be sure to add a forward slash to the beginning.

The headline and body content is completely customizable. You can add sponsorship information, cross-promotion and event speaker details on the page.

Now switch to code view in the WYSIWYG and paste in the shortcode below:

[cinchcast height="2000" width="100%"]

The BeaconConnect event itself is pulled into the page by the shortcode. 

Before the Webinar

Displaying the shortcode on the page prior to the event will display the information that you have set up for the event on your BeaconConnect dashboard. This may or may not include a registration form. If the form is displayed, users can register from this page.

If you do not want users to register directly from the page, you can leave off the shortcode until the day of the webinar and use the space for additional marketing information. 

Just be sure and insert the shortcode before the webinar date arrives.

During the Webinar

Registrants will access the webinar with a a link to the landing page that includes their unique Registration Entry Key ID. When they access the page with their Registration Entry Key ID, the webinar will be displayed on the page.

For example:

www.domain.com/mcaGBO9Lc5S1JLT7MruidS~~?ek=a26bdfd3-8afb-44a6-9a07-6b731ec416e2 

Accessing without the registration id will display the BeaconConnect landing page which may contain event messaging and the Beacon registration form:

www.domain.com/mcaGBO9Lc5S1JLT7MruidS~~

To customize the email, go to your Beacon dashboard and Edit your newly created webinar.  

Go to the Advanced Settings page. 

Select "Yes" to "Override Registration Confirmation Email template?"

REPLACE this code 

<a href="{{EventUrl}}" target="_blank">{{EventUrl}}</a></p>

with the code snippet below, pointing to your domain:

 <a href="https://www.[YOUR DOMAIN]/{{EncryptedEventId}}?ek={{RegistrantEntryKey}}" target="_blank">https://www.[YOUR DOMAIN]/{{EncryptedEventId}}?ek={{RegistrantEntryKey}}</a></p>

Example:

 <a href="https://www.epublishing.com/{{EncryptedEventId}}?ek={{RegistrantEntryKey}}" target="_blank">https://www.epublishing.com/{{EncryptedEventId}}?ek={{RegistrantEntryKey}}</a></p>

Do not add your Event ID - Beacon adds that automatically, along with the unique Registrant Entry Key.

If a registrant clicks their link before the webinar goes live, they will see ther custom message on the landing page created above. We strongly suggest placing a call to action on this page until the webinar goes live in order to channel their interest into purchasing another webinar, a newsletter or a related product. 

Congratulations! The BeaconConnect webinar you created through the ePublishing tools was a complete success and you had dozens of attendees click the sponsorship banners and follow your links to more webinars. But what happens now?

The great news is that there are no massive video files to download and re-upload to some server to host your replays. It all happens right here. The landing page, embed code and URL stay the same.

We recommend returning to the Page Manager page and changing the message to reflect the replay status plus add links and promos to upcoming webinars. Replay landing pages are great long-term cross-promotional opportunities.

The webinar page cannot be access controlled on the ePublishing side due to the fact that many attendees will not have accounts within the ePublishing system. The obfuscated URL and the attendee tracking code will reduce the number of unofficial attendees.

The attendee tracking code is also used by BeaconConnect to create a report on the number of different locations that the same attendee code is used from. This report can be employed by the client to follow up with attendees who inappropriately shared their access information.