Troubleshooting Webinar Jam Replays

WebinarJam automatically records your webinars for you, so there is no need for you to even click a button.   The replays go automatically to YouTube, where you can completely manage your recordings from your Video Manager.

But what about those replays? Where are they? This post will answer many common problems we see.

Replay Is Not On YouTube

Although your replay is available immediately, it takes some time to appear in your YouTube Video Manager for downloading.

Generally speaking, the longer the jam session the longer it will take to show up on YouTube. It takes some time for Google/Youtube to encode it. They’re encoding millions of videos per day, so it may be shorter or longer depending on demands presented by all the users of YouTube.

If you continue to find that your recording is taking a long time to show, go to the replay, then click the “watch on Youtube” part of the video, in the lower right hand corner. Then you’ll be able to see the YouTube account it’s loaded into.

If after a few hours you still are unable to see your video in your Video Manager, perhaps it uploaded to a different YouTube channel than you anticipated. Go to your replay and click the “watch on YouTube” link in the bottom right corner of the video. This will show you the video in YouTube, and you’ll be able to see the account it was uploaded to.

From What to Do if Your Video Isn’t Showing in YouTube’s Video Manager 

Replay says it has Expired

This can happen either when the replays have not been set up or when you need to change the expiration date.

You will find that option at the “Replay” tab of the configuration dashboard.

Change the expiration to no expiration or however many hours you wish.  Then save and republish.

If both have been set, then your attendees may need to clear their internet browser cookies and cache.

Replay Link / Video Doesn’t Work

This can happen either when the replays have not been set up. See “Replay says Expired” above, or if there is a problem with your video.

If you have the replay set up.  Go to YouTube, and make certain your video is either marked Public or Unlisted.  If it is marked private, your WebinarJam replay links will not work.

If the video has been deleted then unfortunately there is no solution unless you downloaded it and saved it elsewhere. Sadly, YouTube does not have a way to recover a deleted video.

Also there is an error that we do occasionally see with no explanation or ability to fix it, the replay link will be broken but the YouTube Video will be there.  In this case you can grab the url to the recording from your channel, enter it into the designated field in the replay tab (the second option), save and republish. This will allow your replay links to go live again and play the recording.

Replay to Now Video

When you use a NOW webinar, links can get a little tricky. The webinar registration link normally switches to the replay link approximately an hour into the broadcast when it is set with a date/time. However, with NOW webinars, there isn’t a time to trip that “switch”, so to speak. This means your webinar appears to be perpetually broadcasting. This means you’ll want to send out the Generic Replay link.

Pre-Recorded Video

If you have selected “Pre-recorded video of your choice” this needs to end with MP4, MOV, FLV or YouTube.  However YouTube is preferred because these videos are encoded correctly to work with our program.  Just be sure your video is public or unlisted.

With YouTube, you don’t need the embed link, you just need to copy the link from your address bar.

Replay is on the Wrong Channel

WebinarJam is based on Google Hangouts.  Google Hangouts sends recordings to your default YouTube account.  So if you have personal and business channels associated with one account, it’s common for the replay to wind up on the wrong account.

To prevent this from happening simply create an email address for that page to use as your superadmin for your webinars. You can choose to have a webinar that posts to a specific G+ page (as opposed to your personal profile). Many users like to do this to keep their personal account separate from their business activities.

Since this process has many steps, go to Blog Posts:

 How to Use Webinar Jam on Different You Tube Channels

However if it has already happened, or you just want to use your personal email, read the section below on “Replay Should Be Private”  Then you can download the video by going back to your Video Manager, select edit on the video you want to download, then select Download MP4.

How to Download, Edit My WebinarJam Recordings 

Replay Should Be Private

WebinarJam utilizes Google Hangouts which assumes you want your hangout public.  When you set up your webinar, you also want to set up replays even if you don’t plan on using them, because under this tab you can set your videos for  Public or Private.

You can turn off the replay link or make the replay expiration just 2 hours.

See blog post: Can I Keep a Webinar Private

But this doesn’t help you if you have already finished your webinar!

Hide it After the Webinar! 

Go to your your  Youtube Video Manager.  Change the Basic Info from Public to Unlisted.  If the YouTube listing is “private” instead of unlisted, your WebinarJam replay links will not work.

If you want to make the video even more private, you will need to add it a membership website, with restricted access.   You can download the video by going back to your Video Manager, select edit on the video you want to download, then select Download MP4.

Also be sure to remove any posts that may be on Google Plus.

Read more at How to Hide a Webinar After It’s Created

Replay Video Needs to be Changed / Replay is the Wrong Link

You can actually configure the replay page to redirect to any page you wish.

You will find that option at the “Replay” tab of the configuration dashboard.

Replace the new URL in the space, then save and republish.

Now, all links to the replay will show that video on the WebinarJam page or if you select “Redirect to URL of your choice” your attendees will go to whichever page you selected.

Replay Video Needs to be Edited

If you need to edit the first couple minutes off the Webinar, you can do so with the YouTube’s Video Editor. https://www.youtube.com/editor

Alternatively, you can use YouTube’s “start at” option, to remove a couple minutes.

Either way you will want to change the replay link and republish. See Replay Video Needs to be Changed above if you need help.

From How To See, Download, or Edit Webinar Recordings

Replay Video Needs Downloaded

You can download your video by going to YouTube Video Manager and selecting edit by the video you want, then “Download MP4”.

From How To See, Download, or Edit Webinar Recordings

Webinar was Interrupted / Only Half the Webinar was Recorded

In Either of these cases there are likely two videos. You can combine these and create one video.  Visit YouTube’s Video Manager and select “Enhancements” on one of the videos you want to combine.

On the lower right of that screen you will see a button with “Try the YouTube editor.” This will allow you to combine two videos.

From How To See, Download, or Edit Webinar Recordings

Offer a Worksheet on Replays

Use the pre-defined offers feature on the replay page to give a link to the worksheet. You can even time the appearance of the button to come at the appropriate place in your replay (or from the beginning).

How can I Get Just the Audio?

Since all webinar replays are posted on YouTube, you can either download the audio directly from your YouTube account, or (even easier) use a free service like this one to strip the audio from any YouTube video.