While your webinar is running, AEvent already knows who's in the room, who left, and who never showed. Live attendance targeting turns that into action: you build an audience around what people are doing right now, then automatically reach them with an email, text, picture message, voicemail, or on-screen chat. It works the same on Zoom and on AEvent's own AStream player. | In this guide: What live attendance targeting is How AEvent reads live attendance Before, during, and after the event Step 1: Build a live audience Step 2: Trigger an action 8 ready-to-use recipes Works on Zoom and AStream Troubleshooting |
What live attendance targeting is
While your event is live, AEvent keeps a running picture of who has joined, who has dropped off, and who's watching this minute. You save those signals as Audiences (AEvent's word for a segment) and point your Timeline actions at them.
That means the person who never joined can get a completely different message from the person who's still watching at minute 45, and each one lands when it actually matters instead of in tomorrow's catch-all email.
How AEvent reads live attendance
There's nothing to switch on here; it happens on its own. As your event runs, AEvent takes in join and leave signals and keeps every registrant's status current.
On Zoom: AEvent reads Zoom's own join and leave events for each participant.
On AStream (AEvent's built-in player): the player checks in every few seconds, so AEvent knows who currently has the live room open.
Either way, it all rolls up into one attendance record, so your audiences and actions behave the same on both platforms. When you need an action to land on an exact moment, exact-clock timing is your most precise lever.
Before, during, and after the event
Here's what you can target at each stage:
Before it starts: you've got your Registrants, which is what you'll use for reminder sequences (email, SMS, voicemail) in the run-up.
During the event: attendance is live, so you can target who's Present or Not Present this minute, who's watched past a certain point, and who's visited a page, then send an email, text, picture message, voicemail, or on-screen chat right then.
After the event: all of that same targeting is still there for replay nudges, no-show recovery, and buyer follow-up.
Tip: live, in-event targeting is fairly new. If you've seen older articles saying attendance audiences only work after the webinar, this guide is the up-to-date version.
Step 1: Build a live audience
In your campaign, open the Audience tab. Three audiences are always there for you (Registrants, Attendee, and Non-Attendee), along with any you've built yourself.
To make one, click Create New Audience, name it, and click + Add Condition.
Every condition starts with If and a Select an Option dropdown for what you're matching on. You can stack conditions; a registrant has to meet all of them to land in the audience.
Here are the conditions you can pick from on a webinar campaign:
Time Attended: total minutes watched, for example more than 20.
Present: they're watching right now (you can require a minimum number of minutes). This is your "still in the room" signal.
Not Present: they're not watching right now. Your "empty seat" signal.
Page View: they did or didn't visit a specific URL (needs the AEvent tracking pixel on that page).
Location: their country.
Custom Field: a registration field value (matches, doesn't match, exists, or doesn't exist).
Inbound Webhook: an outside tool, like your checkout, told AEvent something about them, such as that they bought.
Member: roll other audiences together (every / any).
Click Create and it's ready to use. For the full detail on each condition, see our Audience Creation guide.
Step 2: Trigger an action against your audience
An audience on its own doesn't do anything; it goes to work when a Timeline action points at it. Open the Timeline tab and click Create Action.
The action panel opens, and every action comes down to a few simple choices:
When: the timing, either relative to the event (so many minutes or hours after it starts) or at an exact clock time.
Who: the audience you're targeting (the one you just built).
What: the channel and message. Email, SMS, MMS (picture or GIF text), Ringless Voicemail, an on-screen Chat message, a Tag or List add, or a push to a connected integration.
Tip: if you want to hit "a few minutes before my offer," use exact clock time set to the minute your call-to-action shows up; it's the most reliable way to land on a specific moment. SMS, MMS, and Ringless Voicemail need a connected messaging provider like Twilio.
For the full action builder walkthrough, see our Timeline Action Builder guide.
8 ready-to-use recipes
Eight plays you can lift straight into your funnel. Each one is just an audience, an action, and a time.
1. The empty-seat rescue
Goal: pull in registrants who haven't joined yet.
Audience: Not Present.
Action: an MMS with a quick photo or GIF of the host mid-presentation.
When: about 10 minutes after start. Message idea: "We saved your seat. The part everyone screenshots just started."
2. The call-to-action save
Goal: win back people who joined but stepped away right before the offer.
Audience: attended, but Not Present now.
Action: a short SMS.
When: exact clock time, a few minutes before your offer appears. Message idea: "Don't close that tab. The part you signed up for is 4 minutes away."
3. The "still here?" engagement spike
Goal: reward and re-energize the people actively watching.
Audience: Present right now.
Action: an on-screen Chat message inviting them to claim a watching-live-only bonus.
When: at your mid-point, to keep live viewers leaning in.
4. The hottest-audience proof drop
Goal: nudge your warmest viewers over the line.
Audience: Present at your offer minute AND not yet purchased (Inbound Webhook).
Action: an MMS testimonial or results screenshot.
When: right after you reveal the offer.
5. The multi-channel ghost ladder
Goal: rescue registrants who never join, stepping up channels as you go.
Audience: Registrants who turn Not Present once the event is live.
Action: email at 48 hours out, SMS at 1 hour out, Ringless Voicemail at 15 minutes out.
When: a short sequence of timed actions. Behavior decides who keeps getting nudged.
6. The buyer-suppression guardrail
Goal: never send a "you missed it" message to someone who already paid.
Audience: an Inbound Webhook condition that flags buyers, used to exclude them from your recovery audiences.
Action: none directly. It quietly protects every other recipe.
When: always on.
7. The late-arrival replay route
Goal: catch people who click the join link after the event has ended.
Audience: Non-Attendee.
Action: an email or SMS pointing to the replay or the next encore session.
When: shortly after the event ends. Message idea: "Caught you. Here's the replay, and the offer's open until midnight."
8. The sales-team handoff
Goal: get your hottest leads in front of a human.
Audience: Time Attended over 45 minutes AND visited the offer page but didn't purchase.
Action: a connected integration that pushes the lead to your CRM or a Google Sheet.
When: right after the event, so your team can follow up while it's fresh.
Works on Zoom and AStream
Same powerful builder. Every audience condition and every action works identically on Zoom and on AStream, so you get the full real-time targeting engine either way.
Live presence on both. Present, Not Present, and Time Attended read from each platform's own live attendance feed, so you're always targeting what's happening in the room right now.
Add any channel. SMS, MMS, and Ringless Voicemail run through a connected provider like Twilio; email and on-screen Chat work right out of the box.
Troubleshooting
My action didn't send to anyone: check that the audience actually has members when the action fires. A "Present" audience is empty before anyone joins, so make sure the timing lands after people are in the room.
My SMS / MMS / voicemail action is greyed out or fails: you need a connected messaging integration (such as Twilio). Connect it on the Integrations tab, then add it to the campaign.
A "Page View" condition never matches: the AEvent tracking pixel has to be on the page you're targeting, and the URL has to match exactly. See the Audience Page Pixel guide.
Need an action to hit an exact moment: lean on exact-clock timing or a Time Attended threshold rather than a relative offset. That's the most precise way to target a specific point in your presentation.
Multi-day or multi-event campaigns: if you're relying on live attendance across linked events, test on a low-stakes run first to confirm the audience fills the way you expect for each event.