Virtual Event Success

Remember the telesummit host who spent $12,000 to set up her virtual event, but only made $1,200 in registrations? When she shared her promotional strategy with me, I was able to pinpoint right away the mistakes she made.

She gave away too much.

And because she gave away too much, she wasn’t able to make money on her greatest asset – the expert interviews from her telesummit series.

To build the know, like and trust factor with prospects, you should give away something for free. That way, people can decide whether or not they want to do further business with you. That’s why offering previews is a wonderful strategy. You give away something for free and use it to upsell the participant to purchasing access to your entire telesummit. In other words, give something to whet the appetite, then move people to the paid telesummit series to consume all the success tips your experts have to offer.

But you have to be very careful about how much you give away for free and what it looks like. In a program called Proven Teleseminar ‘Preview Call’ Template to Help You Sell More Authentically, Kendall Summerhawk wrote that when conducting previews, “you are not training the participant to become an expert; you are simply providing great information about how they can get started solving a problem.”

Because for most people, if the entire telesummit series is free, they have no reason to commit to consuming the content. In her blog post entitled The Fallacy of Free, Lynn Pearce states:

“Because the event was free, when something more urgent came up — something that wasn’t free or that involved you making money — the free thing dropped to the bottom of the pile. So while free is initially an attention grabber it is easily pushed to one side when schedule conflicts come up.”

Resist the urge to give away everything for free. Understand how to craft a preview of your series so you motivate, inspire and get people to take action. Your free preview isn’t designed to turn the prospect into an expert. It’s designed to get them interested enough to invest in your telesummit.

As you can see, you can reverse the saga of low sign ups and boost your revenues if you follow the right strategy.

On my FREE call that I’m hosting with Lynn Pearce on August 17, 2011 at 8pm Eastern, we’ll share a fantastic strategy that you can use to pull in more sign-ups. Clients who have use this strategy typically pull in 5-figures or more from virtual event registrations. We can’t wait to share this strategy with you.

To reserve your spot, head on over to www.virtualeventbootcamp.com.

If you’re anxious to host a profitable telesummit, video summit or virtual event, please join Lynn and I on this free teleclass taking place on Wednesday August 17th at 8pm Eastern.

So, it's been a few days since I've been home and thankfully, I won't have to hop on a plane until February. While I loved attending 3 separate events in 4 weeks, I missed the predictability of my home-work schedule.

I was one of Ali Brown's scholarship winners and attended her Shine event which took place in Las Vegas from Nov 5-7, 2009 at no cost. Well, to be exact, there was a cost because I had to shell out $500 for airfare, $230 for hotel (I shared my room) and about $150 for food, however, my registration fee of $1500 was waived.

I met tons of women over the 3 day event, took pictures, kissed babies, you know, the whole nine. In a room filled with 500 women and probably 5 men, I could feel a wave of anticipation in the air.

I soaked in the energy in the room and smiled at God for making this trip happen. Everything aligned so I could be at Shine and I was curious to know what God wanted to show me. I knew something big would happen for me at Shine and I was nervous not knowing what would be revealed.

Well, it was in the first 15-minutes of the event that 12-months of confusion started to unravel. And it was in that moment I regretted going to Ali's event. Why? Because there was simply no turning back because I had been "found out."

[...]

I got the idea for the title of this post from Milana Leshinsky's wonderful report on how to add coaching to your business in 48-hours or less.

So, I often get asked what is the difference between a teleclass and a virtual event. The difference between the 2 is that virtual events are set up like a serial. According to Wikipedia.org, serials are:

Stories that rely on a continuing plot that unfolds in an episode by episode fashion. Serials typically follow main story arcs that span entire seasons or even the full run of the series, which distinguishes them from traditional episodic television that relies on more stand-alone episodes. Worldwide, the soap opera is a notable derivative of the serial.

With your virtual event, you put together stories that unfold with a specific beginning and end. Even though you may be interviewing different people during your virtual event, each expert is presenting material that feeds into the main story arc or theme of your event.

Also, the serialized virtual event is much more financially lucrative. Attendees keeps tuning in to each session that takes place over consecutive days and weeks to learn more. Also, attendees feel your virtual event is well worth the investment because they get a mountain of content for a low price. Think about it - if you offer 18 sessions for $497, the actual cost per session is $27 (and there's no money spent on travel or hotel).

Therefore, a 3-min clip of you singing the Facebook blues isn't a virtual event. It's a video online. However, if you prepare a series of videos that explain complicated terms in plain English, they can be considered a virtual event.

Let's take a look at other examples of virtual events you can start in the next 48-hours or less.

1. Podcasting - This is an audio or video series that's syndicated. You produce a daily or weekly episode and share it via iTunes with your audience. Just posting a recording on your blog from your recent teleclass or posting a video to YouTube is not enough. You need to commit to a schedule and syndicate the content in order for it to be considered a podcast.
2. Telesummits - This is a series of teleclasses that feature a variety of speakers over consecutive days or hours. Examples of these are the Social Media Telesummit, Adwords Advantage or Practice Building Virtual Conference.
   
3. Virtual Workshop - This is a series of teleclasses or webinars that feature only one or two speakers who train you on a specific task. Each week is a module that leads into the next. Examples are Couples Transformations and my Virtual Event Launch Secrets program.
4. Virtual Coaching - Whether it's one-to-one or in a group setting, you can coach your clients virtually. Just make sure to do so over consecutive days or hours so it qualifies as a virtual event. Kendall Summerhawk  wrote about a full day virtual retreat concept where you meet with your client hourly in one day and Milana Leshinsky  lists 20 exciting ways to coach your client (#1-#9 are virtual formats).
5. Virtual Job Fairs - Employers and job candidates meet virtually and share resumes and job leads. This type of event takes place over consecutive hours and may feature expert speakers. Examples are eFairJob and Monster's Virtual Job Fair.
6. Virtual Trade Shows - Complete with exhibitors on a virtual trade show, sponsors and speakers, these huge events attract thousands of attendees. Although the cost to set up this type of virtual is high, the profit margin is equally high.

In my examples above, just remember that the tool doesn't matter. Whether you host your virtual event over the phone or online, just make sure you don't book a conference room. What matters, however, is the strategy.

Are there any other virtual events you would add to this list?

I've been hosting virtual events since 2003. Over the years, I’ve learned what works and what doesn’t when hosting a virtual event.

When I tell people that I'm a virtual event planner, they immediately share with me the negative experiences they've had planning their own. As I listen to their tales of woe, I can't help but feel a sense of compassion.

In my experience, there are some common mistakes people make when producing a virtual event. So, I asked some of my friends, mentors and colleagues to record their top virtual event mistakes. All have attended virtual events as a speaker or produced one of their own and they didn’t hold back.

Here are 3 virtual event mistakes and tips on how to avoid them.

Mistake #1 - Not saying thank you

There is just one thing you can do after the virtual event is over that will guarantee that people say "Yes" to working with you again and again. Yet many virtual event organizers forget to say "Thank you". Felicia Slattery, a professional speaker and business coach, shared with me recently that there are easy ways to show your gratitude. An email, a phone call, even a $10 gift certificate in a card will go a long way. Felicia said that it doesn't need to be extravagant. Just remember to express your thanks after the virtual event is over.

Mistake #2 - Not having a clear theme

Just because you're holding a virtual event doesn't mean people will attend. Kendall Summerhawk, a millionaire business coach, recently shared with me that if the topics are too generic or if it's old news, people won't register for your virtual event. Kendall suggests that you should come up with 30 specific results that you want attendees to get after attending your virtual event. This exercise alone will help you really pinpoint the benefits.

Mistake #3 - Being a bully

So, what's the best way to ruin people's experience with your virtual event? Be a bully. Michele PW, a copywriting expert, explains how one virtual event manager pressured her into sending a solo email to her list to promote the virtual event. When Michele said she couldn't, the virtual event manager became very rude. From that experience, Michele recommends that you should encourage speakers to promote a virtual event to their network using emails, Twitter, Facebook and other tools. Give speakers options in how to promote your virtual event and never make this a requirement for speaking.

To listen to additional mistakes shared by some of the top online coaches, speakers and experts, click here.

I’ve been having a content problem.

I write articles online, I write blog posts, and I write articles for my weekly e-zine. While there isn’t a shortage of content, I was becoming overwhelmed trying to write content for all 3 areas.

I want to provide premium content to those subscribed to my e-zine. I wanted to reward those who took the time to give me their email address with content they couldn’t find anywhere else. However, coming up with original content for my e-zine each week was becoming a huge burden given that I was already writing high quality content for my blog and for articles I submit online.

So here’s a strategy that I started to employ that helps me generate content for online article banks, my blog and my weekly e-zine without becoming overwhelmed.

Publish all your content on your blog. Everything. Focus all your writing energy on your blog. If you’re blogging more, you increase traffic to your blogsite and you start to raise your visibility. Try to update your blog with new content once every 2 or 3 days.

Then, for your e-zine, take one of your blog posts and make it the feature article in your e-zine. However, do not publish the entire article in your e-zine. Instead, give an excerpt, say the first 3 or 4 paragraphs, then provide a link near the end that states:

“Click here to read the rest of this article and to provide your comments.”

All your blog posts will need to include your resource box, 2 or 3 lines that tell people who you are, what you do and a freebie that you’d like them to download.

Two people who do this really well are Kendall Summerhawk and Melanie Benson Strick. If you subscribe to their e-zines, you'll notice that both of these ladies follow this format. They provide a small excerpt of the article in the body of their ezine, then they invite their readers to go to their respective blogs to read the full article.

I really like this strategy as it enables your readers to comment on the article and they get to meet other people who are subscribed to your ezine. It's like you are building a small community on your blog and allowing your readers to finally get a chance to meet each other.

So if you are publishing a blog, publishing articles online, and publishing a weekly e-zine, you can cut down on the amount of time it takes you to prepare content for these three areas by following this format:

1. Publish all content to your blog.
2. Choose one article from your blog to publish in your weekly e-zine.
3. Provide an excerpt of the article from your blog in your e-zine, preferably the first 3 to 4 paragraphs.
4. Then, direct the readers of your e-zine to your blog to read the rest of the article and to leave their comments.