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Marketing Sense

How to Grow Your Audience Using Online Workshops: Part Six

Marketing sense

We’ve almost finished preparations for our online workshop! If you’re just joining us, you may wonder…

“Why bother with a live webinar? Can’t I just send that information in an email series?”

Yes, you can, but a live webinar is about more than transferring information. It’s about new and established audience members engaging not only with you…live…but with each other.

And in this, our final segment, we’ll talk about when and what to send in both your pre-launch and post-webinar email series.

Here’s our breakdown of this series so far…

In Part One, we chose our topic.

In Part Two, we identified and researched various title resources.

In Part Three, we chose our title (it’s a dandy!).

In Part Four, we discussed priming our audience for our upcoming webinar using what’s called “pre-launch” emails.

In Part Five, we confirmed our goal and our plan to reach it.

This “live” component is more powerful than it appears. Your readers will also experience community. YOUR community. While learning information they have sought from YOU. Boom!

They’ll learn. They’ll laugh. They’ll value you. They’ll want more. Voila! Your audience has just grown! Now, serve them well, and as Christ leads, periodically promote a paid product or service. Do that once a month or once a year–whatever your marketing plan is–and you’ll have a larger, loyal following. (Hint: That’s a good thing.) 🙂

The last step before our online webinar is our launch email series.

This is a group of emails (usually) created ahead of time and scheduled for release pre-webinar. It’s imperative that readers understand the benefit your free webinar offers, as that will help them choose to attend. It’s up to you to tell them in both your title (Survive These 3 Treacherous Ice-Fishing Dangers) and your email’s content (below).

First email: Send your Webinar Announcement email 14-30 days out.

You want to give your audience time to adjust their schedule if necessary. Better yet, sharing the date early will prevent conflicts altogether. Include all the normal information: date, time, location, topic, and your event’s URL, along with a clear benefit.  

These days most of us present on Zoom. You can set your webinar up in your Zoom account weeks in advance and share the details in your announcement email.

You don’t have to include your Zoom link in this first email, but it’s a good idea because some readers are meticulous about details. You don’t know who those readers are, so go ahead and send the full details in this email and plan to add them to subsequent emails as well, for those readers who’ll wait till the last minute to take note of them. It happens. 🙂

Second email: Send a Webinar Reminder email 7 days out.

Simple. Clear.Almost a duplicate of your Announcement email, adding another benefit for those who attend. Consider placing your webinar’s URL, date, day, time, and so on in your postscript instead of the body this time, as scanners will read a postscript (a P.S.) when they won’t read anything else.

Third and Fourth emails:

One day before your webinar begins, and a final reminder email 30 minutes before your webinar begins. Isn’t that too many? No. We all get busy and miss important meetings without gentle reminders. You’ll be doing them a favor with these last two emails. Add one more benefit, please, or repeat the benefits you mentioned in your previous emails.

Fifth email:

Send a Thanks for Joining Me! email within two hours after the webinar is over. (Another  reason you want to create this simple email series ahead of time.)

Share a recap of the webinar’s content and its benefits. Offer a limited-time replay link if that’s part of your marketing strategy.  

It’s over! Serve your new readers as well as you’ve served your current readers. Offer them life-changing content that will draw them to your message and to Christ.

Create new webinars as you desire, and watch your audience grow. Offer your knowledge for free or via paid products or services and reach more people for Christ around the world!

Patricia Durgin

Patricia Durgin is an Online Marketing Coach and Facebook Live Expert. She trains Christian writers and speakers exclusively, helping them develop their messaging, marketing funnels, conversational emails, and Facebook Live programs. Patricia hosted 505 (60-minute) Facebook Live programs from 2018-2020. That program is on indefinite hiatus. She’s also a regular faculty member at Christian writers and speakers conferences around the country.

Website: marketersonamission.com
Facebook: MarketersOnAMission

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Marketing Sense

How to Grow Your Audience Using Online Workshops: Part Three

Marketing sense

We’re exploring workshop titles in this third part of our ongoing series. In our first month we chose our topic (ice-fishing if you can believe it!) and our marketing promise which, after further development, won’t work. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Last month in part two, we identified and researched various title resources. This month we’ll choose our title which may / may not also incorporate our marketing promise. Let’s see.

Why Do We Need Our Content Idea Before We Write Our Title?

We won’t discuss our webinar’s content point-by-point in this article series, because we’re here to learn the process of using online workshops to grow our audience.

Still, we must have some idea of this fictitious workshop’s content, or we can’t title it.

Checking books and magazine articles about ice-fishing, I wasn’t inspired. So I researched online news stories and found a content idea that meets my criteria: both new or established ice-fishermen will want this information. Bingo!

My pretend workshop will be how to eliminate or survive ice-fishing dangers. That’s not my title. It’s the focus of my content. The two are similar but distinctly different.

We want our title to attract the audience we want to serve. If you remember from part one in this series, we want the title to do 5 things:

-identify our audience directly or indirectly;

-address a problem, a challenge, or a goal;

-begin with an action verb;

-include a number (maybe), and;

-is utterly clear…like glass.

Let’s get to work. Our audience is new or experienced ice-fishermen. The problem is danger or death. (They want to avoid both.) 🙂

Potential Workshop Titles and Why They’re Strong or Weak Options

Ice-Fishermen: Don’t Let This Happen to You! Spot on audience identification but way too vague on the remainder. Plus, the phrase, “…don’t let this happen to you!” is often used by sensationalists whose titles attract attention but whose content offers no value. We’ll pass.

3 Dangers of Ice-Fishing and How to Avoid Them Meh. Accurate but boring. Moving on.

How to Survive Your 2022 Ice-Fishing Trips We’re getting closer but we’re not there yet. Some might think adding the year makes their workshop timely, but not so. Instead, it ages it after December 31, 2022. It also suggests that your information is somehow related to that specific year in some special, not-yet-identified way, or perhaps that it’s only applicable for that specific year. Both are unintentionally misleading. We want to steer clear of even the appearance of trickery. Utter clarity is our goal.

Survive Ice-Fishing Dangers Looking at our list of 5 goals, the first word is a compelling action verb. Whatever is it, we want to survive it, right? 🙂 Can we improve this title?

 Survive Treacherous Ice-Fishing Dangers Ooh, treacherous dangers. Much more dramatic (read intriguing) than regular ol’ dangers and still applicable to our content. Hmmm…

 Survive These 3 Treacherous Ice-Fishing Dangers This is the strongest contender of those shown. Do you agree? It indirectly identifies our audience as those who ice-fish. Check. Does it address a problem, challenge, or goal? Yes.

It begins with an action verb as mentioned earlier. An attention getting action verb. It also includes a specific yet reasonable number. I don’t have time to read how to avoid 73 dangers. Do you? 🙂 It’s clear…like glass.

Anyone reading this title version will be very interested (in part because we’re using strong words like “survive” and “treacherous”) or not interested at all. Have you ever met anyone who was “so-so” about surviving anything treacherous? Me, neither.

So we’re set. Survive These 3 Treacherous Ice-Fishing Dangers it is. We don’t need to add “How to…” It’s implied. But we could.

By the way, I could have removed “How to…” from this article series without losing any impact.

Onward we go! See you next month when we’ll move to the next step.

Patricia Durgin

Patricia Durgin is an Online Marketing Coach and Facebook Live Expert. She trains Christian writers and speakers exclusively, helping them develop their messaging, marketing funnels, conversational emails, and Facebook Live programs. Patricia hosted 505 (60-minute) Facebook Live programs from 2018-2020. That program is on indefinite hiatus. She’s also a regular faculty member at Christian writers and speakers conferences around the country.

Website: marketersonamission.com
Facebook: MarketersOnAMission

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Marketing Sense

How to Grow Your Audience Using Online Workshops: Part One

Marketing sense

Growing your audience can seem like an uphill battle. Hosting online workshops will help you reach your goal faster.  

Step ONE: Decide On Your Offer

Choose Your Offer: Some would suggest choosing your topic first. That’s logical. But you’ll have more attendees if you begin with the practical result your audience will receive. Everything should revolve around them. What will they be able to DO after your workshop that they couldn’t do BEFORE? And do they want that new result? If not, redirect immediately.

Let’s pretend your topic is ice fishing. What can you teach your audience about ice fishing that they can put to practical use on their next outing? Teach that. Market that. Deliver that.

Based upon that criterion, I’ve selected catch more fish. This is more than a topic. It’s a result.

A Concrete Marketing Promise

Join my workshop and you’ll be able to CATCH MORE FISH. Don’t promise that they’ll catch more fish (which you cannot control) but that they’ll be able to catch more fish. They’ll have the necessary knowledge and skills to do so. What they do with that newfound knowledge and skill set is up to them.

During your workshop, forget about sharing the history of ice fishing. Don’t spend time highlighting the many types of ice fishing rods on the market and the intricacies of each. Omit an in-depth discussion on the remaining essential gear, the best places to get it, and how to use it.

All that information is valuable, but it will draw attention away from the promised result.  Our singular focus is to teach ice fishermen (or those interested in ice fishing) how to catch more fish. Bada-bing, bada-boom!

You might choose to teach them a different skill instead.

Be careful not to add unrelated information to make your workshop more interesting. Information doesn’t get results. You can’t market information alone (well, you can, but who wants another lecture)?

Choose a skill that will require a change in your attendees’ behavior. Results change when behavior patterns change. Should they start earlier in the morning or stay out on the ice later? Purchase new, updated equipment and learn how to use it? Return to the old ways? Research the location where they go ice fishing, looking for information about the water’s non-winter flow (which will affect the water flow in winter, too)?

Notice that these are topics. Information. Didn’t I just suggest you not focus on information? Yep. Here’s the key difference.

This information is directly tied to your promised result.

It moves viewers one step closer to catching more fish–which is what you promised they’d be able to do–while unrelated information does not.

This is the first of 8 steps to grow your audience using online workshops. Next month we’ll discuss how to title your workshop so that it attracts the attention of your ideal audience. Bland or confusing titles are worthless, as are “cutesy” titles. Our audience wants to catch more fish.

We can use that title. It’s simple, direct, and easy to understand, but let’s wait. As we continue developing the workshop, we may discover an even better choice.

Until next month. 

Patricia Durgin

Patricia Durgin is an Online Marketing Coach and Facebook Live Expert. She trains Christian writers and speakers exclusively, helping them develop their messaging, marketing funnels, conversational emails, and Facebook Live programs. Patricia hosted 505 (60-minute) Facebook Live programs from 2018-2020. That program is on indefinite hiatus. She’s also a regular faculty member at Christian writers and speakers conferences around the country.

Website: marketersonamission.com
Facebook: MarketersOnAMission