Category Archives: Marketing

FREE Virtual Summit Blueprint

By Lisa Nelson  |  Marketing, Virtual Summits

virtual summit blueprint

A virtual summit is when you interview several experts around a central theme with interviews being released over a set window of time to participants. A virtual summit might also be referred to as a telesummit with all interviews conducted via phone or you may opt for a video summit.

Each guest expert promotes the virtual summit to their list allowing you to reach a larger combined audience.

There are many reasons to host a virtual summit:

  • Build credibility… and your brand
  • Become seen as an influencer in your industry
  • Grow your list… attract clients
  • Generate income… fill programs and sell products
  • Increase invitations to speak at events

The most common reason for hosting a virtual summit is list growth. Regardless of your business stage, just getting started or an established expert, you will always need to infuse your list with a fresh pool of potential clients seeking the support you provide.

If your main goal is list growth, you still achieve all the other benefits when you host a virtual summit.

Here are 7 steps to hosting a virtual summit that will build your brand, grow your list, and multiply your sales:

7-Step Virtual Summit Blueprint

Step #1: Determine the virtual summit theme to best attract your target audience

You are hosting this virtual summit to grow your list, BUT you don’t want to attract just anyone to your list. You want to attract your target market. People seeking the products and services you provide.

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Are google hangouts going away?

By Lisa Nelson  |  Marketing, Virtual Summits

There is transition taking place in the video livestreaming world.

Blab.im is no longer available. This platform provided multi-person livestreaming. It worked well for interviews or panel style videos.

There are also rumors google hangouts is going away.

Some alternate options…

Zoom Video Conferencing

This system works well for virtual trainings, virtual summit interviews, and client masterminds.

A perk of this platform is the ease of use for your guests. It’s mostly “click a link to join” format. Plus, you can easily pull the mp3 from the video file. Great for virtual summits.

Facebook Live

A multi-person livecast version has not been released, but is highly anticipated.

A problem with Facebook Live… when do you start presenting content? You don’t want to begin until you have a decent audience, but those who arrive early get tired of listening to “filler” information and leave before you really get started.

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Virtual Summit vs. Giveaway: Which is More Effective to Quickly Grow Your List?

By Lisa Nelson  |  Marketing, Virtual Summits

virtual summit vs. giveaway

Summits and giveaways leverage the lists of your guest speakers/contributors to grow your own list.

What is a virtual summit?

A virtual summit is when you interview a group of experts on a specific topic. Interviews can be live or pre-recorded, video or audio, and may last anywhere from ~30-60 minutes. Interviews are released daily over about five days and are available for free to all participants during the replay period.

One summit example is the Creating Unstoppable Teens event. Maggie hosted 20 experts all focused on helping teens develop the skills they need to thrive in and out of the classroom. This event was targeted to the parents of teens, which is her target audience.

What is a giveaway?

A giveaway is when you coordinate with a group of experts to “gift” services or products for free to all participants during the giveaway window. The giveaway window may range from one week to several weeks.

A giveaway example is the Done4You Giveaway. This giveaway is targeted to business owners and provides a wide range of business and marketing gifts.

Effective, quality list growth

You seek list growth so you have a larger audience to offer your services to and increase business profits.

These events can grow your lists by thousands over a few weeks. However, the quality of those subscribers varies… will they become paying clients?
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How do you make money with a Virtual Summit?

By Lisa Nelson  |  Marketing, Virtual Summits

virtual summit speaker invitaion

How do you make a return on investment with a Virtual Summit? Here are just 3 ways:

1. Event upgrades

The purpose behind the virtual summit is often list growth. Therefore, it is a free event anyone can attend, but access to each interview is limited to a 24 or 48-hour replay period. If you miss an interview or want to re-listen to a particularly useful segment, you may purchase the event upgrade package. The upgrade package might include downloadable mp3s, transcripts, a bonus gift collection, and/or special q&a only available to those who upgrade. An upgrade package often costs $97 during the event period with a price increase post event.

2. Affiliate commissions

You may sign up as an affiliate for each of your speakers. Your speakers offer a gift to your participants. Participants opt in for their gift and then move through that speakers sales funnel. You make a commission on any connected sales.

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How do you invite virtual summit speakers if you have no list?

By Lisa Nelson  |  Marketing, Virtual Summits

virtual summit speaker invitaion

This is a main obstacle you may face when planning for a virtual summit.

  • How do you find speakers for the virtual summit?
  • How do you secure big name speakers?
  • How do you get speakers to accept if this is your first time and you don’t have other speakers yet lined up?
  • What can you do to attract speakers to leverage their lists if you have no list yourself?

Let’s shift the way you are thinking when it comes to speaker invitations for a virtual summit.

Your list size is not really relevant.

Part of the agreement when you confirm a guest speaker is that they will invite their list via a set number of solo emails.

Therefore, you are leveraging the lists of your guest speakers.

For example, guest A has a list of 3000… you now have access to a list of 3000 for this event. Guest B has a list of 4000… you now have access to a list of 7000 for this event. Every speaker you add increases your event list size reach.

This leverage is one of the reasons why virtual summits are so effective at quickly growing your list.

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Are you using Facebook ads to grow your email list?

By Lisa Nelson  |  Marketing, Social Media

Yes, you can use Facebook ads for lead generation. Are you?

I’ve started utilizing Facebook ads as a means to grow my email list and generate more sales.

This is for a heart health branch of my business. I’ve sorely neglected the Facebook page for this business. Created the page probably 2 years ago and it achieved a whopping 30 likes over 2 years. Yes, pathetic.

Well, I set my business goals for this year and I’m on a mission to more than double my annual sales from one home study program.

Bing ads flop

Played with Bing ads for a few weeks. Even spent time consulting with their support team to get everything set up just right on two ads I was running and it still wouldn’t track results. If you can’t track…you are wasting time and dollars! Nixed that avenue, purchased a Facebook training course and I like where I’m headed.

Facebook ads success

Implemented my first like ad a few days ago and I’m already up to 500 likes! Now that’s what I’m talking about.

Each like is costing only $0.18. Here’s a screenshot of the ad:
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Content Is Crucial: You Can’t Monetize From Obscurity

By Lisa Nelson  |  Content Marketing, Marketing

This guest post was originally published by Ursula Jorch at Work Alchemy.

Content MarketingIncome in your business is built on the relationships you cultivate and nurture with your clients and prospects. When people know, like, and trust you, they start to buy.

One important way to keep those relationships growing and to start new relationships is to provide great content and spread the word.

You may have heard the marketing expression, ‘content is king’. There’s a lot of truth in that: great content draws people and keeps them engaged with you.

In your business, you’re on a great adventure. You’re learning and exploring new things all the time. If you share that experience with your audience, you’ll bring them in on the adventure!

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Develop a Content Marketing Mindset

By Lisa Nelson  |  Marketing, Project Management

This guest post was originally published by Jen Levitz at Connect with Your Client.

Content Marketing Mindset

Today, marketing really is all about online content. It doesn’t matter what type of business you have, marketing online is going to be more lucrative than marketing offline.

Most people don’t run to the phone book anymore when looking for a business. Instead, they look for a business online. And then in addition to that, they ask their friends online, and do a lot of research online before making their purchasing choices. Whether you have an online business or an offline business, this advice will increase your sales exponentially.

Build Your Credibility

The first step toward developing a content marketing mindset involves using the online world to build up your credibility. Use your blog, release white papers, and participate in social media and more to ensure that your reputation is well represented online. Perfect every social media profile and don’t start an account unless you are willing to keep it up to date at least weekly.

Seek Out Thought Leadership

Getting to know thought leaders in your industry can actually rub off on you and make you into a though leader – eventually. Find and follow thought leaders in your industry, comment on their blogs, offer donated original content, review their products, and ask them to review theirs. Interview them on a podcast. Do what you need to do in order to become part of their circle.
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2 Factors for a List Building Telesummit

By Lisa Nelson  |  Marketing, Project Management

2 Factors for a List Building Summit

SUCCESS FACTOR #1: SPEAKER PROMOTION

By and far, speaker promotion is at the top of this list. The impact of the other factors is not nearly as great.

When hosting a summit, speaker promotion is the key for getting individuals to opt in to your event. Let me tell you now, social media promo does not convert as well as a solo email. A newsletter highlight for your event does not convert as well as a solo email. A solo email is very important. You will have speakers say they cannot send a solo email. You may have to pass on having that speaker participate. Yes, there are exceptions to the rule. Let’s say it’s a really big name speaker and simply having them participate would be a major draw for your audience. I can’t emphasize enough that this is the exception, not the rule.
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5 Steps To Effectively Use Content Marketing to Grow Your Business

By Lisa Nelson  |  Marketing, Social Media

5 Steps To Effectively Use Content Marketing to Grow Your Business

1. Know Who You Want to Attract
Before you can create content that appeals to your target market (and potential clients), you need to know what they are struggling with, what they want to know, and how they want it. Do they want to read, listen, watch, etc? (Always good to simply ask your current clients and subscribers to learn the answer.) Once you know what they want and how they want it…deliver. If you seek clients dealing with food allergies, provide content relevant to this audience. Don’t be all over the place in your content generation…one day food allergies, the next about dieting, and a third about foods to reduce stress. Your target audience is dealing with food allergies, be consistent in what you right about to highlight yourself as someone who specializing in this area.

2. Be consistent with your publishing.
Certain pieces of content imply different levels of consistency when it comes to creating and delivering content. How often you want to publish may impact the form of content marketing that will work best for you. For example, consistency is expected with blogs, newsletters, magazines, and podcasting. Consistency is wise, but not required when it comes to videos, ebooks, webinars, and infographics. If you know you will be inconsistent, go with content where consistency does not hinder results, such as guest blog posting.
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