They are out to take your money and give you VERY little in return. I’d be VERY suspicious of any organization that will claim that they can make you rich if you only join THEIR group.

I’m a member of only one group. The National Speakers Association. I am STILL a member because of the people I know there.

At this point I have (UNFORTUNATELY) found very little value from the meetings that they hold. This is because for all of their GREAT INTENTIONS, implementation of those great intentions is hindered by internal politics.

It was that way years ago when I got started and it’s still that way today. Maybe it’s just how ANY organization works.

My point is this: Don’t expect some organization that you join to give you the MAGIC BULLET for your seminar business.

The biggest “secret” to this business if there is one is to create a MASSIVE list, mail them often with valuable content and then make them AWARE of when you are doing events.

As far as joining a group . . . completely unnecessary!

Then ask yourself, which of the companies you listed would make the MOST sense to approach first. The most sense for THEM! Which companies would benefit the most from getting in front of your group at your event.

Who do you talk to? Start with the vice president of marketing. In some companies they will be the right person to “pitch” on sponsoring your event.

If not the VP, then he/she will direct you to the right person. The decision maker will make their decision on a number of different factors.

They will include:

• How much are you charging for sponsorships?
  
• Are their competitors sponsoring your event?
• How many people are you projecting to attend?
• What is the possibility they will purchase?
• Are the attendees likely to be INFLUENCERS?

All of these questions are critical to be able to answer whomever you talk to sponsorships about.

They will want to feel that the price they pay you for the sponsorship will give them more value than what they paid for it.

What will you give them for sponsoring the event?

Will they be able to put up banners and signs or will they just have an booth or table at the back of the seminar room?

Do they get to sponsor a meal? Will they get to speak in front of the whole group?

What should you do? Sorry to say, but it DEPENDS on what you’re trying to do. If you want the MOST money, you let them have “face time” with your audience. The more time you allow them, the more money you should try and EXTRACT from them.

I’ve also seen people sell the back cover of the seminar workbook to a sponsor. The possibilities are endless. Just put your thinking cap on.

There are two primary things I suggest you do.

One is a longer, more detailed promotional brochure. You will want to do it on an 11X17 coated paper. Given the relatively inexpensive prices of printing these days, you should probably opt for “4 color” printing. This just means that you print in FULL COLOR.

You’ll want to concentrate first on your headline. This will be the most important element of the brochure. Make sure you make it a SELF mailer. Putting the piece in an envelope will only depress your response rates.

On this piece, also make sure to include:

• Lots of bullet points detailing what people will learn
• Plenty of testimonials, preferably audio and/or video
• A bio that will make people want to hear YOU
• Pricing that is tiered based on how soon people respond
• Bonuses that make sense to anyone who visits
• A website address for those who need more info
• Where and when the event will be held

If you opt to do a postcard, here are some of the things you need to know:

• Use a postcard that is over-sized to make sure it gets seen
• Your headline becomes critical to success
• Don’t PACK it with copy, make it “airy” and easy to read
• Your primary goal is to drive people to a site

When using either or both of these direct mail methods, the most critical item is your list. The best list is one that you compile yourself. This will make it MUCH more likely to get people sign up.

I never recommend that people use compiled or purchased lists to promote a seminar. They usually don’t pull enough response to justify their purchase.

But, many people have told me that they enjoy being around me like this. Go figure!

It also works for a number of other reasons.

1. The event becomes similar to going to one of those ALL INCLUSIVE resorts for a vacation. We feed them and give them a place to sleep for the whole event. In my case I limit it to just 6 people.
2. Keeping all the folks together allows you to REALLY GET WORK DONE. I usually pack it in around 6pm and when I come down at 10 to get a drink of water, most of the folks are still working feverishly to get things done.
3. I control the environment, so I control the learning process. It’s my space, I’ve done the event many times this way and I know exactly what to expect and how to handle things.
4. Cost is reduced. I’m already paying my mortgage, so why not turn the location into a seminar space? For 6 people in a bootcamp format it works perfectly. When I do 1 or 2 day events at the house, I can even fit 12 people without a problem.

If you’re comfortable opening up your house this way, I suggest you try it. Just hide the SILVERWARE!

PS – I’ve never had anything disappear, but don’t hold ME responsible if something does! I screen people VERY carefully who stay at my house!

IF you guarantee a certain number of rooms you will almost always get your meeting space for FREE or at a MUCH reduced cost.

It all depends on HOW MANY rooms you are willing to guarantee.

If you get food from the hotel, you will also be able to get the meeting space for free or at a reduced cost.

For MOST of my events, I do NOT guarantee rooms. It just makes me NERVOUS. That being the case, if I KNEW I would be getting X number of people to book rooms, I would do it.

Another option you can discuss is the  SLIDING SCALE. This is where your meeting room fees are determined by how many rooms your people book. The more they book, the less you pay.

The first few times you do an event, I’d try and do it this way.

I’ve seen people get SEVERELY burned by guaranteeing rooms. Don’t YOU be one of them!!

What about you? Do you have a plan for your seminar? If you DO, you’re on the right track. If you do NOT, then I’m worried for you. There are so many people who lose a ton of money attempting to do their own seminars. I see them all the time. They usually call me AFTER the fact.

Here are some things you need to plan:

1. How will you promote your event? What methods will you be using to get people to attend your event? Will you be advertising in the newspaper? Will you be doing direct mail? Whose list will you use? Will you be doing any joint ventures?

2. How big an in-house list do you have? If you don’t have a big in house email list and you’re attempting to promote a seminar, my suggestion would be: WAIT! Do your work and build yourself a big in-house email list first.

3. Where will you hold your event? This calculation is important. Current economic conditions are making it such that this decision is getting more and more important. Fewer people are traveling long distances to attend seminars and bootcamps. They are staying close to home and not spending as much money. This should significantly affect your decisions.

4. Who will speak at your seminar? Will it be just you? Will you have others who you invite to speak? How will this affect your registration? All of these issues need to be considered as you put the elements of your event together.

5. What content will you cover? People attend events based on WHO the speaker or speakers are and WHAT content will be covered. If you’re not a celebrity speaker, then the content that you put together is critical to your success as a seminar or event promoter.

All of these five items are important for you to consider. I know you have a lot of questions regarding each of these 5 points. Feel free to make comments and I’ll be happy to try and answer any and all of them!

There are more models for generating consulting business, but doing conventions is one of the simplest I know about. The keys to generating consulting business are like those which can lead to a great convention experience.

First, you have to give folk a phenomenal quantity of helpful info. This could persuade them of your understanding of the subject and your eagerness to share it. 2nd , you should never withhold info. If you give folks the impression that you aren’t giving them the straight scoop ( i.e, that you are holding back to lure them to use you as a consultant ), they won’t reply well.

In turn, they’ll be far less likely to offer you consulting work. Some convention leaders / speakers think that if you keep a tiny bit of info in your back pocket folk will pay more for you to show your cards. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

Folk are more likely to offer you consulting business when you give them everything you know and reply to all questions completely and forthrightly. If you do this, folk will be rather more likely to ask you to come and give them individual help. Irrespective of how much info you provide, they’ll think you’ve more to give.

When you purposely and glaringly hold back info, you risk having them feel taken by some sort of a ploy to get you to give them more cash. When a person asks you a query during your convention and you reply with : Well, hire me as an advisor and I’ll give you all the info that you would like you are dead in the water.

People  will feel exploited. ( The exception to this and a fantastic opportunity to sell your consulting in the convention is if an attendee asks a question that’s so specific to their company or situation that it is apparent that no-one else will need to hear the solution. . ) You have to be 100 pc prepared to share everything you know in the convention.

You owe it to your partakers. Behave this way and you will get plenty of consulting work.

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You frequently will get a different group of folk from different types of promotion. This simplified approach works well unless you sell products at your convention. ( And if you do not, you have sort of missed the entire point of this book, haven’t you? ) Unless you include product sales in your calculations, there is not any way to show how well you are doing. I suggest you employ a measurement of Bucks / Person / Minute, as I explained in a prior article.

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I was SHOCKED by his answer! Virtually NONE of them. Holy Crap!

With stellar SEO rankings for a service that is IN DEMAND, he’s doing just fine. For mere mortals like you and me, this would be DEADLY.

Whenever I do a seminar or other event, I’m EXTREMELY conscious of doing a great job so that people will come back for more. I don’t have and I suspect you’re in the same position) an endless supply of people who will attend my events.

If you’re in the general field of “weight loss” or “making money”, this article may not apply to you. If you ARE in those fields, I’d suggest you TARGET your market a bit more carefully, so this article SHOULD apply to you!

1. Deliver a LOT of high quality content.

The problem with most people who do seminars is that they are obsessed with trying to sell their NEXT event. In doing so, there seminars and workshops turn into a sales presentation for next month’s “big event.”

To say this is misguided would be a dramatic understatement of the facts.

Like you, want 100% of the people who attend THIS event to come back to my next and every other subsequent event that I hold. To make this happen I want to make sure I deliver on the promises I made at THIS event. If I do that, everything will fall neatly into place.

2. Provide people with a ROADMAP.

People don’t want to just know WHAT to do. They want to know HOW to do it. Scared of telling people because you won’t get any coaching or consulting work? Your fears are misguided. My mentor, Howard Shenson, used to tell me to “give them everything you got!” IF I did that, he told me they would come back to me for more. They were right.

IF you give people the exact/precise way to do something, they will be thinking two things. First, that you haven’t told them EVERYTHING they need to know. It may not be the case, but their perception is their reality. Also, once you tell people how to “make the sausages” they may not want to make it. Many will ask you to do it for them.

3. Be Approachable.

There are MANY seminar leaders who set themselves up as the “guru on the hill.” A number of high profile marketing types pride themselves on this posture. Their thinking is: If I’m not accessible, people will have to pay me for my services to get access. In my opinion, this is FOOLISH.

You should be approachable but draw the line at where general helping ends and individual coaching or consulting begins. At an event I will fully answer any and all questions on general concepts. The specifics will not be germane to the entire group and will NOT help me sell future services. I leave those out.

4. Ask them to Attend Your Next Event

People won’t come back to your next event if you don’t ASK them! It may be an ADVANCED version of the seminar you just did. It may be tangentially related to what you just finished. Both of those are logical choices when asking people to sign up for your next event. But, they won’t know about it unless you ASK them to do so. Have a date and venue set before you pitch it to them as a group.

You’ll also want to provide them with an incentive for making their decision NOW! Give them a substantial price break for signing up before they leave your current event. Make it a GOOD deal. Put a deadline on your offer. Limit the number of spaces you have based on what makes good sense.

5. Be Yourself

Don’t try and be someone you’re not. People will SMELL the insincerity. Make sure that you are the best YOU you can be. Do this and some people may not like you. Don’t do this and many more won’t like you.

You’ll also end up attacting the “right” kind of people. The people that you get along with naturally. The people you’ll like and who like you as you really are. This will make any additional work you do with them simple and easy.

Conclusion:

I know what  you’re thinking. What about your choice of hotel or the food you serve? Meaningless to getting people to attend your next event!

Follow the above 5 steps and your chances for having people come back to your future seminars and events will go WAY up. Do it differently than I’ve described and you’re on your own. Over the more than 25 years I’ve been doing seminars, workshops and other events, this has worked very well for me!

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