Killer Online Course Launches - DC BKK 2014
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Add on materials for the "Killer Online Courses" meetup from DC BKK 2014. October 14, 2014. Shared by Mike Harrington
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Killer Online Course Launches - DC BKK 2014
- 1. Step-By-Step to Pre-Launching a Killer Course Mike Harrington Entrepreneur, Coach, Writer e: mike@mikeharrington.co t: @themharrington w: mikeharrington.co Matt Gottesman Entrepreneur, Digital Strategist, Startup Advisor e: matt@mattgottesman.com t: @startupgotts w: mattgottesman.com
- 2. What’s the Big Idea? What Do People Always Seem To Ask You For Help With NOTE: YOU MIGHT NOT EVEN BE GIVING YOURSELF CREDIT FOR THIS! 1. Relationships & Dating 2. Travel Hacks & Strategies 3. Building Personal Relationships 4. Network at a Conference w/out Being Lame 5. Time Management & 80/20 Strategies 6. Gain Traction On Social Media 7. Negotiation for Freelancers / Consultants 8. Managing Digital Teams 9. Master the Influential Email 10. How to Charge More For Your Worth
- 3. What’s the Big Idea? What Expertise Have You Built
- 4. Validate Me! – The Challenge Do Others In Your Circle Have the Same Pain? How Can You Start This Conversation? Your Network Is More Powerful Than You Think! How Big Is the Market You Want to Help? Where Do They Congregate Online? 10-15 Minute Calls
- 5. LinkedIn Traffic LinkedIn is really special. WHY? Targeted Traffic Where Do Your Target Personas Live? Helpful Content Providing Access to More Info. Gaining Feedback Discussions leads to Pain Points Make a List Document Pain Points
- 6. Reddit Traffic? Similar to LinkedIn How Can I Help? Interaction leads to trust. Trust leads to sales. Helpful Content Links to Resources, Landing Pages, Collecting Emails Gaining Feedback Discussion Boards – Top Level or Micro Niche Make a List Ask Open Ended Q’s & Document Pain Points
- 7. Forums & Private Membership Sites Fertile Grounds for Your Target Markets. WHY? Fellow Entrepreneurs Been through the same problems. Have great advice Built In Database Potential Partnerships, Resource Sharing, Potential Target Market Like Attracts Like Self-Explanatory Invest in Themselves Track record of investing in themselves to build skills, solve problems & grow their business. Immediate Feedback Faster response b/c of established relationships & trust List of Example Forums: 1. Dynamite Circle 2. Fastlane Forum 3. Location Rebel 4. Digital Nomad Academy (DNA) 5. Warrior Forum 6. LinkedIn Digital Consultants
- 8. The “Pitch” – Copywriting w/ a Hook Step 1: Identifying Your Own Tone & Messaging • Friendly? • Corporate? • Authoritative? Step 2: Listen to How Your Target Audience Speaks About Their Challenge(s) • Take notes in Evernote using the words/phrases they use to describe their pain Step 3: Creating Personas (Quick Hack to this)
- 9. Who is Your Customer Avatar / Personality? What are their: • Habits? • Life situation? • Desires? • Fears? • Needs? • Where do they live? • Where do they spend $ • What do they read? • What websites do they subscribe to? • How do they like to be spoken to?
- 10. The “Value Bomb” AKA – The Trust-building Giveaway Content An eBook or Guide A Step-By-Step / “How-To” PDF A Free Email Course Audio Content – Interview w/ an Expert
- 11. Capture Your Leads – Landing Page Essentials Step 1: Choose Your Platform • LeadPages • Opitmize Press • WordPress Landing Page Plugin, etc. Step 2: Upload the course, PDF, eBook, or audio content Step 3: Loop in your email integrations – Aweber, Mailchimp, etc. Step 4: Write and load up your thank you emails – IMPORTANT. Make them glad they “opted-in” to hear from you. Step 5: Go into forums where you’ve interacted with your target audience, give them the link - ask them) to download and give honest feedback. Step 6: Have a feedback form locked and loaded (Google Docs) PRO TIP: Make sure to use open ended questions, not just numerical ratings. Open-ended questions = target market answers in THEIR OWN WORDS. =)
- 12. The PR Campaign – Navigating the Digital “Press Junket” 1. Interviews Reach out to influencers in your space, can you provide them a valuable interview or case study that would benefit their audience? 2. Cross-Promotion with other Online Entrepreneurs in the Space 3. Get featured on Podcasts (use your network in the DC, etc) 4. Pitch a Guest Post - related to your launch • Make sure it will benefit the blog owner’s readers) • Target blogs w/ Medium – Large Viewership. • Focus on benefit to the blog owner, not all about you! 5. Social Media Distribution • After a guest post, podcast or interview happens – make sure to link to it across all social media platforms. • Ask that the host does the same, win/win.
- 13. Pricing – How To Hit the Sweet Spot The power of low-risk, low cost • Allows them to get their feet wet • See immediate results, more apt to pay for more premium level offerings – upsells, masterminds, higher production value, future releases. Incentivize earlier adopters with 2 main benefits • Lower introductory price • More one-on-one access to you $37, $47, $97 model of pricing – Studies show these odd numbers work Ask target market – If they pay X for a course, what value/results would they be aiming to get ? Example: If they pay $47 on a social media promotion course for real estate agents, what specific results would they be stoked to have? • More leads & closed deals? • Less confusion and wasted time? • Authority status?
- 14. Social Media – Amplify Your Message! What Are Your Message’s Amplifiers? # Social Media Distributing your offerings, giveaways and message through Social Hashtags Relevant keywords to your offer or subject matter Influencers @ Influencers to retweet / redistribute through their networks
- 15. The Art of Cross Promotion What is Cross Promotion? Think… 1. Complimentary friends willing to distribute for you. • Fellow bloggers • Affiliate Marketers 2. Guest Blogging • As alluded to earlier • Keep it relevant to their audience 3. Links from their pages • People who would be willing to give you some link “juice.” • How can you scratch their back? • Can you call in any favors? • How would it benefit them or their audience?
- 16. • Something to think about – but we did NOT cross this bridge. • Still an important topic to be aware of, and part of your post-launch strategy! • Blogger friends with an audience that trusts them? Win/Win Affiliate Program Site (example) www.sendowl.com Affiliate Sales To Be or Not to Be?
- 17. Wrap It. Ship It. Share It. Our Wins: • Writing a relevant (free) eBook for our targeted audience. • Building a lot of interest around the book and eventual course, due to providing value out of the gate • 74% conversion ratio from the landing page; due to HIGHLY targeted traffic. Our “Lessons” (read: Fails): • Niche down further – at first we focused on “all freelancers.” • Having the wrong “respond to” email address programmed into Aweber = missed out on a LOT of engagement. Our Pivots: • Niching down to focus on serving ONLY high end web developers • Will focus on adding higher production value content (video, screencasts, audio, etc)
Editor's Notes
- Ideation What expertise have you built?
- Do others in your immediate circle have the same pain or itch that you want to scratch? How can you start this conversation? LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Email, Forums, Real Life, Co-workers, etc. Sphere of influence – Your network is more powerful and probably larger than you think How many of them are out there? How big is the market (estimate)? Where do they congregate, both online and offline? MeetUps, Industry Forums, Facebook Groups, LinkedIn Groups, SubReddits 10-15 Minute Skype Calls (Use Sohelpful.me as a credible platform) Asking if they have this pain? What are they doing about it? Have they spent to solve it / improve it?
- Groups are specifically formed around your identified pain point / shared interest. Where do your personas (Target Traffic) live? Do a search for keywords (i.e. “freelancer,” “web design,” “social media,” “real estate CAREFUL – remember to enter the group of people you want to HELP! Example, you want to do social media for Real Estate Brokers – don’t go to Social Media Group, go to Real Estate Broker Group. Step 1 – Go to target group Step 2 – Scroll through all of the content Step 3 – note which discussion is relevant to your offering Step 4 – Read through ALL comments and document top 3 -5 pain points that repeatedly come up Providing helpful content Create an easy tip sheet, mini white paper, e-guide, etc. Drive them to a landing page with content you’ve created that will help them, collect their emails. Give them links to BASIC information that would educate them Asking for feedback and awareness Ask open ended questions about their main challenges Reply to discussions, note who the “influencers” are. Documenting their pain points – Evernote, Google Docs, etc You can use this in your marketing materials, sales letters, email campaigns – in THEIR OWN WORDS
- Use some similar tactics to targeting LinkedIn Boards and Discussions around your pain point? You can go as niche as you want, or remain as general as “small business.” In our experience, the more niche the better. Asking them for their feedback – Open ended questions Documenting their pain points – Just like LinkedIn Asking them how you can help? Providing helpful content Links to resources A Landing page with content you’ve created – that helps them Collect emails, baby!
- Why these are FERTILE GROUNDS for your target market: Like Attracts Like – Self explanatory They have a track record of INVESTING in themselves to build skills, solve problems and grow their business. Fellow Entrepreneurs Built in Databases – You have a curated list of people, often that says EXACTLY what their business and challenges are. Potential partnerships Potential sharing of resources Potentially your target market, depending on your offering Immediate Feedback Quicker to respond to you, b/c you have already self-selected into the same group You have an established e-relationship with more trust – assuming you have been participating in the forum! List of potential groups: (DC, Fastlane Forum, Location Rebel, Warrior Forum etc.)
- What are you giving them right out at the gate that will grab their attention and trust? Establish Authority and give them tons of value, asking nothing in return (for now). eBook Audio content – interview with an expert, etc. PDF “step-by-step” Guide Free Email Course Free Consult (maybe?) – Use this for market research to create a product
- Capturing Leads: Try a platform or two Use Wordpress to start Upload the course, pdf, eBook, whatever Loop in your email integrations – Aweber, Mailchimp, etc. Set up thank you emails Go into forums and locations where you’ve interacted with your target audience, give them the link - ask them (nicely) to download and give honest feedback. (This is currency) Have a feedback form locked and loaded (Google Docs) Make sure to use open ended questions, not just numerical ratings.
- What we did: Interviews Reach out to influencers in your space, can you provide them a valuable interview or case study that would benefit their audience? Cross-Promotion with other Online Entrepreneurs in the Space Get featured on Podcasts (use your network in the DC, etc) Pitch a Guest Post related to your launch (that will benefit the blog owner’s readers) on Blogs w/ Medium – Large Viewership Social Media Distribution After a guest post, podcast or interview happens – make sure to link to it across all social media platforms. Ask that the host does the same, win/win.
- The power of low-risk, low cost Allows them to get their feet wet See immediate results, more apt to pay for more premium level offerings – upsells, masterminds, higher production value. Incentivize earlier adopters with 2 main benefits Lower introductory price More one-on-one access to you Additional sign up bonus? $37, $47, $97 model of pricing Asking others what they would be willing to pay and what kind of value would they like to gain out of it. If they pay $47 on a social media promotion course for real estate agents, what specific results would they be stoked to have? More leads? Less confusion and wasted time?
- Distributing through social Hashtagging relevant words Attaching your influencers to retweet/redistribute through their networks
- What is Cross Promotion? Complimentary friends willing to distribute for you. Fellow bloggers Affiliate Marketers Guest Blogging As alluded to earlier Keep it relevant to their audience Links from their pages People who would be willing to give you some link “juice.” How can you scratch their back? Can you call in any favors? How would it benefit them?