Use Seminar Marketing to Boost Sales 500%
by bobrichards ~ January 16th, 2009. Filed under: seminars.The most underutilized marketing method by financial advisors is seminar marketing. While you may think that most financial advisors use seminar marketing, very few do. And those who do, use seminars incorrectly.
Most financial advisors “close” one new client at a time. Do you go to the bowling alley to knock down one pin at a time or do you get a better score when you knock down all ten pins simultaneously? Financial seminar marketing is marketing and selling to several people at once. It allows you to multiply your success by leveraging yourself. Why has this never occurred to you or why haven’t you pursued this?
Because you probably do what your first mentor told you to do. You gain business in the same ways as everyone else. But some of your competition earns 500% of what you earn because they use seminar marketing to present to several people at once. Consider this example. Most real estate agents start their career by farming an area with mailings or cold calling seeking to list one property at a time. The alternative is to send an invitation into the same neighborhood, “Thinking of selling your home? Attend and learn 10 ways to get 20% more for your property.” Maybe 15 people show up to the seminar and as a result, the agent gets 7 listings over the next year. Now that’s time leverage. This agent will earn several times more than the agent who prospects for business one client at a time. And the same is true for financial advisors and insurance agents.
If you’ve ever taken any sales training, you know that there are four steps to every sales conversation:
1) attention,
2) interest,
3) desire,
4) action.
At a financial seminar, you can take a whole room full of people through the first 3 steps. You may need to meet individually to complete step 4—action by your prospect. However, I have been to some financial seminars here all 4 steps are completed with the entire room.
For example, the financial seminar presenter has their book or kit or program for sale at the back of the room. At the end of the presentation, the presenter offers some limited free item (he has fewer free items than there are people in attendance) and these free items will be given to the first 10 people who buy. Immediately, there’s a rush to the back of the room. You can use this type of marketing to sell an item, a service or have people set appointments with you at the end of your financial seminar presentation.
So what stops you from doing this type of marketing?
If you’re afraid of the expense, you can start a financial seminar marketing program for $2500, most of which will be postage for3,000 invitations sent to your target market. The profits from the first seminar pay for the next and so on. So the investment is tiny compared to the rewards.
Maybe you’re afraid of speaking in public. No problem, you don’t need to do the speaking. Hire a professional. I have successfully found speakers by advertising on elance.com or through specialty ezines read by professional speakers. A professional seminar speaker does not need to be an expert in your discipline—they only need to know enough to make the financial seminar presentation and get the audience fired up for action.
Or maybe you don’t know where to start. Just access the collection of articles from financial seminar marketing and you’ll get an unparalleled education and be a seminar marketing expert in no time.
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June 21st, 2009 at 7:56 pm
I never thought about hosting a seminar before, Im sure it would generate a lot of interest. However, anyone planning to do this should follow the 4 steps listed above because if the seminar is not what people are looking for it could negatively affect your reputation.
July 4th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
This is quiet interesting, I would love to try it but does it really work? Like the title says, “Use Seminar Marketing to Boost Sales 500%”, I don’t think this applies to all niches.
July 9th, 2009 at 4:24 am
My father used to use seminars back when he was a stock broker. He frequently mentioned the success he gained from them. I may start using them as well soon.
- Heartland Energy Colorado
August 28th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
I remember once trying seminars as a marketing strategy to bring new customers to one of our trading firm, and the common customers’ response was: “If you are making money from trading, why would you waste your time on seminars”? So we’ve started making these seminars for free and indeed saw a heavy new customer traffic. What I’m trying to say is that seminars are important, but their structure and pricing need to be taken into consideration.
August 31st, 2009 at 8:06 pm
Very nice information but till now never thaught that seminars are this much useful but I dont think that this applies to all….but I wish to try marketing in this manner….
October 23rd, 2009 at 5:26 am
An investment in real estate education is an investment in your financial future.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:47 am
Would you mind elaborating on how you come up with 500%
November 6th, 2009 at 10:27 pm
Great post; but what do you do when your business is not a model that could benefit from a seminar? I just wanted to add that your blog has a lot of useful information that could help almost any business model.
November 19th, 2009 at 8:47 pm
Hi Bob, great post. I’ve been meaning to organise a seminar for quite some time now but I don’t really fancy speaking in public. I’ve just checked out elance.com and hopefully I will be able to get someone to do it for me!
November 20th, 2009 at 9:59 am
Recently, we helped a financial planning firm with their seminar marketing by combining a real live chef demo with food sampling and cooking instruction. Their guests loved it, it created buzz and they had clients there to make everyone feel comfortable. They used a prospecting firm to put bums in seats, then they invited clients and asked them to bring friends. All in all, everyone had a great time. They closed 25% of the leads in one week and another 50% asked for future meetings. Everybody wants to come back and bring others. The financial advisors only spoke for 30 minutes over a 2 hour evening. They spoke frankly and limited use of PPTs to keep it as real and sincere as they could. It worked. They had a successful event, created buzz and had a great time.
November 21st, 2009 at 11:00 pm
Nice article about seminars.
Seminar can be a good promotional tools for your business.
You can give out a free seminar for your audience and let them decide if the product you are selling is good for them.
Thanks again and goog luck.
December 22nd, 2009 at 9:56 pm
I think the biggest block that stops people from doing this type of marketing is the fear of speaking in public. Presentation in a seminar is key and for that reason I’d definitely recommend hiring a professional speaker if you’re not completely confident in this aspect of your own ability.
January 13th, 2010 at 8:29 am
Your not the first person to tell me about the success of seminar marketing. I need to start doing it for my own businesses.
January 17th, 2010 at 2:02 am
I have been playing with the idea of offering web seminars, but haven’t pulled the trigger yet. Your entry is helpful. I know for sure that in person seminars and free tutorials on various legal issues often are used to bring in potential clients, but I am not 100% certain that the legal field is actually ready for online seminars. Care to respond?
March 5th, 2010 at 7:28 pm
very nice info for business man..
seminars is good for beginer
March 8th, 2010 at 12:30 am
Seminars give you the time with your prospects to let them sell themselves and do not offer the chance for the customer to build up any personal objections to you as a person. Also gives the customer the sense of vaule due to the buy in of other people.
March 15th, 2010 at 8:40 pm
I’m definitely agree that financial seminars are the most effective tool for marketing your business.
April 8th, 2010 at 7:09 am
I think the same it is very important make good the first 3 steps, the arrive the 4 steps that is the conversion that is the more difficult. Thanks for your post
April 28th, 2010 at 11:53 am
seminars will be good for big companies. Is there any affordable way of marketing for small business,
may be social networking and marketing website will work for small businesses
April 29th, 2010 at 8:30 am
Wouldn’t it be much harder to setup seminar marketing then selling to one client at a time?
May 3rd, 2010 at 1:29 am
marketing is a vital factor in a business success so every businessman should be focusing on this area. thanks for the helpful post.
May 3rd, 2010 at 9:33 pm
If cost is an issue consider doing a joint seminar with a business offering complimentary services or targeting the same market - spilt the cost and increase your prospects.
May 5th, 2010 at 9:24 am
With seminars u can make 10 sales at once, hence its harder but more beneficial.
May 26th, 2010 at 11:21 am
I appreciate this post. Seminar Marketing can be a lot of fun and extremely profitable, if you do it right!
May 27th, 2010 at 1:59 am
Hosting a seminar involves a lot of spending on marketing it. Wouldn’t it be a risky venture by itself? A company can end up loosing money if there aren’t enough prospects attending a seminar after all the investment in the marketing.
June 3rd, 2010 at 5:11 pm
Seminars do work, and I see too many of them. You wonder if they actually make money doing what they are talking about doing, or if their preferred way & easiest way of making money, has now become seminars!
June 4th, 2010 at 4:48 am
I like your idea of hiring someone to do the speaking from elance. Very creative.
June 18th, 2010 at 2:56 am
Seminars are a great way to spark interest and motivate buyers and help to educate them as well. It would be very beneficial for your business as it provides an opportunity to connect with your future clients and perhaps even get a bit of feedback for later projects!
June 23rd, 2010 at 10:34 pm
I am an accountant and never tried seminars, I think I have just been persuaded to give one a go!
June 30th, 2010 at 5:23 am
Seminars helped me get started, they helped me learn the basics of marketing and promoting myself and my business. They are very useful and I used to visit them at least once a month they were priceless.
July 7th, 2010 at 11:16 am
I think seminars are best for marketing and finance industries.