step 1 - the planning phase - kaysanders.com · kay sanders coaching i i [email protected] 5 step...

Kay Sanders Coaching I www.kaysanders.com I [email protected] 2

STEP 1 - THE PLANNING PHASE

1. Define Your Virtual Summit Theme:

o Narrow down your niche: the more specific you can get the better.

o Research and identify the summit model you want to use: this includes if it’s

going to be a live event, pre-recorded interviews, also, how many guests do you

want to interview, do you want to have only one topic or multiple topics

o Define your customer avatar: this is very helpful in terms of marketing and

promoting the summit. It also is helpful when determining who you would like to

bring on as guest speaker.

o Decide on a summit name/title: it should be a catchy title that makes it clear as to

what type of summit it is and what people would get from it. For example if you

want to host a summit on creating online courses, then the title should convey that

message clearly. I just hosted a summit called “Business Excellence Summit” which

let people know it is a business related summit.

o Buy domain name: you want to make sure that the name you choose is also

available as domain and you want to get the .com domain. If the domain is not

available for the title you choose, I would highly suggest changing the title of your

summit.

For example, my summit title was Business Excellence Summit and the domain was

www.businessexcellencesummit.com

o Create a summit banner: You want to create a nice banner that you can share on

social media and also add to the summit landing page. The banner should have the

summits title and subtitle if you have one, as well as your picture so visitors can see

right away who the host is.

To create a banner you can use Canva.com, Photoshop or any other image editing

software. If you don’t know how to create banners, you can also go onto Fiverr and

pay someone to create a banner for you.

http://www.businessexcellencesummit.com/


2. Plan Your Summit

o When will it take place: decide on a date, I would suggest, plan it 3-4 months out to

give yourself enough time to get everything done in time.

o Free or paid: usually summits are free as it is mainly used as a lead generating

strategy but you can however, offer an up sell to an all access pass. The difference

between free and paid is that with the free version, the interviews are usually only

available for a short time such as 48h. Subscribers do however have the option to

purchase the all access pass which gives them life-long access to the interviews

without any timely restrictions.

o Live or pre-recorded: Both options are great, the only drawbacks with a live event

is that there could be technical difficulties, guest speakers might cancel last minute,

and subscribers may not be available at the time of the summit to join the live

interview. Pre-recorded is more flexible as you can take more time to record all the

interviews, and if there are technical difficulties you can reschedule and re-do the

interview. Pre-recorded is also more convenient for subscribers as they would get

daily emails with the link to the interview and they can listen to the interview when

it is most convenient for them and their busy schedule.

o Decide on the format & get acquainted with the platform: The interviews can be

done in different ways, from audio only, video or even both. For audio you can

record the interviews via Skype or a conference line. For video you could use

applications such as Google HangOut, or Zoom. Get acquainted with the platform

prior to your first interview, you want to make sure you know how to use the

platform.

o How many interviews/speakers: You should decide on how many topics or guest

speakers you want to have part of the summit. Most summits have between 15 and

20 guest speakers but there are also some who have less than 10. You can have

more than 20 but you don’t want to overwhelm the audience either. Instead of

having too many guest speakers, what you can do instead is, make it an annual

event.

o Include affiliate sign up or just for guest speakers: affiliates are beneficial for

promotion; however, you would have to provide the affiliates will all the marketing

material they would need in order to promote the summit. Some might not promote

a free summit but they might if you are offering an all access pass.

o Do you want sponsors: sponsors can help you promote the event which will give

you more exposure. If you do have sponsors however, you have to make sure to


mention your sponsors on your website and give them credit but also make sure it is

a fair deal for you and each of the sponsors. Make it a win, win, situation.

o Decide how to promote: there are different ways you can promote the event and

you should already think about the different ways of how you would like to promote

the event.

o Summit speaker agreement: you want to have a speaker agreement for each

speaker that outlines the relationship as well as what their responsibility is in terms

of promoting the event, if you are offering an all access pass and would like to give

the speakers a commission for promoting, you would include that in the agreement

as well.

o Make a list of experts to contact: think of everyone you would like to interview,

make a list and start reaching out to them. If you don’t know who to bring on as

guest speaker, you can look through your social media friend list and see who would

fit your criteria, you can also connect with experts through LinkedIn and Facebook

by looking at their profile and if they fit your criteria you can reach out to them.

Usually you have to reach out to a lot more than the number of experts you are

looking for because not everyone is interested or it doesn’t fit with their marketing

schedule, or they are too busy. When you do reach out to experts, make sure to

reach out to those who already have a good size list, usually it should be an email list

of at least 3K.


STEP 2 - THE EXECUTION PHASE

1. Create The Website (you can create amazing looking pages with a WordPress Plugin called InstaBuilder)

o Landing page/Home Page: on the landing page you want to have a short video

introducing yourself and the summit. On that page you also want to list all the guest

speakers, all the topics, if you have more than one topic, include registration signup

forms, your short bio, details about the summit i.e. when it launches, how many

days, how is the summit delivered, etc.

o Thank you page: this is the page they come to once they registered, you can add a

short thank you video or just a short text thanking them and give any instructions

such as, join the Facebook group, mark your calendar, etc.

o Order page: this is only needed if you are selling an all access pass.

o Inner pages: the inner pages are for each of the interviews. One these pages you

would include the title, the guest speakers bio, headshot and link to the free gift that

they are offering, the interview video, and any other information you want to

include pertaining to that particular interview. You would create one page for each

interview.

o For all access membership: if you are offering the all access pass you would need

to create a membership option that would be accessible only for those who

purchased the all access pass.

2. Start The Interviews

o Create and send introductory emails to experts: once you have your list of

experts, reach out to them and invite them to be part of your summit.

o Invite speakers who have a good size email list (3-4K preferably): the reason

for inviting speakers with a good list size is that you will be getting more

subscribers than if you choose someone who is either just starting out or who

doesn’t have a list. You also want to make it fair to all the other speakers as they will

get more exposure as well

o Schedule pre-interview calls to screen and build rapport: You want to schedule

a quick call with each expert to build rapport and go over all the details and to make


sure that they are a perfect fit, i.e. willing to promote, have a good size list, are

available.

o Set up calendar and schedule interviews: you can use an online scheduling

service such as TimeTrade for example and send your speakers the link to your

calendar so they can schedule a time that works best for them

o Send speakers the agreement and any other information: Make sure they return

the signed agreement prior to the interview as well as their bio, a headshot and any

free gifts that they might be offering.

o Interview flow and questions: it would be beneficial if you would outline the

overall interview flow and write down a few questions you want to ask each

speaker. This is especially beneficial if you have never done any interviews and you

might get nervous. If you have an outline, it can help you stay on track.

o Edit interviews (if necessary/desired): you can edit the interviews if you would

like and also include an intro and outro to make it look more professional but that is

not required. For audio you can use Audacity which is a free software and for video I

use Corel Video Studio which is a paid software but very inexpensive. If you don’t

know how to edit then you can also find someone that can do it for you.

o Upload interviews, add to website: once you have finished an interview you

would upload it to sites like YouTube or Vimeo but make sure to make it hidden so

no one can view the videos. This is especially important if you are offering an all

access pass because you want to protect your videos so no one can share them or

view them. In Vimeo you can set restrictions that allow the videos to be only played

on your summits website. Once you have uploaded the video you would add the link

to the video to the websites interview pages.

3. Create Promotional Graphics/Materials For Yourself And Guest

Speakers

o Images: this could be images to use for Facebook Ads, or an image for each guest

speaker with your and their headshot

o Banner: the banner can be added to your own website and made available to guest

speakers

o Email templates: create the emails to be sent out daily, as well as any promotional

emails promoting the event for both yourself and the guest speakers


o Social media post templates: create a few promotional social media post for

yourself and the guest speakers

o Newsletter blurb template: create a newsletter blub for guest speakers to include

in their own newsletter

o Flyers: you can create flyers to hand out at events or to friends, co-workers, etc.

o Create promo schedule for guest speakers and yourself: make a plan to promote

the event, start promoting at least 4 weeks prior to the event to give enough time for

promotion. Give the schedule to the guest speakers

4. Affiliate Back Office For Guest Speakers If you are offering an all access pass you can create an affiliate back office where you

make all marketing materials available to your affiliates as well as guest speakers. If you

don’t offer the all access pass and you don’t want any affiliates promoting your event, it

would still be beneficial to have an affiliate back office that helps you track who of the

guest speakers is promoting and who isn’t as well as who is getting the most

registrations.

o Set up affiliate back office

o Upload all marketing material

o Get all guest speakers to sign up

5. Create Autoresponder Email Series You want to have all of the emails written and ready to go prior to promoting the event.

Set up the welcome email which subscribers will receive as soon as they register.

o Advertising email series to own email list

o Welcome email

o Daily emails

o After summit emails

o Create different email series if selling all access pass

6. Create Private Facebook Group (If Desired): A Facebook group is beneficial to build a relationship with the subscribers and all the


guest speakers can be part of that group as well in case attendees have any questions or

would like to connect with any of the speakers.

o Create a group – make it private

o Add link to autoresponder emails

o Make banner for group

o Encourage registrants to join the group (do not add, ask to join)

o Encourage guest speakers to join as well

7. Testing Before you get ready to start promoting, make sure everything works as it should. You

don’t want to wait until you have people registering for your summit just to notice that

something is not working properly.

o Test registration process

o Test all access purchase

o Emails

o Test, test, test


STEP 3 - THE LAUNCH PHASE

o Start promoting 1 month prior: You want to have enough time to get the word out

and also give your guest speakers enough time to promote as well.

o Get promo schedule and materials to guest speakers: This is very helpful as it

helps your speakers promote better. If you leave it up to them how and when to

promote, they most likely won’t promote at all or maybe only once. By giving them a

promotional schedule they know what they are supposed to do, all you have to do is

make sure they promote.

o Make sure guest speakers promote: this can be a bit challenging at times because

people get busy and they might forget. When you post on social media, tag your

guest speakers to remind them they need to promote as well. Send weekly emails at

first and the last week you want to send out daily emails motivating them to

promote the event and you can also offer an incentive, such as a gift card for the

person who promotes the most. You must motivate them and be on them to make

sure they promote. Don’t be afraid to be pushy, this is your event and they agreed to

promote when they signed that agreement. Often times, they are thankful for your

reminders as they might forget.

o Engage with Facebook Group members (if you choose to have a Facebook

Group): If you do decide to create a Facebook Group for your summit, which I

highly recommend, you want to engage with members, during the summit you want

to post each day talking about the interview of the day and ask members to post any

questions, thoughts, or they can share what their take away from that interview

was. Connect with the members as you will be able to build a relationship with them

and they get to know, like and trust you.

o Look for affiliates that can help promote the event (if you choose to have

affiliates): don’t just depend on your guest speakers to promote, if you want to your

summit to be a huge success you might want to find affiliates to help you promote. If

you don’t offer an all access pass where affiliates would get commission, you might

want to offer them something else or you can ask friends and colleagues if they

would like to help you promote. As long as it’s a win-win situation.

o Promote: Facebook event, Facebook or Social Media Ads, Press Release, Flyers,

direct mail, mention it on your website, Blog post, put in email signature, create

videos and share on social media, etc.


o Launch with a BANG!!!!


STEP 4 - POST SUMMIT PHASE

1. Guest Speakers: Just because the summit is over does not mean that you can’t continue leveraging the

relationship you build with each of the guest speakers. There are a lot of possibilities to

collaborate and work together in the future.

o Leverage the new gained relationship – webinars, joint ventures, affiliates, etc.

o Send thank you cards to guest speakers thanking them for their participation

o Send speakers their interviews

2. Summit Attendees: You gained a huge list of subscribers from the summit, now it’s time to nurture that list

and build a relationship and eventually turn them into paying customers.

o Over deliver with content, bonuses, amazing customer service: the more you

can give the better, let them know you care and you want to help them. If you over

deliver they will think: “If I get this much value out of her/his free content how

much more would I get if I would work with him/her???” You might have heard not

to give away too much because then they might not need your help any more but

often times it’s the over delivering that gets you clients because they see the huge

value and that often times means a lot more than just teasing with content.

o Sent a simple survey asking them for feedback: by asking for their feedback, you

can use it to make your next summit even better and it makes your subscribers feel

important because they get to put in their two cents.

o Engage through emails, and Facebook Group: this is very important, once you

have people on your list or in your Facebook Group, you MUST engage with them

even after the summit ended because that’s where you get to turn them into paying

customers. If you don’t engage with them they will quickly forget about you.

Engage, engage, and engage some more!!!

o Offer free session/consultation or invite to webinar, etc – try to convert them

into customers: any events you host such as webinars, workshops, another summit,

you want to invite your subscribers, anything you are giving away for free, you want

to offer to them. If you do coaching or consulting, you can offer a free consultation or


coaching session asking them how you might be of assistance to them.

3. Repurpose: you can repurpose the interviews in different ways to continue benefitting from your

hard work. Just because the summit is over, doesn’t mean you can’t leverage the

interviews in other ways.

o Re-use interviews, or interview content in different ways, blog posts, podcast, kindle

book, e-book, etc)

o Make content evergreen and offer as Lead Magnet or sell as product: this will allow

you to continuously build your list and make sales.

*****

Now you have the entire step-by-step process of how to create and host a virtual summit

and even though there are a lot of steps involved, it is still the best way to grow your list

and make a name for yourself in the online world. So many opportunities can come from

hosting a virtual summit and it is SOOOOO MUCH FUN!!!

If you have any questions about this step-by-step process or if you would like my help in

executing this step-by-step process, please feel free to reach out to me, I’d be happy to help.

To your success,

step 1 - the planning phase - kaysanders.com · kay sanders coaching i i [email protected] 5 step...

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