How To Give Back Through Your Virtual Summit

A virtual summit is a powerful way to grow your own business. There's opportunity to make a good amount of money, it's a great way to build your email list, and it's an effective way to increase your reach and gain new client leads.

But you may not have realized that it's also an opportunity for helping other people. And everything we do in our business is more worthwhile if there's also a way that we can give back to others.

So in today's post, we'll talk about 4 ways you can give back and make a real difference through your virtual summit.

1. Give a portion of earnings

The first way you can give back is by donating a portion of your summit earnings.

If you're selling a product or doing an upsell on your summit, you can set aside a percentage of that profit to donate to a cause of your choice. 

Now, it's up to you to decide whether:

• a) this is something that you advertise to let attendees know that a part of their purchase is going towards something good or
• b) if you do it as something for yourself and either announce it later or choose not to.

For example, during my first summit I decided to donate a portion of my earnings to Mission of Hope Haiti. I ended up donating $2,000 to them in the name of my summit attendees.

This wasn't something that I advertised while people were signing up for the summit, but was something that I announced in the community after making the donation. Everyone was so grateful, many saying they wished they would have known earlier.

It also created a strong sense of community, as I had several attendees who had been involved with or even adopted children through Mission of Hope!

It was a great way to give back and do something good through something that was doing a lot to move my business forward.

If this is a route you'd like to take, here are a few tips:

1. Identify what cause(s) you'd like to donate to
2. Decide how much you'll give - will it be a flat fee, a percentage of your profits, an amount that just feels right?
3. Determine whether this will be something you advertise up front, announce after the fact, or keep to yourself
4. If it's something you'll advertise or announce, add related tasks to your summit task list 

2. Work toward a mission

The second way to give back through your virtual summit is to work toward a specific mission. There are a couple ways you can go about this.

An opportunity for attendees to learn + give back

First, you and your summit attendees can work towards a specific goal that benefits others.

For example, you could work all work together to create a brand strategy, brand, and website for a non-profit or cause that you care about.

Or you could organize groups in certain cities to work for a cause. This could be anything from gathering donations to teaching young girls how to code.

Progress toward a goal that benefits attendees

You could also work towards a specific goal to benefit your attendees and solve a problem they have in their own lives or businesses.

If you plan your summit with a problem they have in mind and have a goal to fix it, you're making a big difference in solving a problem they may not have been able to solve without you.

Making a difference for the people attending your summit is another great way to give back through what you're doing.

3. Giveaways

This is a fun one and it's simply hosting giveaways throughout the event. You can choose to give prizes to people who are attending, interacting and making it great.

This may not feel like as big of a difference-maker as donating earnings, but it's still a way to give back to the people who are supporting you and your summit and it adds a layer of fun and excitement.

In my summits, I like to give away daily prizes to people who are interacting, taking action, and making it fun. And it's not anything big. Sometimes I give away books related to the summit's topic, a piece of software, free access to the upsell, or entry into a 30-day mastermind.

Any kind of giveaway makes your event more fun and it's another way to give back.

4. Scholarships

And last are scholarships. This is one I'm passionate about because it gives your attendees who are involved in your summit and working hard to see progress a chance to take it all a step further when they may not have been able to afford it themselves.

The way I look at scholarships is free entry into one of your products or services. One that is designed to make a difference for your audience and relates closely to your summit's topic.

And as a note, I do recommend you position this as a "scholarship", rather than a giveaway. You should also have interested attendees apply for the chance to receive a scholarship.

Your application process doesn't have to be anything intense, but you'll want to make sure that the scholarships you're giving are going to people who you can truly help, will take it seriously, and will value the gift you're giving them.

You can choose your scholarship winners based on things like:

• Who applies first and is qualified
• Who takes specific actions or reaches certain goals during the summit

I like to give scholarship entries based on actions my attendees take during my summits and then do drawings from that pool of people.

Take this opportunity to brainstorm how you'll give back through your virtual summit

While hosting a summit can do a lot to benefit your own business, I urge you to take a step back and think how you can you use it to benefit others as well. During your next summit, try incorporating at least one of these things and see how it goes for you.

Take time now to brainstorm and write down ideas you've had while reading this post!

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