Innovating and Experimenting in Summits without Breaking Everything
There’s so much talk in online business now about the old, classic strategies not working. Webinars are dead. Challenges are dead. Summits are dead. Email lists are dead... whatever. First of all, I actually think all of those things are incorrect, and I have numbers to back it up. But still, I do think that we need to innovate.
A webinar strategy that worked in 2018 probably needs a decent update before you run it in 2025. And the same goes with summits, we’re not running summits in the exact same style we did back when I started in 2018. We've adapted and updated to what's working now, and you need to too.
It’s important to stay on top of strategies, trends in the industry, and what people are needing and asking for and making tweaks to fit those things. And that's exactly what we're going to talk about today!
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How can you customize your summit without breaking it?
The idea for this topic came up after a Slack support conversation with one of our Launch with a Summit Accelerator® clients. When it comes to customizing your summit strategies, there is a balance here. On one hand, you need the freedom to stay true to yourself and your preferences and your values. And sometimes it’s a give and take. Like with values, I think your values always stay front-and-center, even if it means a bit of a decrease in results.
On the flip side, if you want to do something just because, but doing that thing would lose you $20,000 in all-access pass sales or sales of your course afterward... well, maybe we just don’t do that thing. So how do we achieve that balance?
What I coached my client on with her summit
My Accelerator client that started this conversation is in a very summit-saturated niche. With as saturated as her niche is, it takes more for summits to stand out these days.
My client was thinking about changing up her all-access pass. It involved doubling the price and making it stand out from the standard all-access passes in her niche... but there's a risk to that kind of change.
Instead of focusing on fear and the negative potential, I looked at the potential for what could go right. What if her attendees loved the changes she made to the all-access pass? What if her conversion rates stayed the same, but doubling the price meant doubling the revenue?
Why I coached my summit client this way
I’ve had my hands in hundreds and hundreds of summits; I know the potential risk of messing with something that works. But I could also see that, with this specific situation, it was pretty low risk because of the way she had it set up - and had a really great potential for big results.
But we didn't just assume it would work and not make contingency plans! We wanted to get rid of some of the risk before trying it. In the Launch with a Summit Accelerator®, my coaches and I work closely with clients when registration opens. We have a 1:1 call where we’re looking at data for the registration page: how it’s being used, how far people are scrolling, where they’re clicking. If we’re looking at that data for this client's summit and see, “actually, this change DID cut conversion rates in half,” that’s an easy fix, in my eyes. We have a second version of the page ready with the original format that we'll switch back to and then she'll be good to go.
(And by the way, if you want that level of support and coaching and experienced eyes and feedback on everything you’re doing, you can apply for the Launch with a Summit Accelerator at summitinabox.co/apply!)
What you don't want to experiment with for your virtual summit
I think, in general, if the results of your summit are important to you, there are a few things you don’t want to touch. These things are the core foundational pieces of making an event work:
- Your speaker selection strategy
- The free ticket
- Your all-access pass and overall monetization strategy
- General rules when it comes to positioning a summit - it needs to be specific and attention-grabbing
What can happen when you mess with these elements
When you mess with these core elements that make a summit work well, it really impacts your results. One example is someone who decided to add a low-priced ticket to her summit instead of keeping it free. She was thinking this would lead to extra revenue, but she wasn't considering some of the other factors that come with charging for your summit that negatively impacted her overall results.
Another example is someone who didn’t want to add bonuses and some of our recommended perks to her all-access pass because “my people don’t like bundles or all these extra things." Unfortunately, her all-access pass conversion rate (and therefore, her revenue) tanked because of it.
What you can play around with for your summit
While there are some pieces of the summit strategy I don't recommend messing with, there are some elements that you can have fun experimenting with for your next virtual summit! Things like engagement activities, presentation styles, and your audience or topic are great places to play around in your summits.
Key Takeaways
I’d encourage you to give yourself the space to be creative and have fresh ideas and work them in... but then pause for that gut check. Trying something new can definitely make your summit stand out, but we don’t want it to stand out and look awesome, then not perform for you on the back end.
If you’re someone who does like to get creative and innovate, if you do want to stand out from the other summits in your space, but you don’t want to destroy your results I’d really encourage you to check out our Launch with a Summit Accelerator program. It’s a space where you can run all of your ideas by us and not get shut down just because it’s different than what we teach. Instead, we’ll likely get excited over your idea, walk you through the risks vs. rewards, collaborate to find the balance between your idea and still getting the results, help you create a backup plan in case it doesn’t work, and watch the numbers and results with you to decide if a shift needs to be made to still have a successful summit. If you’re interested you can apply at summitinabox.co/apply or just reach out to me on Instagram if you have any questions!
Resources
- Episode 033: What To Include On Your Virtual Summit Registration Page
- Episode 120: Create an All-Access Pass that Gets Virtual Summit Attendees Hitting 'Buy Now'
- Episode 216: Infuse Your Values into Your Virtual Summit
- Launch with a Summit Accelerator
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