Eight Great Ways to Fill a Workshop in a Bum EconomyWritten by Suzanne Falter-Barns
Yes, you can fill a workshop when spending is down and buyers are wary. If your topic is clear, your marketing materials well-done, your product solid and your title catchy, success shouldn’t be tough. The fact is that people are as hungry as ever for inspiration and stimulus a workshop provides, even when they’re nervous about money. And even though most bum economies recover over time, you may find following tricks helpful enough to keep using even in good times!1. Tailor workshop to economy. In other words, acknowledge problem. So if your workshop is about helping women over 50 live their dreams, change it to Living Your Dreams Over 50 … Even When Economy is Down. Or make it about finding your dreams after being laid off, or managing fear while pursuing your dreams in a poor economy. Your fundamental message doesn’t have to change … you just dress it up in slightly different clothing. 2. Use unconventional marketing methods. Advertising and flyers may not be most effective way to enroll a workshop in lean times. For one thing, affordable ads are not usually big enough to effectively describe a workshop, unless it’s very targeted and easy to ‘get’, i.e. quitting smoking, or stress-reduction. If you’re teaching motivational or inspirational work, consider using an affiliate program, viral email marketing, distributing articles through targeted ezines, working your personal network, or making yourself available as a guest on local TV or radio talk shows. Best of all is a combination of all of above. 3. Make your niche one with a pipeline. Be careful not to pick a tiny niche market that is hard to access. Instead, a good rule of thumb is to look for a niche market with marketing channels already in place. For instance, one successful workshop leader I know targets retirees on RV-Camping circuit. Many US campgrounds offer classes and other stimulating perks to visitors, and since RV’ers often stay for several nights or even weeks, this makes a workshop a likely hit. She simply has to talk to management, and they put her workshop in place for her. Participants magically show! Hospitals with neighborhood ‘wellness’ programs, bookstores with evening events, and community center Teen programs are also good venues. 4. Pitch a co-operative venture with another business. One fun way to reach your niche is to approach another business’s clientele. For instance, if you’re offering stress-reduction workshops, arrange a tie in with local health club or weight loss group. Look for businesses that attract people who would logically be drawn to your product as well. Then approach that business and offer something great. You can sell them your workshop at a reduced rate (a special offer just for their members, which they can use as a perk.) Or you could hold a workshop on their premises at your usual fee, and pay them a percentage of gate. Or you could simply offer to exchange advertising plugs for each other’s business’s. (This works well if you communicate with your clients via an email newsletter or direct mail.)
| | Love What You DoWritten by Deirdre McEachern
Copyright 2001-2003 by Deirdre McEachern. May be distributed if full attribution is given and copyright notice is included."To love what you do and feel that it matters, how on earth could anything be more fun?" --Katherine Graham Susan had been working in computer industry since college (8-10 years) and though she was financially and professionally successful, she felt dissatisfied with her career. Her heart was just not in it anymore. Susan did a brave thing - she decided to make effort to pursue a career change. For about six months she worked to uncover her core interests, identify her values, test her natural abilities, and outline parameters required for fulfilling work for her. Making a change at this point in her career was a risk and process took time but Susan tells me it was well worth effort. Susan made a move from computer database programming into bio-informatics and is now working on a life saving new medical product. Susan had always had an interest in biology and human medicine. Sadly, she had put her interests and values on shelf after she completed graduate school, like many of us, because job market was tight when she entered work force. By finding work that felt meaningful to her, Susan has started a new career that fits who she is along with what she believes in and what she can do.
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