Ep127 Running a LIVE limited launch for your course

 

In today's episode, I'm going to be running you through all of the different ingredients that you need to run a really exceptional, limited launch.

The first time I ran a limited launch was the moment that I knew that this business was going to be the path I was going to take for the next chapter in my life.

I've done about 18 limited launches now - I’ve tried & tested so many different launch strategies, on myself and also for my Empire Builder clients. We have had multiple six figure launches now, and so many five figure launches, especially from people that are doing it for the first time.

 I've created a whole course about this, Limited Launch Formula, which is now officially out this week! I’m so super pumped to share this with you because, I know it works.

In this episode, you will learn: 

  • The ingredients for a successful limited launch
  • My past launch stories
  • Limited Launch Formula short course!

 

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Resources:

Limited Launch Formula Checklist: https://www.tinatower.com/checklist 

Limited Launch Formula course: https://www.tinatower.com/limitedlaunch 

Kajabi - https://app.kajabi.com/r/XqN7VFxG/t/ptjcqqil 

Hotjar - https://www.hotjar.com/ 

Later.com - https://later.com/ 

Facebook Creator Studio - https://business.facebook.com/creatorstudio

 

 

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Show Transcription: 

 

The first time I ran a Limited Launch was the moment that I knew that this business was going to be the path that I was going to take for the coming years for that next kind of chapter in life. And sometimes I think you need those moments to be able to go, oh my gosh, it's actually real. And for me, I had been running online programmes for about six or nine months already, and decided to do like a proper live limited launch. I was in Thailand at the time, it was when I was travelling around the world. And it was seven days, and I opened the cart, and I did all the things, not really knowing what I was supposed to be doing, but trying everything, close to the cart, and had made $11,000 in that week. And that, to me, was a revelation. There was just this moment in going, I had seen people doing it, and I didn't know whether it was going to be possible for me. I, I, you know, you guys follow along with me, I'm not like one of the cool kids, you know. I'm not super trendy, I'm dorky, I'm geeky. I'm a middle aged, slightly overweight woman. Like it's just not the online.

Sort of, like hat-trick. However, that $11,000 to me, without really knowing what I, what I'd done. And without really experimenting was the moment where I knew, okay, this is gonna work. This is so much better than service based business where you're trading time for money, instead of money for value, and having to work for every single second, and every single cent that you're trying to get. And so from there, I've made it my mission for the last three years to experiment with live launches, and to be able to go, Okay, how can we get this perfect. And so I've done about 18 limited launches now. And I've created a whole course about it Limited Launch Formula, which is actually out this week. 

So today's episode, I'm going to be running you through all of the different ingredients that you need to run a really exceptional, Limited Launch. And then if it's something that you're like, you know what I want to be able to do that you can jump on over, you can grab the course, and then you can do it too. So this is something that, you know, I've tested on myself and experimented many, many times, but also with my Her Empire Builder clients. And we have had multiple six figure launches now. And so many five figure launches, especially from people that are doing it for the first time. And so it's something that I know works I'm super pumped about, and I am ready to share it with you now.

If you have never done a limited launch before, it can be something that looks a little bit scary. it is very much, It's kind of exposing. You're having to show up for your community, you are having to put on a performance. And when I say put on a performance, I do not mean for a second be someone you're not. What I mean is you have to bring maximum energy, and you have to show up purposefully. So in a way you are performing. I like to think of it like a Broadway show where you're spending all this time training in your offseason, you're getting ready, you know the scripts, you know the customers, you know everything you know the feeling that you want to leave people with at the show. Then your limited launch is your time on stage. You're stepping into that spotlight, you're allowing yourself to shine. You're illuminating the parts of you that you're wanting your customers to see so that you can show them that you are super passionate about what you do and that you can deliver on your transformation promise because what a limited launch does is It's like a magnifying glass on your business. So normally like we're in such a noisy environment. So if you've got evergreen courses or things that are always there, you don't have that scarcity element. So you're not opening and closing, there's no reason for people to jump in right now. And then when you're doing unlimited live launch, it is the time where the volume goes up, the show is big, and anyone that's on the periphery that's been watching along, really gets a chance to see what you're actually made of. They get the chance to say, hey, is this someone that I want to work with, and the thing that I need help with is this the person that's going to be able to be my guide. So I love it for that chance. I also love it because I only do two live launches a year. So when I first started my first 18 months, I did one every 12 weeks, so four times a year, each quarter, that's a lot. If anyone's done a lot of them, it's, it's a lot. It doesn't sound like a lot, it's kind of like oh, like eight day live launch, and then 11 weeks off. But it comes around really, really quickly. And if you're doing your launch, right, then it's going to be really loud. And so you need to love up your customers in the meantime, and really offer that massive value and get people excited. So that when you do open those doors people are they're going, Finally, yeah, this is my kids, and then they can jump in because they know you're going to close the doors soon, it's gonna be a whole other six months. But I do think until you get traction, like if you haven't lived launched before, it's a really good idea to do it every 12 weeks for that first kind of four, or five, or even six launches, and then to taper it back. Because you've got to get traction. And launching in itself is one of the best marketing activities that you can actually do. Because it's so concentrated, and you're putting so much effort and you're putting so much strategy into it. And so often I see people that are watching their businesses or running online courses, and the strategy element just isn't there, they're winging it, they're going, you know what, I'm just going to show up and do my thing and see what happens, which you know, is okay, but you're going to do so much better, with good strategy behind you. Because it means that you're spending your time, energy, and effort purposefully on things that are going to get you a massive return and are going to impact your customers in the most positive way. And that's what I'm all about. 

Alright, so what I want to run you through is the process with how to run the limited Launch Formula. So if you want this checklist, go to Tinatower.com/launch. And you can get everything that I'm talking about today, like in an abbreviated form in a free checklist. 

Alright, so the first thing is set up. Now, when you are setting out, here's the interesting thing about launching. The actual show, so the actual eight days of live launching, all the hard work has been done before that if you've set it up, right, so if you're scrambling during lunchtime, and you're like, Oh my gosh, I got to do this, I got to do that, I got to write this email, I gotta put that social media thing out, like all the things. You've like really stitched yourself up. All of the effort should come before you actually go live on your launch. Because that way during your launch, you can be 100% dedicated to your customers. So when you're doing this volume of marketing, you're going to get a lot of questions, people are going to be sending you messages on Instagram and emails and Facebook saying, Hey, is this right for me, here's my situation, and you want to be ready and available to be able to serve. So you want to have everything set up beforehand. So in the setup, you want to go through you know, the things like your goals, how many people you trying to impact, how many people you're trying to reach. That's going to set up the whole thing, and then you're going to go completion backwards. Because it's no point in going you know what I want to do a six figure launch, but I'm not sure I really want to put myself out there. I don't think I want to do live video. And I don't think I want to do webinars because that's really confronting. So, you know, it's cause and effect. If you want the big results, you got to take the big scary actions, because that is where the field really lessens. So what I find time and time again, is you will look at people that are super successful. And if you actually look at what they do, like always remember success leaves clues, who said that was it Richard Branson, someone said that that's fabulous. But if you look at what they do, a lot of people aren't willing to do the things that they've done to get to where they are. And so I give you the whole limited Launch Formula. But still, I know some people are going to hold back on it, and that's okay. But just know, the results are going to be effective. I've seen people go, you know what I'm going to do that, but I'm not going to show up live daily, that's fine. Totally your choice, you can do business, however you want to do it, I'm all for choosing what's going to suit you the best, but you won't get as good a result. So you have to kind of take that on to go, you can pick and choose. But if you do all the things, you're gonna get maximum results. 

And sometimes I go, I've got to get over myself in order to do those things. So I used to be so scared when I first started doing limited launches. I've never gone live on social media before I was like, What? What do you mean, and then I discovered, you can go live on social media and people they're on the other side, watching and listening. And I mean, that's amazing. I've been in business for many, many years. And I used to, like pound the pavement with flyers, you know, use the most old school of marketing techniques. And now I go, we've got this thing available to us. That is right there in our pockets, where we can reach and communicate with our perfect customer, We can have conversations with them, we can add massive value. So simply with a button, like it is amazing. And so if you focus if you're feeling like you know what I'm not sure whether I want to go live on video, or webinar, or whatever it is, if you focus on your customer, focus on the impact that you can make for them, that's going to allow you to really have that preference above your fear. So when we're feeling fearful of it, and when we're feeling trepidatious, about doing the things that we've never done before, your purpose has to be greater than your fear to move you through that kind of icky feeling. Because we will always feel it, you'll always sit there at the start, like I remember when I started webinars, and I was like, oh, at the start, you know, playing the songs and doing deep breathing. Like just trying to get through. And then once you know the show started, I was always fine. But the lead up to it, like the night before webinar, I wouldn't sleep and replaying it over and over in my head, I was so scared about it. But I always went with you know what, even if there's three people on my webinar, and this is a point too, I showed up in the same way as whether there was two people, or 200 people. And I think that's really important is to act at the beginning exactly as you would if you had 1000s of people on there. Because even that one person, if one person shows up, they deserve your time. I mean, hell, once I ran a webinar, nobody showed up, and I still ran it just in case someone was going to click on halfway through. Nobody did. Anyway, it was a good practice run. But we've all been there. I hope. That was before I learned all of this cool stuff about digital marketing anyway, hoping to shortcut your success for you. 

But my point is, if you focus on the impact you can make, and if there's only a few people on there, even with a few people on there, you can give tips, you can give different things that are going to resonate with someone that's going to make their life just that little bit easier, that's going to be able to give them that massive value. And that is worth it. You have so much unique knowledge and expertise inside your brain that if you can share it with people, you're going to smooth out the path for them. Be the lawn mower. Go over the grass and make it nice and smooth for the people that are coming in after you. 

Okay, so set up. So first thing you can do with your goals, you're going to do all of your videos. So you need lots of different videos, you need your sales page, your welcome page, your course videos. There's lots of different videos that you're going to need for your social media videos, there's about eight different videos plus your course videos. So work out all the videos that you need. Knowing that when you put a video on a landing page, it's going to convert more highly. So it's worth doing it when you're doing promo videos, keep them under 60 seconds, keep them short and sweet, focus on your customer and the benefits and you will be fine. You're then going to look at all your funnels, you're going to get all your marketing in order, you're gonna get your offer, irresistible. So where a lot of people come done it and undone is not having their offer perfect. And you know, a good offer is always an experimentation you're going to work out where the value lies and what people are perceiving as high value and what they're not. I mean in limited Launch Formula, one of our bonuses is Canva templates. So for a lead magnet for webinars, I give the templates and this was something you know, I love camera and I'm very designing and I create things quite quickly and easily. And it always blows my mind how much people love the templates. Like, really like anything like, did you know this gold, I've put in this course that people like. But then the templates are like, Oh my gosh, this is the best thing.

So you want to figure out for your customers like what's really going to make them go, Oh, my gosh, this is fantastic. This is saving me a lot of time and money. This is really helpful. Give people what they want. So figure out the launch offer, making sure that you're putting in not only what people want, but what you know they need to get that result. Because remembering online courses are really, really simple. You are just getting people from point A to point B in the simplest, quickest way possible. That's it. So you've just got to figure out how you can do that, and how you can package it for a win-win for everybody. So you always want your customers to feel like they're getting the best deal. Like oh, my gosh, this was so much exceptional value, this was the best thing ever. But it's a win-win, you know, it's going to be worth your time and money, you know, it's going to be worth their time and money. So you're putting together your beautiful offer with that as well. 

Then you're going to create your lead magnet. So lead magnet pre-launch is so important in being able to grow your email list. So unless you're super famous on Instagram, email list is going to give you it's like directly proportionate to launch results. So so much effort has to be put into how to grow your email list. I mean, even now with me saying go to tinatower.com/launch, you're going to get that free checklist. Now that free checklist is going to be super valuable to you, it's going to make it so much easier for you to go from. But what it's going to give you is the whole list of everything that you need to do, but it's not going to show you how to do it. How to do it, you're going to get from Limited Launch Formula course. So it makes it the perfect lead magnet. Because for people that already know how to do all the things, it's giving you a beautiful abbreviation for people that don't, it's going okay, here's everything that I need to do. But I want to shortcut it, I don't want to do all the experimentation, I want to know exactly what to do, when to do it, how to do it, show me. And so it leads perfectly into that next stage. So for you to create your perfect lead magnet, you've got to look at what do your customers need and want and what's going to lead perfectly into your offer. There is no point in creating a lead magnet that doesn't seamlessly lead into that next step of your offer. So you're doing your lead magnet next, then you're creating your webinar. So you're going to do your webinar during your live launch. Some people will do up to three webinars, I like to just do one, I just do my one hero webinar, all roads in that two weeks before lead to webinar. My webinar conversions are high, very high. Now, I think some of that is because of only running one. So there's not heaps of different options to come to different times, there's just the one live one that I put all of the effort into. 

The other thing is actually teaching valuable information. So you don't want people to get on and go, Oh my gosh, she's wasting my time, she's just selling me stuff, you want to really be able to go, I value your time highly, I'm going to teach you something tangible that you're going to be able to leave with. But also if you want to go deeper with this, they're going to know you're the perfect person to do it. Because you've given them so much value, but still left it open ended to go, there is so much more that we can do. So you're gonna do your webinar, set up your whole webinar pipeline. So for me, I use zoom, and then I build the whole pipeline on Kajabi. So the opt in page, it's going to have all your automations so that everything in launch is automated. I like to automate absolutely everything except customer correspondence passed to the automated emails. So I don't do like canned responses to messages and emails and that sort of thing. I make sure everything is pre-planned and automated that can be so that in that launch period, it's it's me, I'm there, I'm showing up the people because that is what you have to do to be able to connect with people and to raise that level of trust, so that they know that you're the right person to help them where they want to go.

So after you've done all of your webinar, you've set all that up, it's then time to go Okay, let's get ready for success and start some marketing. So your pre-planning, like I said, all of your emails, so all of the daily emails that go out through your whole launch, you're going to write them all beforehand and schedule them all to go out. Because you don't want each day to be going okay, what am I going to be saying now? Because you're going to repeat yourself or you're going to feel like what am I supposed to say? So in Limited Launch Formula, I give email, swipe copy so people can see the strategy behind it because you've got to have strategy, it's taking people on this journey through launching going, Hey, here's my credibility, here's how I can help you, here's people like you have done this and this is the results that they've been able to get. Here's some information for you. So you can see and make a well planned decision. So it's, it's taking people on this journey so that people know what it is that you're offering. Because so often I see people and you go, like, everything's so fancy, or, you know, you can't tell straight away is this right for me. So you want to be really clear and really strategic with the way that you are emailing people throughout your launch as well. Then you're going to set up your live launch schedule. So I'm a big fan of going live, every day of that eight day launch is one of the most highly converting things that you can do. So whether your main channel is Instagram or Facebook or LinkedIn, pick your channel, go live, every day, teach something valuable, so that you can connect with people, answer questions, and invite them into the next step. So good, if you don't do it, you're gonna miss out. Social media is just like the most highly leveraged, beautiful way to market our businesses and connect with our customers. You can go simultaneously live on all the channels. So I actually push it out to Facebook and Instagram at the same time. Because I want to have as much reach as possible. If I'm going to spend the time and energy, I want to be able to connect with the most amount of people as possible. 

So we do that, then if you're doing affiliates, you're going to set up all of your affiliates, you're going to make relationships with them, you're going to give them all the marketing materials that they need, do all of that you're going to get on other people's podcasts and Insta live so that you can start talking about what's coming and start really seeing that excitement in there as well. 

And then you're going to make your beautiful sales page, sales pages! Now, let me tell you, by the time someone gets to the sales page, you've done work before that, right. So yes, some people will find you organically through Google. But for a lot of it, they're going to hear you on a podcast or your podcast or see on social media or have got your lead magnet. So you've got a little bit of the relationship before then. So a sales page isn't the be all, end all, but it can make or break him. So you want to really think about your messaging, making sure that's clear. And making sure your copy is appropriate for the customers that you're attracting. Set up your whole customer journey so that when someone purchases from you, that's their first indication of being in your world. So you want to make sure that you're welcome is right there that you're making people feel comfortable, like they've made the right decision. And you've set it up in a way that's going to give people a quick win straight away so that they know that they've invested well, that they're going to get the return that they wanted. That you are the person that's going to be able to do that for them. 

And then I'm a big fan of Hot Jar as well, measuring with Hot Jar. Because I used to make changes to my homepage and my sales page and different things going I think this would work better and change things but not really knowing is this gonna work or not. And so Hot Jar actually measures all, doesn't measure it, like gives you heat maps of what people are clicking on the most, and it records sessions on there. So not like the people records, like someone's behaviour, where they're scrolling, where they're stopping where they're clicking, so that you know what elements are they skipping through and what ones are really resonating with people so that you can make those changes to encourage the behaviour on your sales page that you want people to take. And that's how I know that videos work really well. It's how I know where to put dense text and when to put really spread out text, when to put big headings, when to put small headings. It's because we've experimented with so much and looked at raw data for our pages and for our clients pages. So it makes a huge difference. Go for Hot Jar. It will be worth it like listening to this email just listening to this podcast just for that.

Then you're programming in your social media marketing. So you're working out what are your short links gonna be, create that for Instagram, like you don't want to have you know your website forward slash dadda dadda dadda dadda. With your course name, you want to have a short URL and redirect it to that sales page. Make it easy so that when you're on Instagram lives when you're on other people's podcasts, you can say that URL and people can go there really easily. Then you're going to create all your social posts. I'm a big fan of Canva. So we map it all out on there. And then you can schedule either straight from Canva or use something like Later or just use it natively in Facebook Creator Studio. But having everything all well thought out and this is the same thing. You know, I've got an Limited Launch Formula with the Canva templates for the social media that we use throughout launch with the captions so that you can see the journey that we take people on throughout the launch because sometimes it’d be really hard to go, Okay, what am I supposed to be saying? How am I going to do that? And really, I gotta say the same thing again. You're repeating yourself quite a bit. Yes. But always the concern with people with social media is, am I going to overload people and people are going to get sick of me, are people gonna get mad that I keep marketing to them. And if you have done your job right in the offseason, so yes, if you do a launch like this, and then you ghost people for months, people will unfollow people, you'll get a bad rep. Like, it's just not cool. But if you've spent six months providing massive value, showing up providing content, a weekly podcast, newsletters, Facebook posts, Instagram posts, going live, answering people's questions, serving people time and time again, then doing that one week live, you can be forgiven for that. Because really, one of my friends, Colin Boyd has this beautiful thing that he says selling is serving. And I believe it wholeheartedly. You need to put your offers in front of people, because they're looking for what you've got. And so if you don't give them that shortcut, you're actually doing a disservice. So I know, yes, a lot of people do all of these courses, they do all of this stuff, they get all hyped up. And they're like, okay, I've made my perfect course, I built my list, I've done all this, and then go to launch and go, I don't know what to do, what to actually do. And I get people coming to me time and time, again, that have done multiple courses about online courses, and still don't know what to do. And this is where Limited Launch Formula came from is it's our look aside, it's probably one of the most practical and boring courses I have made. Because instead of it being all about hype, it is practical, it's alright, open your screen on Kajabi. Click here, go here, click this, do this load this, I'm showing you how to schedule I'm showing you how to use Canva. With social media templates, I'm showing you how to create the emails, I'm showing you how to sequence them, I'm showing you how to make webinar pipelines, like it's actually walking you through step by step by step. But to me that was super important, because what I wanted to do was give something that people finished and got a result. And that's what I think online courses should be all about. Unless you're doing things that are like blatantly personal development mindset which there is a total place for and I love them. But if you're looking to do online courses, and to launch, you want to get something that's really practical, that's going to give you a result. So that is why like it's very granular, we show the order of posting, how to do good photography, all of that sort of thing. And that is important. You want to make sure when you're doing a live launch that you've got appropriate photography for that. That was last week's episode on her Empire Builder podcasts. So if you haven't listened to that one, and you're looking to do a good photoshoot go back and listen to that one, there'll be very helpful. 

If you have launched before, and you've had people through your course, you want to have interviews with existing members, so that you can get their testimonials and use those videos in your marketing. And you want to schedule them for each day of launch or better yet, if you can get them on live with you get them on live, because that is also super highly converting. So once you've set that up, you set up your social media marketing, your sales pages, all your other marketing, your webinar, your lead magnet and all of your things on Kajabi, then you're ready to actually launch. So you want to spend, you know, two weeks is like the quickest you could possibly do all of that. But ideally, you want to give yourself kind of six weeks to be able to programme all of that in nicely, then you're ready to launch. So launch, the biggest thing is remembering all the hard stuffs been done, everything's programmed. So then it's you going day by day, here's how you're going to show up, here's how you're going to manage your energy. Here's how you're going to go live. Here's how you're going to connect with all of your customers. 

So you want to really focus, I mean, all of it in launch is just customer focused. I mean all of it, all the time is customer focused, but a lot of the back end and the admin has already been done so that you can perform well and have the energy to really communicate it to the people that need to hear it. So you're running your launch through and then after launch is also super important. So usually when you're finishing your launch, and you know your launch, one of my most exciting things about launch is the uncertainty. And I know a lot of people hate uncertainty. But I find it so incredibly exciting. Like there's nothing else like it where you like, you know, I know the patterns after launching so many times. I know what's gonna happen on day one and day two and day three and day four. But every launch throws you a curveball somewhere, you never quite know what's going to happen. And that's what makes it so exciting is you're like, Oh my gosh, like, what result can we actually get here. And so managing your energy and being detached from the outcome in a way, and I know, when I say detach from the outcome, I've, I've been the breadwinner of our family for a long time. So when I started launching, it was kind of like, really hard to not be super attached to the outcome, because I knew if I didn't hit those targets, like I can't pay the mortgage, you know. But if you are too focused on the outcome, you won't show up in the same way. So you have to try it and not stress about it, not be desperate for it. But just go, you know what, what will be will be, I'm going to do the best that I possibly can and just focus on serving people. And the more that you can do that, you better you actually do. 

Then after the launch, you want to do a debrief, you want to work out how everything went at every single touch point. In the middle launch formula, we have the whole spreadsheet, everything for the key metrics that are going to make a determinant difference to your next launch. Because right in that week, after and I know you'll be so tired. But it's also the time to change the things for next launch. Because otherwise, when it comes around to either three months or six months later, you'll forget like you, you won't, you won't have that same level of detail that you do straight after. So you want to get all of that kind of documented then, and then change everything back so that your back in offseason, can chill out a little bit and serve people again until the next launch. 

And that, my friends, is a limited Launch Formula. Right? Cool. Hey! Anyway, if you want to get that list with all of the things that I spoke about, go to tinatower.com/launch. And what like, when we're talking about limited launches, I said at the beginning, like the reason that I love them is you get to do it in this burst. And then you don't have to sell again for a really long time. Which is, which is quite nice. It's quite nice. But always focus on serving people, because that's what's going to make the biggest difference. And then each time and when you start, you know, you may get three people in your first launch, you may get 30, you may get 300. Like it all depends on the exposure, the profile, that you've got your personal brand, everything there. But no matter how many you've got, if you focus on getting people exceptional results and fulfilling that transformation promise, you will grow and grow and grow beyond your wildest dreams. It is all about delivering people the result that they wanted. And then some, the more that you can exceed people's expectations, the more they'll start talking to other people about it, and the more you will continue to grow and grow and grow. And that's what's going to shoot you into the next stratosphere. So get to it, grab the checklist, and do a limited launch. And when you do it, tag me in it so that I can see. Alright, happy launching. 

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