The Ultimate Guide to Selling with Mini Webinars

If you’re a course creator, entrepreneur, small business owner, or coach looking to attract more clients and (or) customers (while massively leveraging your time) then you may already know that…

traditional webinars are the best and most notable aspect (crowning glory) of marketing,

...but they’re also so freakin intimidating. Not to mention a lot of work. Right?!

When I hosted my first webinar, it took me almost a year to complete. (yes, I’m serious). I procrastinated because it just felt like a lot of work (writing the script, creating 200+ slides, decision fatigue on which software to use, what to offer, etc).

I had mindset roadblocks to overcome, like:

• perfectionism,
• wondering if there were people out there who really wanted my thing,
• what if I did all this work and had nothing to show for it (other than a lot of work).

Plus - at the time I was a mom of 3 (now a mom of 4) and just too busy… so I needed to find another approach.

So I decided to experiment with short and sweet mini-webinars to sell my lower ticket offerings and VIP offers.

PART 1 - Mini Webinar Overview

Everyone's talking about online marketing, right? And we all know that webinars can be intimidating.

But what almost no one understands about online marketing is the concept of mini webinars.

It's not only one-hour webinars that help you make more money, it's also creating mini webinars. And that can happen even if you are too busy and can't stop procrastinating, as long as you're also starting where you are with what you have using mini webinars.

So let's get into it...

What is a Mini Webinar?

If you think that a mini webinar is just a shorter version of a longer webinar, then you’re completely wrong.

Mini webinars are 5-15 minute pre-recorded hyper-focused video presentations (direct-to-camera or slides only) that addresses your leads top objections, moves them to the buying decision faster, and validates the Who, What, Why, and How of your offer:

1. Who are you?
2. What do you have and what’s so unique about it?
3. Why is it important?
4. How to get it?

Mini webinars address the main points of what you offer and build your credibility pretty fast.

They exclude all the fluff found in traditional webinars that a hot lead doesn’t care about or need to know in order to make a decision. Mini webinars are best for low-ticket or low-cost offers and driving leads through your application funnel for a consultation of your done-for-you or done-with-your high-end offers.

I hope this article was helpful! However, if you need help with deciding on your mini webinar topic, please download the Secret to Choosing a Hot Mini Webinar Topic cheat sheet below 👇👇👇👇👇

Using a Mini Webinar vs traditional webinar

Mini-webinars are NOT the same as traditional webinars.

But they ARE a very powerful tool to have in your business to get people to take action.

The biggest difference between the two, besides the time length, would be that traditional webinars are marketing funnels and mini webinars are sales funnels. What this means is that Mini Webinars can quickly validate your offers because if you don’t make a sale, you know your offer needs tweaking.

Once you validate your offer and make enough sales, you can transition to the bigger webinar so that you can market to a wider audience and get more people into your funnel.

Below are just a few key differences between a mini webinar and a traditional webinar:

Should a Mini Webinar be Live or Pre-recorded

As mentioned a few times previously, mini webinars are pre-recorded hyper-focused video presentations.

You do have the option to host one live, and I had a student successfully host one live prior to turning it evergreen, however, I do not advise it.

When going live, you run the risk of your mini webinar running longer and you may find yourself teaching more of the how-to than anticipated.

In addition, if you are selling a low ticket item, there could be an opportunity to host a short Q&A at the end of your mini webinar.

But for the most part, Mini Webinars should be pre-recorded so that every word is intentional.

Recording Your Mini Webinar via Direct-to-Camera

One of the things that make mini webinars so awesome is that they don’t take a lot of tech.

There are two ways you can record your mini webinar. The first way to record your mini webinar is by Direct-to-Camera or DTC (or Talking head).

When doing DTC, I advise writing your Mini Webinar script in Google Docs and then uploading your script to a teleprompter. Practice a couple of times and when you feel ready, record your final take. I use my iPhone to record my DTC mini webinars.

I use a teleprompter app called BigVu. Another teleprompter I’ve used is PromptSmartPro. However, I prefer BigVu.

Recording Your Mini Webinar via Slides

The second way to record your mini webinar is with slides with text only.

My favorite way to create presentation slides is using Canva. Sometimes I use the Canva slides as-is and other times I will upload the slides into PowerPoint if I want to use more animation. You can also use Keynote or Google slides for your presentation.

It really doesn’t matter just as long as you use what is best for you and takes little resistance.

In order to record your screen use…

• Loom - Free version up to 5 minutes (One thing I learned the hard way is that to record high definition (HD) using Loom, you have to use the desktop app and not the chrome extension.
• Zoom - Free (But the free version is not HD quality)
• Any recording software you may have like Filmora Pro, iMovie, ScreenCast, or Camtasia to name a few.

Where to host your mini webinar

Another reason why I love mini webinars is how versatile they are.

You can host your mini webinar on:

• A landing page
• It can go above the fold of your sales page to reinforce the copy on your sales page
• You can host your mini webinar on YouTube and in the description place a link that they can click on for your call to action
• You can share your mini webinar on social media and drive traffic to it
• If you have Google my business set up for your local business, you can create a post and host your mini webinar there.

You don’t need complicated webinar software like webinar jam, webinar ninja, Demio, or anything like that. You just need a way to record and download your webinar and upload it wherever you want to host it.

PART 2 - How a Mini Webinar Could Fit in Your Business

How could a Mini Webinar fit in your business? Let's find out by using 3 types of businesses.

Mini Webinar Funnel for Course Creator

If you’re a course creator, you are using Mini Webinars to introduce your new way, your vehicle, your unique system.

You’re not trying to convince people to purchase your course. You are trying to teach people that the old way they’ve been doing things is wrong, outdated, or there’s just a better way. Your course teaches them how to implement this better way.

For example, your mini webinar content isn’t to sell your course on bullet journaling, your content is to show them why bullet journaling is awesomesauce! In the end, you pitch them your course that “just so happens to teach” them how to bullet journal.

Your funnel could look like this:

Traffic >> Opt-in >> 5-15 minute Mini Webinar >> Course Checkout Page >> Customer Onboarding

Mini Webinar Funnel for Authors or Free + Shipping and Handling Offers

If you’re an author or selling a free + shipping and handling offer, this follows the same method as a course creator.

If your book is on meal planning, you are teaching them why meal planning is so important.

At the end of the webinar, when you pitch your offer, it’s a yes or no response. Your audience is empowered to make the best decision for themselves and take action quickly.

Your funnel could look like this:

Traffic >> 5-15 minute Mini Webinar on Checkout Page or Two-Step Order Form >> Customer Onboarding

Mini Webinar Funnel for Coach or Service Provider

If you are a coach, service provider, or sell high ticket courses:

You are using Mini Webinars to introduce your high-ticket offer. You are not teaching them how to do anything, but are teaching them why they need your services and how they can get their problem solved.

Only people who watched your 5-15 minute pre-recorded mini webinar and are interested will book a call with you.

This eliminates tire kickers and your call is more about figuring out if you and they are a good fit. The thing to understand here is that “time” is the currency to these buyers. They do not seek Do-It-Yourself offers because they value their time more than anything.

They are interested in:

• How you can solve their problem
• What’s your solution
• And how fast can it be done?

Your funnel will look like this:

Traffic >> Opt-in >> 5-15 minute Mini Webinar >> Application >> Calendar >> Enrollment Conversation >> Client Onboarding

What tools are required for high-ticket offers?

If you’re using your mini webinar to send people to book on your calendar, in addition to creating your mini webinar, you’ll need an application funnel.

You’ll need:

• An application funnel
• A CRM or other tool to collect client information
• An email autoresponder once someone opts in
• A form to use as your application
• A scheduling tool
• Ability to record your conversation for future reference
• An ability to send contracts once clients enroll in your services or programs

I’m getting my feet wet with Dusado as it can do most things.

The best part is that Dusado is free. Forever. Yes, as long as you have less than 3 clients, you can use Dusado for free.

This is great for slowly building out your funnel with a tool like Clickfunnel or Kajabi and testing it as long as you want without the pressure of paying monthly.

PART 3 - How to Choose Your Profitable Mini Webinar Topic

A profitable topic not only gives your attendees what they want but also attracts them to your offer.

A profitable mini webinar topic starts with researching your audience.

The Different Types of Market Research

There are two (or three) types of research:

1. Direct Market Research - this means surveying your people by talking to them directly on the phone, via email, or chatting with someone on Facebook
2. Indirect Market Research - is when you collect information about your audience without communicating to them directly. Forms of indirect methods include reviewing the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section of sales pages of similar topics to yours, Answerthepublic.com, Amazon reviews, searching in Facebook groups, YouTube comments, Quora, and Reddit, to name a few.
3. You are your ideal customer - Using yourself and remembering a time when you had the very problem you’re trying to solve. You can use this as your base for collecting data on your audience.

It’s best to do a combination of all three forms of research.

How to Conduct Your Market Research

1. Search for people discussing pain points on your topic in Facebook groups.
2. Read reviews for relevant products on Amazon.com to see what people like/dislike about those products.
3. Research Pinterest, YouTube, or Buzzsumo for trendy topics in your niche.
4. Identify 3 people who could need your help in what you do.
5. Invite these 3 people for a market research interview.
6. Conduct a 15 min recorded interview for each.
7. During the interview, identify struggles and objections.
8. Transcribe your interviews for ease of use. (optional)
9. Based on all your research, pick the best topic.

If you would like a checklist version of this, click here! No opt-in is required.

List of Data Items to Collect During Your Research

Here are 7 questions you can ask in a 15-minute interview or just researching on the internet.

1. Demographics like age, gender, location
2. Immediate results. It’s their “If I could only just _____” statement.
3. What’s the problem they need to figure out?
4. What are their pain points or frustrations?
5. What do they need to believe/know/or understand before they will take action/move forward?
6. What or who are the barriers, roadblocks, or objections they have to getting their problem solved or obtaining their desires?
7. What are their long-term desires?

Use a transcription service like Rev.com or Trint.com to help organize the data and identify trends in pain points and desires.

With this information, decide on the ULTIMATE result that your potential clients want. It could be a pain point or a desirable result.

Deciding on Your Mini Webinar Offer

Once you’ve collected information from your audience and know the results they want, it's time to decide on your offer.

There are many things you can offer on a mini webinar, but I’ll place them into 4 distinct categories:

• Free Offers - These are your free PDFs, Checklists for example. You can use a mini webinar to lead people into your traditional longer webinar to expand on the ideas discussed on the mini webinar. Lastly, your mini webinar can even be the thing your audience opts into in order to view.
• Low Ticket Offers - These are your ebooks, mini audit, physical products, mini-courses, intro courses, paid consultation, or memberships priced anywhere between $12 to $97. Although I’m curious to push the envelope and test a $147 offer.
• Application and Calendar Invite Offers - If you need people to book a consultation prior to enrollment, you will use a mini webinar that invites people to apply and schedule on your calendar.
• Affiliate Offers - Lastly, if you don’t have a product of your own, you can use a mini webinar to sell someone else’s product and you earn on the affiliate sales.

PART 4 - Creating your Mini Webinar Script

Understanding the Key Ingredients of a Mini Webinar

A 5-15 minute mini webinar includes the following criteria:

• Hook - Hook your audience with a question that challenges their belief in your topic. For example, my audience believes that webinars “have to” be long in order to make sales but that’s simply not true.
• Why You? - This can literally be a sentence or two of why it makes the most sense for you to talk to them about the topic. What results have you gotten for yourself or others?
• Your Blue Ocean / Unique Solution - This is your unique process, solution, or method. Use words like Secrets, Tips, Myths, Keys, Frameworks, or Mistakes when explaining your process.
• Common Objections / What they already know - Your entire webinar is basically about busting their objections so they’ll purchase and get their problem or desire solved. In Part 3, we created an audience list full of their objections.
• Why does this matter? - Just don’t tell them what your secret sauce is, they need to know why it’s important, why it’s better and why it should matter to them.
• Offer - Your offer is what you’re selling. The idea here is that the barrier to entry is low. This is why the price of your offer is either free or low ticket.
• How to get it - Restate your offer and tell people how to get it such as “Click to register”.

A Basic Mini Webinar Outline

Because mini webinars are so short, it’s important that we hit key areas. Now that you know more about the ingredients that make up a mini webinar, let’s start to structure your script and give it a bare bone start.

The following is a very basic mini webinar script:

1. Hook / Did you know:

2. Who are you?

3. Blue Ocean / Unique Solution:

4. What they are thinking or what they already know (their objection):

5. Share the 3 Secrets/Tips/Myths/Keys/Frameworks/Mistakes of your topic:

   1. Shift #1 and Why is this Important?
   2. Shift #2 and Why is this Important?
   3. Shift #3 and Why is this Important?

6. What is your offer?:

7. How to get it:

I have 3 examples. Two of which are from my teenage sons. I enjoyed interviewing them to see if the mini webinar was simple enough for even them to understand.

I think they did an awesome job with my questions and creating a fake start to a mini webinar.

Basic Structure Example 1: Splatoon 2

The following example is brought to you by my oldest son.

Hook: You may think winning Splatoon 2 matches boils down to having good aim and holding forward, but that simply isn’t true.

Who are you?: I am someone who has earned money in Splatoon 2 tournaments multiple times.

Blue Ocean: Objective Relevance - This is when you play certain positions and try to account for what the enemy is trying to do and try to counter and play where they are trying to be.

What they are thinking / What they already know (Objection): I’ve tried that but it didn’t work

Share the Secrets/Tips/Myths/Keys/Mistakes of: Objective Relevance

• You can master Objective Relevance in as little as 7 days - this is IMPORTANT because you can predict what your opponent will do next and apply counter strategies and you win more games
• You can earn ELO, which is Game Power, this is IMPORTANT because it earns you a chance to play better players which helps you get better at the game
• It is more enjoyable and easier to play, this is IMPORTANT because if you’re just holding forward and dying repeatedly, you’re making the game harder for yourself because the whole point of the game is to stay alive

Offer: Splatoon 2 Video Training to help you get better at the game.

How to get it?: Click the link

Basic Structure Example 2: Roblox NASCAR

The following example is brought to you by my next oldest son.

Hook: Did you know that there is more to NASCAR Roblox racing than just driving in circles?

Who are you?: I am someone who has been invited and participated in two different Roblox NASCAR leagues and has brought home wins for my team.

Blue Ocean: Finding the right balance of three key ingredients: drafting, sneaking through the window, and control of the car.

What they are thinking / What they already know (Objection): How am I supposed to do all that stuff?

Share the Secrets/Tips/Myths/Keys/Mistakes of: Finding the right balance of three key ingredients: drafting, sneaking through the window, and control of the car.

• Drafting is a key factor to NASCAR Roblox racing - this is IMPORTANT because drafting pulls the car along and keeps it from overheating. Clean air pulls your car more than dirty air. Dirty air causes your car to overheat and slows you down tremendously. When there’s little space between the cars while racing on the track it's called dirty air. So keeping more space between cars keeps the air clean or you can draft.
• Sneaking through the Window - this is IMPORTANT because everybody’s going to be moving around the track, so when the opening opens up you have to go for it. Because if you waste time, your opportunity will close quickly. And then you’re going to be in the same spot you were when you could have been three spots ahead.
• You need to have great control of the car - this is IMPORTANT because, without it, your lap times are slower meaning you are moving slower.

Offer: Roblox NASCAR Video Training to help you win more races

How to get it: Click the link.

Basic Structure Example 3: Mini Webinars

Hook: Did you know that your webinar doesn’t have to be an hour-long to sell your course or VIP offers?

Who am I?: I am someone who has helped hundreds of students over the last 5 years leverage and harness the power of webinars. Blue Ocean: Mini Webinars What they are thinking / What they already know (Objection): I can’t see how this will work. Or How do you squeeze all that info in such a short amount of time? Or You already know that webinars are one of the most effective ways to sell your course, but you also know that they can be freakin’ intimidating and a lot of work.

Share the Secrets/Tips/Myths/Keys/Mistakes of:

• Mini Webinars Traditional webinars take a lot of time to put together - This is IMPORTANT because if you’re someone who finds webinars scary, intimidating, and rather not deal with the tech and unsure what all goes into one, you’ll procrastinate BIG TIME doing one, like years. And webinars will most likely be on the “I’ve been meaning to do that” list.
• Validating your offer with a phone call doesn’t earn you money - This is IMPORTANT because most people teach to validate your offer using phone calls. Once validated, create your 200-slides webinar to sell it. This strategy works but at what cost? It’s a lot of work upfront and no guarantees that you’ll get it right or make money the first few attempts.
• It’s hard for people to sit through a 60-90 presentation straight - This is IMPORTANT because times are changing and while webinars still work, people really don’t have time to sit through a 60-90 minute webinar. Your show-up rates will only be average or below average.

Offer: Live Training on Friday, February XXth, 20XX

How to get it: Click the link here!

I hope you're finding this article helpful so far! If you need help with deciding on your mini webinar topic, please download the Secret to Choosing a Hot Mini Webinar Topic cheat sheet below 👇👇👇👇👇

PART 5 - How to Create an Intro Product as Your Low Ticket Offer

What is an Intro Product?

An intro product is a product that gets people acquainted with your business and equipped them with the necessary tools and is ready to purchase your next offering.

Pre-work or prerequisites of your main offering or coaching program make the best intro products. Pre-work is the foundation of what must take place before someone is ready to take action.

Intro products can also be on topics you don’t want to teach over and over again.

For example, if you are a photographer, your intro product may be a guide to help them pick the right style, outfit combination, hairstyles, solo poses and group poses, and accessories in order to ensure the best experience.

In the end, you’ll have confident clients that will get more out of their photoshoot investment and you don’t have to coach as much during the session or feel like you have to create miracles in PhotoShop.

Understanding the Key Ingredients of an Intro Product

A good intro product includes the following specifics:

• Should solve ONLY ONE problem. We are looking for a quick win.
• Simple and easily digestible.
• It’s easy for you to create and easy for them to consume
• Is Evergreen
• Is priced around $17 to $97.
• Should take 2-3 hours MAX to create and complete.
• The barrier to entry is low because it's low dollars.
• Establishes that know, like, trust factor
• Leads into the next step

Create Your Training

Now that you’ve settled on a topic that is very specific and solves one problem, you’re ready to outline your teaching topics and start recording.

Below is an example of how you might outline your intro product:

• Introduction, Welcome, What the course is about.
• Anything they need to know/ Purchase / Sign up for / etc
• Teaching Content 1
• Teaching Content 2
• Teaching Content 3
• Teaching Content 4 (optional)
• Teaching Content 5 (optional)
• Recap and Call to Action: What's the Next Step?

Create your Supporting Deliverables

Now that you have your training recorded, it’s time to include supporting deliverables to increase the value of your training and support your students in completing the course.

• If you’re able, strip the audio so your students can listen on the go. If you used Zoom to record your intro product, Zoom already does this for you.
• Transcribe your training so that your student can have something to read if they prefer to learn that way. It’s up to you to have the transcription word for word or you can clean it up a bit and create more of a supporting document with key takeaways. I like to use Temi (Who was bought out by Rev.com) to transcribe all my videos and audio.
• Create a workbook or checklist that your students can use to follow along while they go through the training or for use as homework to get a deeper understanding. I like to use Canva to create my supporting PDFs.
• If you have them, share your slides as well. 

Do You Have to Be on Video?

If you prefer not to be on video, that is ok.

You could always use a program I used called Otter.ai.

A lot of my blog posts started out as me just talking into my phone because my thoughts ran faster than I can type. I like to record my voice as I speak on a topic and then clean up the text after the fact.

So if you don’t want to be on video - Otter or Zoom (remember Zoom also exports an audio version of your recording) may be an option.

Also, both of these options are free. So that’s always a plus. If you know of any other tools that transcribe as you speak, then you can use that.

Putting it All Together

An intro product will take you 2 to 3 hours to create.

This includes the hour’s worth of teaching. A good intro product as you were taught to create here and easily sell for $147. With a value of $147, I want you to price your intro product somewhere between $37 and $97.

Down the road, when you have more testimonials you can always increase the price if you choose to do so. But this isn’t a hard rule.

Just to recap, the perfect intro product course includes:

• The video training
• Video transcript or snapshot (notes)
• Audio only version
• Ebook, workbook, or checklist, cheatsheet
• Share your slides if you have them (optional)

Now, let's move on to the final steps of creating your mini-webinar.

PART 6 - Next Steps

How to Reliably Get People to See the Front End of Your Funnel

One of my prospects looking to hire me to build her sales funnel had an awesome question. She asked “How can I reliably get people to see the front end of my funnel? I gave her several options and came up with even more listed for you below.

Here are both free and paid traffic ideas to get people to see your mini webinar funnel in the first place:

• Create a Blog Post with a CTA of your mini webinar
• Send Email Invite
• Add a link to your mini webinar in your email signature (Business and Personal)
• Post on Social Media
• Add the link to your Instagram Bio
• Share with your affiliates
• Use Paid Traffic (Facebook ads, Google Ads, Instagram, Pinterest ads) Retarget people who watched but didn’t buy using retargeting ads
• Share on Pinterest
• Post on YouTube and repurpose to IGTV
• Place on your Website or sidebar of your blog page Create a post on Google My Business
• Pitch Podcasts & Articles that allow backlinks to your site (Help A Reporter Out -H.A.R.O. or Thrive Global)
• Create a dream 100 list of people and brands who already have an audience similar to yours and one-by-one get in front of those people

Mini Webinar Case Study Blurbs

This is what Rah had to say about a previous mini webinar training I did:

“...As someone who's been trying to do webinars for years. Knowing in the back of my mind webinars are good for business, but also knowing, and feeling that disconnect between I'm just starting out, and I'm not trying to sell this huge program. And it has just not really been the right timing for a webinar. But now it is because I have your program to meet me and help me with where I'm at. …A 15 minute webinar is way more doable.”

-Rah Freestone, Self-care Specialist

This is what Natalie had to say about a previous mini webinar training I did:

“…You inspired me to get out the knowledge that I have to share with others and how to actually navigate it. That's actually what has been life-changing for me and I appreciate it. …I created a five to 10-minute webinar that is evergreen, which I always have on my Instagram Reel on my Facebook page. On YouTube. And what I've learned Is that I'm what's called an Omnichannel. …which allows me to reach more people. So they can learn about me. They can learn about what my course is. With the mini webinar, I created a “mini-course”, and it's a great way to introduce them and give them a preview of what to expect from my signature course.”

-Natalie Collier, Founder of Co-Parenting Network

This is what Amanda had to say about a previous mini webinar training I did:

So I had an overwhelming experience with webinars at first, ...there's just so much information. I hosted my own webinar a couple of times when I first started and it was okay. I didn't have a whole lot of attendees. I don't know if it was my topic or what, but I also know that a lot of people don't wanna sit through a really long webinar and make that commitment. And then you introduced me to the mini webinars. I took your advice and I implemented all of the things that you talked about. I created a very, very short, like 20 minutes, plus Q&A, [mini webinar]. About 55 ish people sign up, about 20 ish people attended live (40% show-up rate), and it was very successful. So I was very, very happy to get my message out there and also help to sell my course.

-Amanda Tento, The Determined Mom

Those are just some of my students that implemented what I taught about mini webinars.

Hopefully, you're starting to see why mini webinars are such a powerful tool.

Ready to Create Your Mini Webinar?

It always amazes me how sitcoms writers and editors can open a problem and then conclude it in 20 minutes. You walk away entertained, satisfied, and maybe even took something away that can help you in your personal life. You got just as much value from these 20 min shows as a 90-minute movie.

That’s mini webinars!

Writing and editing the right buttons that empower your audience to decide very quickly whether or not they want to work with you. And either way, they walk away knowing more than when they started.

ACTION ITEM: I hope you’ve enjoyed this article and before we go, I want to assign you a small task! Choose something you learned from this post and decide how you're going to IMPLEMENT it in your business?

So if you’re ready to create a simple 15-minute presentation, without resorting to...

• 90 minutes of content,
• 200 slides,
• complicated tech,
• weak wi-fi,
• that one attendee who can’t hear you and there’s nothing you can do to help them but say refresh,
• and ALL of the work that goes into putting a traditional webinar together,

...then get The Ultimate Guide to Selling with Mini Webinars eBook to help you plan and create your next mini webinar!