I'm reminded of Jay Abraham's Master Mind seminar a couple of years ago. He charged $5K up front or $500 a month x 11 payments. I wasn't sure which pulled the most, but...

He sold over 600 seats (1 of them to me).

At one point during the seminar, he wanted to make a point about process marketing and had everyone stand up and move to the walls surrounding our seats.

He said if you signed up with the first letter, or phone call, or email sit down. Perhaps 2-3 people sat down.

If it took two touches, letters emails, conference calls, etc. sit down. Again just a few sat down.

By the time he got to about 10 touches, we still had half the room lined up along the wall. He didn't have the last person sit down until about 17 touches.

The point is... don't expect to sell out with just 1 letter or promo. Put a process of follow up, conference calls, emails, free reports, etc.

John Gilvary

Fantastic lesson, John.

Thanks for sharing it...

I've been ignoring this thread because I was paying attention to the showdown in general discussions. I'm glad I finally read it. Great lesson.

Randy Gage has a consulting program in this price range, and I once asked him, one on one, what kind of marketing got people to sign up in that price range, and he said, without exception, all those people had met him in person, seen him in action.

He was very skeptical that people would pay $5,000 to someone they had not met in person.

Hope this is helpful.

Marcia Yudkin

I agree with you Marcia (to an extent).

ALL -- but two -- of my high-fee clients came from:

a) Hearing me speak at a meetings somewhere
b) Networking...
c) Referral from someone who "knows me"

BUT...

I know some people who do sell at those fees -- without face-to-face -- and the do it with PROOF... and guarantees.

JP,

I wasn't claiming any kind of hard and fast rule. I was simply passing along what Randy Gage said about his experience.

Last month I got hired sight unseen for a $6,000 consulting engagement, but it was after several telephone conversations and the client checking three references.

If I had to make a recommendation, it would be to include as many forms of contact as feasible in the marketing - direct mail, printed materials, phone conversations, teleclasses or podcasts as well as web copy, for this price range.

Marcia Yudkin

Hope I didn't sound like I was contradicting you... just providing a perspective -- we're on the same page.

I was just at Dan Kennedy's information marketing summit and the one common theme I saw the speakers doing was massive promotions - but little of it focused on just email and web.

There were email and web sites as backend support tools to fill their seminars - but hands down - the most successful seminars used majority offline marketing (with 400-500 people all paying big bucks to be there AND paying $5,000 - $15,000 per year for coaching).

One guy had 97 steps to his sequence to fill his room (450 restaurant owners) - he used the promotions to get them in buying mode before they got there - and he sold 7 figures worth of back end products and services.

Another guy in the mortgage business had 30 some steps to his sequence ($1.2 million in sales at a free seminar).

This was a big difference from what was revealed there - compared to the majority of online marketing seminars that only do online marketing.

Also, this was also quite prevalent there...

Everyone doing online AND offline marketing sees a typical 5 - 10 times better response from their offline marketing than online only. The same message in print will outpull the digital substantially.

So if serious results are the factor - mix both online and off for maximum profits.

It was an excellent event with top notch speakers on all areas of internet and offline marketing - highly recommended to attend next year.

VERY interesting stuff, Troy! Thanks for sharing that...

I keep testing sequence selling, and I have to tell you, it is very expensive to test in the long run. I mean, there are so many combinations...phone follow-up versus direct mail (letter or postcard?) versus voice blasts, versus online. I've discovered that to find the perfect "control" sequence is a pipe dream, but to even get close amounts to lots of disposable income.

Any test results anyone would want to share?

I have some, but I'm only to the third or fourth sequence! Many more to go...

John