Hot, warm, cold

Hope you’re enjoying the Easter break, if that’s a thing where you are. Today’s a public holiday in the UK. But in some parts of Spain the festivities started yesterday!

I’ve been working this morning but I’m off to the beach later to enjoy the sunshine with the family. ☀️

However, for the last couple of months I’ve been in full-on course development mode.

That’s because I’m working on a paid product that’ll go deep into the course creation process.

(I know, I know. It’s all a bit Inception-like — I’m creating a course about creating courses…)

And it’s long overdue. In fact, when I ran my end-of-year survey back in December, a couple of responses said: “Love the content! But when can we actually buy something!?”

Well, recently I’ve been going through the same process with myself that I go through with my clients, distilling years of experience into a bulletproof road map and curriculum.

And rather like putting on sun block, I’ve found it’s a lot easier to do it for someone else than for yourself. 😉

So I’ve been taking things slowly. Formulating my ideas. Developing new tools and strategies. Testing them in the real world and then refining as necessary.

(I’ll share more about the process — and the progress — in future newsletters.)

But naturally, I’ve wondered who might actually buy my course when it’s ready. And if you’re planning your own course you’ve probably done the same.

So here’s a useful way to think about your prospects — the people who might actually buy your course.

First, there are your HOT prospects. These are people who already know, like and trust you. They’ve engaged with you in some way and ideally already bought something, even if it’s small.

Then, there are your WARM prospects. These are people who know who you are and are interested enough in what you’re doing to connect with you and follow what you’re up to.

Finally, there are your COLD prospects. These are people who are a good fit for you on paper but don’t really know you and haven’t even had the chance to decide if they like or trust you yet.

Personally, I put most of my newsletter subscribers in the warm category.

The much smaller group who’ve reached out to chat to me over email, or joined my Zoom workshops or even gone on to become mentoring clients, are my hot list.

And the people who land on my website or stumble across me on LinkedIn or see a comment I’ve left in a Facebook group somewhere are my theoretical cold list.

But here’s the main point when you’re thinking about the people who will buy your course.

You can assume that:

• 1 in 5 hot prospects will buy
• 1 in 50 warm prospects will buy
• 1 in 500 cold prospects will buy

Obviously, your mileage will vary based on countless factors but these ratios aren’t wildly wrong.

And there are two conclusions to draw. If you want to sell more courses, you need to:

1. Find more of the right people

2. Warm people up before selling

In practice, you’ll need to do a bit of both.

But if you’re relying on cold prospects to buy your course, know that the odds are not in your favour.

See you soon,

Glen