3 Tips for Hosting Online Summits with Benjamin Dell
Branding with Friends | Episode 40
Ever heard of an online summit? Take a closer look at this fresh, innovative way to get more eyes on your business and more ideal clients on your email list.
Meet Benjamin Dell, Founder & CEO of HeySummit.
Annie Franceschi: Hi there, welcome to a new episode of Branding with Friends the show where branding meets key business topics. Here you get to learn straight from the experts on everything from podcast hosting to content strategy to client experience. We focus on what you can do right now with these topics and the power of branding to attract your ideal clients. I'm your host branding expert Annie Franceschi of Greatest Story Creative, I help service business owners tell their story and show their value through clear messaging and consistent branding. I'm also a former Disney storyteller, professional speaker, and the author of two best-selling books, Establish Yourself and Permission To Try.
And today I am very excited to introduce you to one of my new friends in the business world. If you have been craving more visibility and email subscribers, you're gonna love today's guest. My guest today is the amazing Benjamin Dell.
Benjamin is the founder and CEO of HeySummit. That is the easy-to-use virtual event platform that helps you grow your audience and monetize your passion. Ben is a serial entrepreneur with multiple exits under his belt. His real passion, though, is creating impactful products that empower businesses and brands to grow and reach their goals. Ben, I'm so glad you're here. Thanks for joining me.
Benjamin Dell: Hey, my pleasure. It's wonderful to be here. It's nice to be on the other side.
Annie Franceschi: It is yes, we had this unusual way that we met just about a month ago, you had hosted what I think was called the Creator Bootcamp. So this was an online summit. And we're about to talk about what an online summit is. But basically, he had put out a call for speakers, had a huge lineup, including folks from ConvertKit, Harry Rice, and maybe Pat Flynn, if you've heard of that name before, I pitched myself and Ben accepted my submission. And I spoke at his Creator Bootcamp. And it was an incredible experience. And I was so impressed with his tool, which is called HeySummit so I invited him to come on today I share his his thoughts with you. And recommendations, if you want to get started with summits, it is a very powerful way to grow your audience.
So we're gonna be talking about that shortly. And he brought along three tips for that. So if you're new to Branding with Friends, just know, we're gonna save that third tip for the end, because Ben's brought along a free gift for you if you're listening or watching. So we'll make some time for that today. But as we're getting started, Ben tell me a little bit about first, let's start here, because people are wondering if they've never done one before, maybe they don't know what's called this, what is a summit or an online summit?
Benjamin Dell: It can mean a few things to different people. And so the first bit of advice I'd give this is not the official tip, this is like a precursor to the tip, a little bonus, when I suppose is to don't get too preoccupied with the association that you might currently have with the word or the phrase virtual summit or online events or something else, because it can often conjure up sort of notions of a huge multi-day multi-week kind of multi-speaker kind of event. And for most people, and a lot of people it does, but it doesn't have to be an event, as we see them within a summit can literally be anything from a one-off webinar that you deliver with one or two speakers, maybe just one through two, maybe a couple of talks in a day. And you just got to do you know, just cover a couple of topics, but you have to split them out into a couple of talks all the way through to a multi-day multi-speaker kind of event, you can even do things in between where you do maybe one event, but on a regular basis. So you'll do maybe a fireside chat or an interview like this, but through a summit kind of scenario, once a month for your community or something like that. So there really are many different ways to do it. So I definitely advise don't get too caught up in that.
It's really all about just engaging with your audience in a way that you are essentially sharing information with them knowledge and advice from experts in the field. And the beauty of a virtual event, for me anyway is that it almost doesn't matter how small or how niche the subject is, in fact, in many ways, it becomes more impactful, the more niche the audience is, or the subject is because you can really kind of double down and get some experts in who just love to geek out and talk about and share knowledge on that particular subject. So yeah, long answer, but short sort of pithy thing there is, it could be anything you need it to be.
Annie Franceschi: So how I've always seen online summit, and I think for the purpose of our conversation today is, it is also a strategy to grow your audience to grow your visibility, and specifically get more people to sign up for your email marketing list. So if you have an email marketing list, but you don't have very many people on it, this can be a really great way to get some more eyes on it and to get people like you were saying about niches, people who would be the right people to be on your list. So when you partner this can be as simple as you know, Benjamin AI partnering, if we had invited all of you here to listen to us live, and you had to sign up and give your email address we would share. You know, basically, people who knew me would know about we learn about Ben, people know Ben would learn about me, and we would grow our audiences that way because by registering for whatever event, we were hosting whatever format it was, they will be, you know, opting into our email marketing list, right?
Obviously, you can unsubscribe and do all those things. But that in a nutshell is what it is, it’s collaborating with other people to share your audience and get people to join your email list as a result, so that you have a way to connect to them and foster a relationship, scale your relationship and sell your products and services over time.
So I am just really happy that you have created this amazing tool called HeySummit, which is basically the platform that should have existed to make this easier. So it just makes it incredibly easy for me as a speaker to log in to you have a whole speaker dashboard that comes with the software where you can like, say, let's say, say you were thinking of planning something with like three different speakers, each person can have a dashboard, each person can put in their bio, they can offer something for free to get on their list, like it was just so seamlessly done and great for attendees as well, I assume I need to go back through the replays myself. So anyway, that's a little bit about what online summit is and what HeySummit is in relationship. It's basically a really easy-to-use platform that makes it super easy for you to do these kinds of events, and to get more people sharing audiences. So with that being said, I know Ben has brought some three official tips. So if you're thinking if you just heard what we were talking about, you're like, Yes, I need more visibility. Yes, I need more people on my list. I am very interested in getting started with this, what is the first thing that we should consider if we're going to get started with the world of online summits?
#1 Action TIP
Keep it simple.
Benjamin Dell: But I do want to just circle back if I can to kind of one of the purposes and routes to or one of the reasons why you might be running an event, maybe we can circle back to that, again, because it's a little bit more nuanced than that. And it's maybe a way to think about things. Anyway, let's get back to the tips.
So number one, I would say just keep it simple. This is probably the most common piece of advice that I give, I talk to a lot of our customers. Typically in the first couple of days, when they sign up, I offer sort of complimentary setup calls for a range of customers. It's sometimes it's random, depending on how busy our you know, our week has been. But the most common piece of advice I give is to keep it simple. It's so tempting.
Again, going back to that first sort of thing I said, when trying to describe what an event can mean for you, it can be very easy to get caught up in the dogma that it needs to be very complicated and clever and everything else. And yeah, has its benefits, but actually keeping it simple in the first. Certainly, if it's the first event you've done is absolutely the way to go. It'll be less stressful, you'll actually learn a lot more because you'll know what works and what didn't because there'll be fewer variables to kind of contend with and workouts, and it acts as a springboard to the next one. So keep it simple.
Annie Franceschi: Yeah, I think that that's really good advice with like any marketing strategy, in particular, this one because I think we've all seen the like summits that are like 10 speakers, and you don't realize like with all those people and all those attendees, it's a lot of work. And if you've never done it before, I think starting small getting some traction, getting that foothold can be really important, especially if you don't have your brand developed yet, if you haven't been telling your brand story, this can help you kind of figure out what it is.
And maybe, you know, I think you know, it can be just an event with one other speaker or maybe two other speakers and try to keep it you know, simple in length simple and format simple and you know, content so that you can start to develop, like what it is you believe what it is you want to stand for and make sure you get the right people in the room.
Because the more variables at play, the harder it is to make sure that like you have a shared audience, for example, that's part of why you do this is not to get just anybody coming to you, but the right kinds of people that you actually value to. But kind of on that topic, I don't want to skip over your thoughts. So obviously, I get given a very kind of simplified summary of why people do summits but what else did you want to add to that?
Benjamin Dell: I just thought we had a point, it's kind of the same site or that or the other side of the same coin, I suppose. But just noting that it can it can be either an out-and-out kind of list building brand building kind of exercise where you're you're trying to capture new crowds, new audience, new members. And that's super powerful.
And that's what a lot of our customers will do is to find new business or to find new leads, but actually can also and equally at the same time be a an audience nurturing opportunity, as well. So you have your existing preexisting audience of say, 1000 people 100 People really doesn't matter the size. It's a really powerful, simple way to sort of deliver some out-and-out value and exhibit some value to that existing audience to show them that you are kind of the arbiter, the owner of that kind of that space, and a domain expert by bringing in.
And it's one of the great things about events, you know, you're bringing in the speakers, it puts you on a pedestal just by being the person to round up these speakers, these experts in the field, which is so so powerful. And so you're bringing them in, and it's a nurturing opportunity. And so that's just a list-building kind of thing, either new or nurturing the existing.
But then on top of that, you've got revenue opportunities, because of course you can choose you don't have to, but you can choose to sell tickets to your, to your web to your summit. And that can either be to the new audience that you're attracting or to the existing audience that you already have.
So if you're thinking about ways to I hate to use that word, but monetize your audience, yeah, people at the end of the day, but you know, we all run businesses and that's what we're here for. If you're looking for ways to monetize your audience, putting on the odd or regular sort of summit, it's a really great way to sort of give them value, but actually have some funds in return for that through ticket sales. So really, really powerful for multiple reasons.
Annie Franceschi: So what I heard you sort of add to that conversation were two big things. So one is that not only are summits a great way to build your list, but they're also a great way to like, establish your credibility, and kind of put yourself out there as a thought leader. So that's one piece. And I think that that's something this is a really great avenue. Guys, if you've heard me talk about consistency containers. So like Branding with Friends, is the consistency container Branding with Annie has been one, what are you doing to show up consistently, it could be as simple as doing a summit every quarter or something or every month where you trade an audience and you do some sort of event and that by association with these experts, you become this part of why I do Branding with Friends is that we help share audiences, right.
And I would also use this example like, I didn't know who you were until you did this, or like, wow, he's doing this conference with ConvertKit and Pat Flynn, and like we met and I was like, wow, you're the CEO, like, let's talk like I want to have you on my show. So that is exactly why we are talking today, like very meta here in the metaverse for sure.
And the other second thing that I heard you say was that HeySummit, and summits, in general, can be used to sell tickets. So you can sort of run a virtual conference-style event, if you would like where you charge admission for that it can be a revenue stream for you if you're delivering value that really should have some sort of you know, investment assigned to it, you can absolutely do that. That's a really great element of HeySummit as well. So you know, the one I was a part of happened to be a free event. And that is one way to build a list.
Benjamin Dell: But it can also be done to nurture and to make some money for your business as well. It doesn't just have to be the conference that you charge for it could be you're doing regular interviews once a month, and you're doing that for your members only a new charge $10 a month, or whatever it is to access that. Or it could be even a one-off webinar and you charge for that. So again, it's down to you to decide whether you charge for watts and all those sorts of things.
Annie Franceschi: But either way, we want to keep it simple and start small. Yeah. Right. So that's the first thing. So maybe that feels a little intimidating. Okay, I'll start with square one, which is going to be just an event, maybe one or two other speakers, keep it simple, whatever that means. Right? Keep it simple, keep it small. So the inverse of that is actually your next step. So we're going to keep it simple and start small when it comes to doing an online summit of any sort. What's the next thing we should keep in mind?
#2 ACTION TIP
When it comes to speakers, aim big.
Benjamin Dell: Yeah, and it leads nicely from the example you gave where just by me inviting you into the event, you've never heard of me or the platform before it made me it made me appear to be a thought leader and a, you know, someone of authority in the space, simply because I had some meaningful speakers there.
So the second tip is, ironically, in opposition to the first tip, which is to keep it simple, keep it small, when it comes to speakers aim big. And the reason for this. And when I say aim big, I mean in terms of who you go out to ask to speak at your event, be ambitious, and go for the big names.
And the reason for this is that you'd be surprised how quickly and how readily speakers will say yes. Now there are some caveats. Of course with anything, don't ask, you know, a stupid example. Don't ask a fishmonger to talk at a bakery summit, you know, for example, you know, you've got to target and approach your speakers and make sure that they are aligned to the audience, the subject matter that you're talking about, or will be talking about.
But if you get that, right, I honestly can only remember on probably one hand, and I'm probably only two of those fingers. I think how many times in the last five years since we've been running where I've been running away from multiple, multiple events. But people have said no, you'd be surprised.
And actually, I think I've only had one time where a speaker has actually asked to be paid. And that's another common question that people get, which we can just wrap up into the same tip, which is in big in terms of speakers, but also don't get preoccupied with this idea, or don't be fearful that you shouldn't be because they're gonna be asking for lots of money. Generally speaking, they will accept expect, not just accept, but expect to do it for free, because they see it as a way to build audience and get in front of a new audience and etc, everything else as well.
Annie Franceschi: And that's really become the name of the game and only business as well. And I think you're sitting at the intersection of that is like, you know, I talk to my clients all the time. And I personally don't have a big audience. And I know many of them have little to none, they don't have a list, they don't have they have very little dollars. And when I say like you could absolutely have a business like that, but, and I am proof of that, like I have a really, you know, great, consistent six-figure business that is continually growing.
That being said, like most of our challengers in the world that I know as people don't know we exist, that it's not because we're not great at what we do. So they don't know that we exist. And so everybody is in the name of the game of online business.
Getting in front of the people, building awareness of what you do and who you are, is really how you grow and really how you build a sustainable business. So if you don't like social media, this is another way of doing it right? Just another flavor of online strategy you can try and employ maybe you're more of a people person, etc. Still to promote yourself and market all of those good things but I just all that to say like, you know, you have these big names part of why they are saying yes, even though they're big names, and part of the why they would do it for free is because even they know that awareness is the biggest barrier, right?
If people don't know that they exist, they don't know about their ecosystem, they don't know about their great product or book or whatever it is that they do. And so the more people that know that they are around their bottom line changes.
Benjamin Dell: Right, they also know the power of a focused audience. So again, don't get caught up in this feeling that it needs to be 1000 10,000, speaker, audience events, it could be 100. But if they're focused and passionate around your subject matter, speakers understand the power of speaking in front of fans of advocates have ambassadors of that kind of thought area, or subject matter, or whatever it is super, super powerful. For you as a speaker. Of course,
Annie Franceschi: Of course, it was, and I'll speak to that as a case study is, you know, I again, I didn't know you until about a month we did this summit, it was mid-May. And now it's end June. And within two weeks of your event, I had booked a dream client, who had never heard of me. Yeah, she's awesome. And it was such a great fit. And I'm so excited. And she's doing one of my higher, you know, branding done for you branding solutions, and it's like, could not be a better fit, and only came to me because I pitched you know, that was in the works months before and I pitched myself for this. You had said Yes, I did a great event, you know, all of those things had to happen in a certain way. But that's why we do it. And thank you for including me, even though I'm not, you know, the big luminaries of the Pat Flynn's and Terry Races and these folks, but you know, we're all on a journey. Absolutely.
So you've been telling us, you know, we've got several tips so far. But I want to make sure we pause here because you brought something along for Branding with Friends audience. So what is that thing? If we're curious about trying out HeySummit? I know you've got a little bit of a special deal. What's that about?
Benjamin Dell: Yeah, so in very simplistic terms, six months, for the first six months, I should say using HeySummit on any of the plans that you choose to go on 25% off now, we don't usually go for as long as six months, we usually do sort of two or three months, or maybe your first month you get a slight discount. So you won't see this offer many places, other places, if any, I'm trying to think there must be one somewhere, but it was a long time ago.
It's just a bit of legalese just to cover myself in case you find it somewhere else. But yeah, 25% off any plan for the first six months, we operate monthly and annual plans. And you can cancel at any point. So you know, give it six months. If you don't like it or don't need it after that. You're welcome to cancel. No, no strings attached, no contracts, all those ugly things that just frustrate the hell out of me. So yeah, all the good stuff. Hopefully none of the downside.
Annie Franceschi: Yeah, of course. Well, if you've been curious about doing an event, I really can't recommend this software enough. Because, you know after Ben asked me to do this I just thought it was so impressive that I asked him to come on.
And if this episode has gotten you thinking about more clarity and consistency in your business, are you clear enough to be able to host an event? Are you competent enough in your story to be able to put your brand out there and share it with other audiences? If you're not, have a chat with me, you can always set a free time to talk with me and GreatestStoryCreative.com.
So, Ben you've been telling us we need to keep it simple and start small. We should aim big for speakers. And what is that third thing we should keep in mind?
#3 Action Tip
Run more than one event, treating the first as an experiment.
Benjamin Dell: So this is all these are all related. They're all part of what I would like to think of a bit of a flywheel to kind of help sort of move you on one leads on to the other and it creates a nice healthy kind of growth cycle, if you will.
And this third tip is run more than once, or run more than one I should say. And the flip side of that is well the reason we can do that is because we're treating the very first one that we put on as an experiment. Just remember, especially if you haven't done an event before on a summit. It is an experiment, you want to see what works for you what what kind of presentational styles work for you, and what sort of audience numbers and feel good for you ticketing strategies, these are things that you won't you don't know what you don't know until you've done that first event.
So keep it super simple. Keep it nice and lean. But then remember that the real power is taking what you've learned from the first one and applying it to the next. And that isn't just us saying stay with us for longer, and we'd love to keep you on as a customer. Of course, we would. But it is honestly where we see the most impact from our customers.
It's when they actually apply their learnings to the next one. And it's when they ended up sort of 345 times in the revenue or the leads that they made in the first one because they're now applying what works. And this just really talks to the fact that because I'm a big advocate for learning by doing not learning by just being told, you know, because it's very easy to be told lots of common practice and best practice all those sorts of things.
But very rarely do they work specifically for your situation. And so it would be wrong of me or anyone else to say this is exactly how you want to run a perfect event, which is why I say keep it simple so that you can learn your own lessons and what works for your particular audience and your style. And if the answer to that you can apply it to the next one. But really, that is where we see our customers have the most impacts. And it's great to see kind of that sort of aha moment when they go, Aha, that's the thing that really works. I'm gonna do more of that less of that chart. In this way, maybe reduce the price, they increase the price. And it's great to see the revenue that they make. In the second, third, and fourth events.
Annie Franceschi: I'm really glad that you kind of ended with that flywheel that piece of run it more than once. And I think that that is really great advice across the board, and especially to think about your business overall like I am a business strategist as well. The idea of this is all an experiment, it's all the tinkering. And I think the people who stay in the game, I'm grateful to be celebrating almost 10 years in business shortly.
And the people who make it, you who have the business that can flourish and grow, are willing to be scientists, are willing to test hypotheses and run experiments. And know that the first time isn't the only time and I was literally just talking to my assistant right before this, that I was like, I just ran a great workshop.
And I built it, you know, built the plane I was flying in. I'm so proud of it's called Package Your Process. And feedback was great. But my instinct is always on to the next thing. And I was talking to her, I was like, No, we're gonna sit here and set the next states repackager process because my natural status is to like, just create, create, create, and it's like, that's great.
But my, the engine in which I grow my business is putting effort into making things better. So I have a great product, I have this incredible workshop series. And now what I need to do is strengthen it, make it better, take the feedback, apply it even better the next time even better the next time and I think the more I can tell you and I can be the ambassadors for coaches and consultants and service business owners and tell them if you did it once you didn't do it, you only did it enough to see what the promise of it was not the full potential because I think I am a recovering perfectionist.
So many of the people I coach are perfectionists or don't realize that they are. And they really want all those outward signs of success that if it wasn't this big thing, they're more than willing to scrap it and try the next thing just to see if they hit pay dirt. And it's like it's all a process. Like that's always my experience. It sounds like it's been yours. And I think if you're thinking about getting started with summits, you're working on your brand this it takes tinkering it takes time and it takes giving yourself a chance to try it again and again and to make it better over time. So you know, be that scientist. Keep it small aim big for speakers and run more than one if you want to try this really great strategy. Ben, thank you so much for being here.
Benjamin Dell: My pleasure. Thanks for having me on.
Annie Franceschi: Yes, thank you Benjamin Dell with HeySummit, be sure to check out HeySummit and this special discount code that he's sharing with us today. It'll be here wherever you're listening or watching this episode. And I hope you enjoyed yet another episode of Branding with Friends.
So many thanks again to Ben for joining us tune in next time we'll we're going to tackle another topic where branding and business meet. Until then I'm Annie Franceschi of Greatest Story Creative you can find all our episodes, branding resources and so much more on our website at GreatestStoryCreative.com.
“Branding with Friends” Episode 40
Show Notes + Resources
Here are 3 key tips for hosting online summits:
Keep it simple.
When it comes to speakers, aim big.
Run more than one event, treating the first as an experiment.
Resources:
Get 25% off any HeySummit plans for the first 6 months: https://www.heysummit.com/pricing?coupon=Blm1Pp6M
Dive deeper into branding and growing your greatest business with Annie Franceschi:
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To learn more about hosting online summits or to seek Benjamin’s help with your service business:
