Four types of free give-aways and their real intention

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text css=”.vc_custom_1605900347470{margin-bottom: 0px !important;}”]It’s fairly common, and helpful, to offer something for free on your website, often related to subscribing to your email list. It’s something that’s been done for years, and continues to be helpful.

However, folks can struggle about what to give away, and they can also struggle with the tactic itself: is it just manipulation? Trying to “get” an email?

I want to make the intention clear, from a heart perspective, and then I want to tell you about four different types of give-aways that can help focus what you want to do.

A free give-away is not trying to “get” the email.

This is a really painful way to approach it. If you think you have to create the “right” give-away in order to entice people to give you their email, that is going to tangle you in knots. It feels horrible as an intention.

Let’s face the truth: if you have to entice someone to give you their email, they probably aren’t going to be a great potential client anyway.

You can stop trying to “get” emails.

Just get them the help.

When someone is on your website, maybe it’s 2 a.m. Maybe it’s Sunday morning. Regardless, it’s some time when you’re probably not available.

The free give-away is to get them help, at least a little bit of help, NOW. And not make them wait.

The email list is to be able to build a relationship, by giving them consistent help over time.

It’s all about giving, not about taking. Bring a generous heart to this whole topic, and it will be MUCH easier, more fun, and more effective for you.

If you’re struggling with what to give-away, let me help you narrow your choices down.

Four types of giveaways

These are four common types of give-aways, and hopefully this will help ignite your creativity!

1. Quick tool/Quick help: This is something incredibly short and easy. Maybe a 1-5 page PDF, maybe a 2 minute video. Who knows? Something short and easy.

Sometimes there’s resistance to using this because it can feel shallow, or coming from a “quick fix” mentality. But let’s not undermine how useful it is to just get someone something easy.

It can be *really* helpful and important to at least briefly point at the larger context of your work, and to be clear that it’s not all quick and easy. But an easy tool or easily-consumed piece let’s them know you have empathy for the pain they are in, and that you don’t require them to take on more than they can handle when they are perhaps already overwhelmed.

2. Go deep with one topic: Let’s just say that “going deep” doesn’t mean writing an entire book on it. Going deep, in my estimation, means giving a fairly complete and useful dive into one topic. This is not meant to be an academic exploration, but a way to make a concept/approach useful and doable for the audience.

3. Big framework/Big Picture: This helps to define and explain your world view, which helps the audience to understand their experience differently. Often a shift of world view, which helps to make values and systems visible, helps make things that seemed crazy or mysterious suddenly make sense.

4. Assessment: Help someone ask the right questions, and know how to look at themselves and their situation as you might, so they can know better not only what’s not working, but why it’s not working.

There isn’t always a solution included in an assessment, other than perhaps an area to focus on, and the relief of knowing that certain areas aren’t actually broken.

Even without a solution, an assessment can bring a lot of ease to someone’s mind and heart. “Oh, so *that’s* what’s really going on!”

What’s your take-away? What comes up for you? And what kind of give-away are you inspired to create?

Peace,

Mark Silver, M.Div.
Heart of Business, Inc.
Every act of business can be an act of love.

P.S. Free webinar on pay from the heart

For a few years I’ve been experimenting with an approach I’ve called “pay from the heart’ which is a specific version of pay what you can. Then, a year ago , we changed the bulk of our business model over to pay from the heart.

It’s been fascinating and rewarding. I want to share what I’ve learned with you as a subscriber.
Totally free. No upsell.

Join me for this free webinar[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]