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We’ve all got something to offer. But is that *something* perfect for your audience? Will anyone even want it?

Maybe you have a great idea that you want to get off the ground but have been stuck at the dreaming stage. Or maybe you’ve got so many ideas floating around your head but you’re just not sure which one your audience wants or needs most, and more importantly, will actually buy. It’s important that you’re putting the RIGHT things out there…

If you’re wondering how to create the perfect offer, I’ve got you covered. I’m going to walk you through my EXACT process for determining what to offer next in my business, whether it’s a product in the shop, a freebie, a mastermind, or a new course. 

Ask the Audience

What do I mean by “offer”? This could be a physical product you’re going to sell or a new service, a group coaching or 1:1 program, an e-book or course… Basically anything you create and make available for sale in your business.

First things first when creating the perfect offer for your audience, make sure you ask the source! It might seem super obvious, but honestly I don’t see many businesses actually surveying and asking their audience directly when trying to figure out what to create for them. This is especially important if you, the business owner, are not your target audience. Don’t make the mistake of skipping this step. You may be creating something that appeals to you or someone outside of your target market instead of reaching the right people. Sometimes when something comes easily to us, we can overlook it as valuable content that would help serve our audience.

I try to do this several times throughout the year because my audience and market is constantly evolving and growing and I want to make sure I’m refreshing my research and staying on top of their current needs and pain points.

How to do it: Get on the phone, create electronic surveys with sites like SurveyMonkey or Google Forms, add calls to action in your blog or social media posts inviting feedback, ask questions in private Facebook groups that your audience hangs out in, email your list and ask their opinion, include questions on Insta Stories, or take a past client out for coffee to gain in-depth feedback. Don’t over complicate this step because it doesn’t really matter HOW you get the information. as long as it’s feedback coming from the right people you want to serve in the future.

Ryan Levesque’s book “Ask” is a great additional resource on the topic of you’re looking for a step by step guide to surveying your audience. He teaches that we need to be really intentional about the types of questions we ask so that the answers will help guide the products and services we create. The best way to do this is to give people a chance to leave open-ended responses. It’s possible they may have ideas you hadn’t considered and you’ll only gain this information by letting them freely write their thoughts. Tune in carefully to their pain points and wording used and start to think about how you could create an offer and provide solutions whether it’s in your free material or with what you are selling.

Do Some Research

After you’ve polled your audience, there are a few other places you can gain insight into what they might be looking for from you.

The first place to start is looking at the data within your own business. What is your current audience telling you about the content you’re already creating?

Google analytics: What blog posts get the most traffic? Are there topic trends you can start to notice that might help give direction for your offer?

Social media: Do certain posts on Instagram or Facebook always seem to have higher engagement? Which Pins are driving the most traffic? Also check out Pinterest’s guided search feature where you can search for your topic and it will auto-populate what other people are searching related to that topic. It’s a great way to broaden your search.

Another place I like to look when I’m researching is to read reviews for other related products. Whether it’s a book on the topic and you check out Amazon reviews, or see what people are saying about your competitors products. Tune in to their actual language and pain points. What did they like? What was missing? What were they hoping to learn? Use all of this information to start to guide both your offer and the specific details when creating the content, sales page and ads when promoting it down the road.

I do want to caution you about doing too much competitive research for a couple reasons:

First, even if you’re in the same market and serve a similar audience, it’s still important to create for your exact audience and the people who are choosing to follow you. Your slightly different messaging approach and way of teaching is likely the reason people have chosen to follow you and I don’t want you to be too impacted by what others are doing. When I’m in creation mode, I tune out everything else around me so that it doesn’t influence what I’m working on. This is why I focus on the reviews of competitors products instead of the actual products and services themselves.

And second, when people look outward while doing competitive research, it can be so easy to get discouraged. You might see someone else is already doing that new idea you had. Maybe they’ve been doing it for awhile and it would be easy to say “well, I guess I can’t do that anymore”. But here’s the thing: if someone else is already creating what you want to offer, that is a good thing. Why? Because it means there is a demand for it. It’s almost like a proof of concept. What you should do with this information is say “great, someone else sees this idea as valuable” and then go create it in your own way, with your voice and unique perspective on the topic.

Think about your promise

What are you promising your audience? When you create an offer for your audience, you first have to ask what result they will get by buying your product or working with you. People are going to buy from people they feel are going to provide them with some sort of outcome or experience and it’s important to focus on this from the start.

Paint the picture for people for what it will look like after they’ve experienced your product or services. Will their life be easier? Better? More enjoyable in some way? Focus on the end result when creating products and stay focused on that goal throughout the entire process.

Test a few options

People put too much pressure on this question of what to create next for their audience. Let’s take some of the pressure off. When you’re in business for yourself you have the ability to pivot when you need to or when your audience changes. My advice if you’re stuck and don’t have a clear picture? Test a few things out in a free format that doesn’t require much investment other than your time and see which ones get the best response. This will help direct a future offer.

Developing the material

When it comes time to actually create your offer, be sure to think through how your audience wants to consume the content. My advice here is again, ask them! In my business we use a site called Kajabi to host my courses and I really love how simple it is to easily pull together a place to house your product. There are other sites out there like Teachable or Udemy, so check them out to see which one best fits your needs. For my courses, I try to offer the content is as many formats as possible. We offer a video, MP3 download, and written format so students have choices and can pick what best fits their learning style.

Bottom line: Ask yourself, “What is the experience or feeling that my customers will want most?” and keep that in mind while creating.

What is the end result?

We often create generic offers because we see that someone else is having success with them. We don’t put enough thought into how our offer is different or unique. I challenge my students to first think of the promised end result: What do you want people to be able to do, experience, or gain at the end of your offer? What is the outcome?

Once you’ve established the desired outcome, then you want to craft your material in a way that breaks it down step-by-step to lead people toward that end result. This approach has helped us immensely as we work through creating and updating our courses. We identify pain points, we identify what the end result is, we identify what sets my process apart, and then we break it down into a step-by-step process that is easy to understand and follow. Use this approach for small or free offers, too, because if you’re able to get people results for FREE, they will be far more likely to purchase from you.

Launching Your FIRST Small Offer

It’s OK to start small and build to larger, more complex offers for your audience. Consider something you could offer TODAY. I want you to remember that your offer doesn’t have to be a huge 10 module masterclass that is everything you want to teach all at once. Break it down and think about meeting your audience where they are at today. In fact, I teach my mastermind girls that this is smart for a few reasons:

• Quick wins are huge for your own confidence in your business and prove to you that you are on the right path
• It proves that there is demand for the direction you are heading
• Smaller offers can fund those bigger projects that might be more expensive to get off the ground
• It provides a quick win for your audience and help establish trust in you so they will come back and purchase that next level product or service.
• A small offer can lead into your core offer if there are some initial steps someone might need to take before they are at a place they would be ready for your larger offer.
• Small offers in the form of a freebie can bring awareness and education to your core offer and set your audience up to purchase the larger offer.

Creating Your Core Offer

Now once you’ve got that first offer out and you’re ready to create that core product there are a few things to consider.

What do you want to be known for in your business? What foundational product could you create that resonates so deeply with your brand and what your audience is looking for from you?

Your core offering should be your best work. Something you dream about creating and can’t wait for everyone to experience it because you are so proud. This point right here is what makes it feel less “salesy” and more like “serving” because you believe so much in the impact and outcomes it will create.

Finally, create your offer in a way that it can be something you sell for a long time. I want you to think through how you could get it out in the world, and then your plan to offer it over and over again, whether it’s always for sale or offered a few times a year. Keep in mind during the creation process to develop your material in a way that it will have a long shelf life. For my courses on Instagram and Pinterest, we have some main foundational teachings and then the more detailed trainings that may change as the platforms make changes.

Automating the Whole Sequence

Once you’ve found an offer that works, it’s time to simplify and automate. We look at what’s leading people to make purchasing decisions and then work on creating content that connects that free offer into the paid one via an email sequence that comes in the form of serving and then the invitation to purchase. When you can start to see what your audience is excited about, it’s easy to lead them to the correct offer. The best part is: That entire process can be automated. Now yes, this is the fancy step, but as you start to create more and more freebies and more and more offers, you want to make sure that everything is leading into something else so that people aren’t hitting a dead end. It might look like this:

Pinterest Freebie >> Serve through Episodes and Resources >> Invite to Webinar >> Sell Program

Ultimately people are going to come to you and pay for your products and services if you are able to promote and deliver on outcomes and experiences.

That’s the real deal, friend. My process for creating the perfect offer — Tuning in to the exact needs of your audience by polling them first, looking at data and testing options to make sure your offer has proof of concept, intentional development and delivery of your product in a way that will be beneficial to your audience, and creating smaller offers that lead into your core offer in your business.

Now, how you promote your offer is an entirely different topic… And you know I’m working on an episode of The Goal Digger Podcast to cover it all.

What will you create next?

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