As an entrepreneur, I’m gonna guess you know all about the ‘feast or famine’ roller-coaster (and maybe all too well).
Here’s what it usually looks like: One month, you’re on cloud nine. You can’t help but smile every time you open your business bank account app. You wake up every day feeling wildly supported by your business, in love with your (many) clients and over-the-moon thrilled by the opportunities ahead.
But the next? You’re scrambling for cash and inquiries (and can’t even find an old one in your ‘Spam’ folder collecting dust) and your biz savings is fading faster than your last eyebrow tint.
This scenario is all-too-common–and it’s a big reason why I’m such a huge advocate for diversifying your income streams and scaling as a service provider. And, coincidentally, one of the main ways I love to teach my clients to do this is through evergreen courses.
But.
I would never tell you that offering an evergreen course is the Holy Grail. It’s not a magic pill or secret sauce that will explode your business overnight.
In fact, you might be surprised to hear that there are actually lots of very valid reasons you should consider ‘live’ launching your course instead.
Curious when should you choose a live launch over selling your course on autopilot (evergreen)? Let’s dive in.
1. You’re Launching a Brand New Offer
If you’ve never offered this particular ‘thing’ to your audience, running a live launch allows you to beta test. In short: A beta test means you offer your course at a lower, introductory price in exchange for feedback and/or testimonials. This means you’re technically getting paid to try out a new offer, not to mention gaining invaluable feedback straight from your students (so you can make sure the offer is super up-to-snuff next time!).
You’re risking a lot less this way. And? If you live launch your offer once and can visually see that it’s a hit based on the number of sales, you can easily go on to set it up so it sells via an evergreen sales sequence.
Even better? Once you’ve launched an offer once, you don’t need to create all the marketing materials from scratch, either. You can simply tweak and repeat–and you can either live launch again (with the updated materials) or use that same sequence to sell it on autopilot.
2. You Need Cashflow Quickly
Evergreen offers can help you ‘fill out’ the gaps in your income and provide income stability in between clients or coaching programs. It’s just smart business to have something for sale on your website or in a sales funnel or email sequence, so new-to-you visitors have something small to snap up when they first ‘e-meet’ you to get a taste of your work.
That said, unless you’re actively promoting your evergreen offer (which is definitely something you can–and should!–do), you likely won’t make thousands in a day (or week) from it.
On the other hand, a live launch can provide you with a huge boost in cash flow pretty quickly. It’s also much more common to use tactics like scarcity and early bird bonuses to promote live launches, and these tried-and-true marketing practices can definitely motivate buyers who otherwise wouldn’t have purchased.
3. You Don’t Mind Weeks (or Months) Without Sales
Here’s the deal: Some entrepreneurs thrive off living live launch to live launch. There’s definitely something attractive about the idea of pouring your all into a large launch–and then being able to take a chunk of time off from selling (to sip margaritas on the beach, or just hang with the kiddos at the zoo all Saturday long). And if that’s your thing, then by all means, go for it!
Some online business owners only launch their signature offers once or twice a year, then take a nice, spacious break from selling. (Although let it be noted, they don’t take a break from business entirely.) If you like to ‘batch’ things and wouldn’t mind a huge cash injection followed by several months of slow or non-existent sales, then live launching might be perfect for you.
4. You’re Running a Live Program
Running a live coaching experience or workshop? It might make the most sense to ‘live’ launch a program you need to actively show up for (with something like weekly live calls, for example).
You can also run live versions of digital courses, too, of course. But if the offer your launching has a specific start and end date, you’ll likely need to run a live launch to get people signed up in time (even if you’re going to offer a replay).
In the end, choosing whether to live launch or to sell your offer more passively is a personal decision and will vary depending on the offer, business goals and season of life and business you’re in.
Want to learn more about how to structure your business in a way that works for you? Grab my FREE $100k Business Systems Workbook to learn how to simplify your processes, streamline your workload and grow your business to 6-figures and beyond!
