Webinars or Video Sales Letter (VSL) Which one should you use?

Video Transcript 

Today I want to show you the differences between a Video sales letter funnel, commonly known as a VSL funnel, and a Webinar Funnel.

So, the whole purpose here is to help you to understand the differences between the two so you can pick the right one for your business and get the best return on your marketing dollar.

So I’m excited. So let’s hop in and dive into the content, shall we? All right, guys, so today what we’re going to cover is first, what is a VSL funnel? I’m just going to give you a broad overview about what a VSL funnel is because we actually have another video that goes more in-depth. 

So check it out on our YouTube channel or blog, and secondly, we’re going to do the exciting part, which is the numbers, guys, for any of you who are business owners. We know the numbers are important because we want to know how much we can get back from every dollar that we spend on advertising and how much the returns are for that.

Okay, so we’re going to dive deep into two scenarios. One is a webinar funnel and the second one obviously, would be a VSL funnel. So let’s look at numbers so you can make a more educated decision as to what funnel to use or your business and to help you further to decide which one is most suitable for your business.

We are gonna talk about when and why to use VSL versus webinars.

So let’s hop into this very exciting content starting now.

VSL Funnel Overview

Okay, so here’s a very brief overview of a VSL funnel.

What we have here are the traffic sources, right? Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, whatever you drive traffic from, we drive it to an opt-in page. In this opt-in page, we are basically promising, hey, we’re going to help you solve the problem. Using these three solutions in the video that I’ve prepared for you. But you need to opt-in by putting your email into this opt-in form right at the bottom of the page. Once they opt-in, we bring them to the content.

This is where we deliver solid content to them and help them solve their problems. And from there we kind of say. Well. If you enjoyed the content and if you want more help. Well. You can actually hook up with us on a one-on-one appointment by clicking the button below which then you can bring them either directly to a calendar to schedule a time with you.

Or if you want to pre-qualify them. Bring them to a survey page. Get them to fill in some details before they are qualified to actually set a time with you. So that in essence is a very simple VSL funnel. 

Comparison Example: Webinar vs VSL

All right, guys, so let’s look at the numbers.

So in this case, it was a financial planner that came to me and wanted to do webinars. So I thought to myself, look, maybe Webinars work for them, maybe they don’t, but let’s look at some projections because here they wanted to bring people from the webinar to a one-on-one appointment with them where they finally did the upsell of their services.

So I said, look, let’s look at the numbers, right, because ultimately that’s the best way to make a business decision. So in this case, they were getting based on three different scenarios where show up rate were ranging from 15% to 25% with a monthly ad spend of $3,000.

Let’s look at the return on ad spend, which is the bottom line, right? 97%, which means they’re getting the money back. In the front end, we’re not taking into account or consideration any of the repeat sales and how long the customer stays with them for the long term. So taking that into account makes these figures look a little bit more ‘sexy’ because right now they don’t look all that ‘sexy’.

I mean, you’re talking one-to-one return. You’re talking 1-1.6 return here, and in the best-case scenario, 2.3 times the return on the ad spend. But then once you take into consideration the lifetime value and repeat purchases, that makes more sense.

So this was for webinar, so let’s look at what it looks like for a video sales letter.

All right, so let’s look at the VSL funnel, and what are the figures here.

First of all, let’s look at the ad cost. It’s still the same ad cost, but the bottom line, in the worst-case scenario, we’re looking at 4.67 times on our ad spend, seven times in an ordinary case scenario, and 9.33 times in a good case scenario.

So does that mean we completely ditch webinars? Not necessarily.

Let me explain more in the rest of this video before you jump to any conclusions.

So in all three scenarios that we saw earlier, the VSL funnel is way better than the Webinar funnel. Does that mean we ditch Webinar funnels?

Once again, please watch to the end of this video before you make a decision.

Why a VSL Funnel?

So let me quickly explain why you would say VSL funnel.

Advantages of a VSL Funnels

Firstly, a VSL funnel is automated: 

This is one of the key benefits of having a VSL funnel that you don’t need to actually present at this VSL thing, right? Unlike a webinar, you may do live webinars and you have to present.

So VSL funnel is fully automated. All you have to do is set it up once and just run traffic to it. Very simple, and then you can basically have qualified prospects and it’s scheduled the time. All you have to do is to turn on your calendar every morning, see what appointments your VSL has brought you, and bam. Tend to those appointments. Very, very simple. You don’t need to have great presentation skills either. Like in webinars, you can actually hire a professional actor or professional voiceover to do your VSL for you.

This is ideal also for high-ticket items.

If you’re selling high-ticket products in the thousands of dollars at least, VSL may be better for you because with VSL funnels you’re generally getting them to an appointment at which you are able to present your offer for high ticket item. And a VSL is much faster to split test. Instead of redoing a whole 60 minutes webinar, all you need to do is maybe just change little bits of your video sales letter and to split test it to make sure it is optimal and that it gets you better results. So it’s much faster to split test.

Disadvantages of a VSL Funnels

All right, so we’ve looked at some of the pros. Let’s look at some of the cons of using a VSL funnel.

Firstly, it can be time-consuming because imagine you’re waking up and you got 6,7 appointments all set up. That’s fantastic for yourselves, for your business, but you don’t have time to do anything else. So it can be a time suck. But it’s a good thing to have this kind of problem because then you can hire people to fulfil your appointments. So it’s not a problem that cannot be overcome, but it’s something to be aware of.

Secondly, is that the show-up rates for appointments can be frustrating sometimes because I mean, you have set aside this 30 minutes or 1 hour for this person and the prospect does not show up without any notice. That can be extremely frustrating. That’s why you need to have a proper follow-up sell system there to follow up with people to show up for their appointments.

And finally, ultimately, a VSL funnel gets you one-on-one appointments, which is not a very leveraged way to sell. So you’re still having to sell on a one-on-one basis. So those are the three cons of using a VSL funnel.

Advantages of a Webinar

So, why use a webinar when a VSL is so awesome?

There are actually a couple of reasons why you should use a webinar and let’s get into it here.

The first reason is that a webinar helps you to build authority and brand. Because you’re spending a lot of time at a webinar, you can showcase your various results, you can demonstrate your expertise that helps you to build authority and your brand. So that is the one of the reasons why you want to use a webinar and the fact that you can interact with your participants that helps to build trust and likability.

That will also stimulate the high likelihood of them making a purchase with you. And the third thing is that you can sell directly from the webinar. You don’t need to lead them to a one-on-one appointment unless you want to. But there is a good opportunity for you to just send them to an order page where they whip out their credit cards and they make purchases.

Which leads me to the next benefit is that webinars are a highly leveraged channel for selling because you are selling one too many. Like, for example at one of our clients webinars yesterday, they had over 200 people attending the webinar. Close to 90 people or 40% of the room ended up whipping their credit cards and purchasing what he had to offer. So he didn’t need to get people like one-on-one and had to talk to 90 people.

He just had one webinar and 90 people purchased on the spot. And the final thing is that with webinars you can generate excitement before the events using a series of emails, using Facebook groups, telegram or whatever channel to actually build up the excitement for the upcoming event. So those are some of the benefits of using a webinar.

Disadvantages of a Webinar

All right, so we’ve covered why use webinars. Let’s cover some of the reasons not to use webinars. 

Firstly, it is harder to sell high-ticket items on webinars, especially if you have a webinar that’s one-two hours long.

It is extremely difficult to sell a high-ticket item such as a $5,000 product at a one or two-hour webinar. So that is one of the reasons why you shouldn’t use the webinar if you’ve got a high ticket item. If you do, what you should do is to guide them. And the offer at the webinar should be a consultation. A one-on-one consultation where then at the one-on-one consultation you then pitch the high ticket offer, right? That works.

Now secondly, show-up rates can be dismal. If you do not have a good follow-up system, your show-up rates can be bad and that can be very disappointing because you spend so much money to try and get a lead, right? So watch out for show-up rates.

And the third thing is you need good presentation skills and training, right? Just because you speak well doesn’t mean that you can actually pitch and sell well at a webinar. It is a specialized skill that needs to be trained. So those are the three reasons not to use webinars for your business.

Using A VSL For Your Business

So when should you use a VSL for your business? I suggest you look at these 6 criteria which will help you decide whether a VSL is suitable for your business.

First of all, if you got a small advertising budget, then I would say a VSL funnel may be suitable for you, more suitable for you compared to a Webinar funnel because with webinars you really need a big budget to scale.

And secondly, if you’re just starting off, I would suggest that a VSL is much easier to get off the ground, and much faster to get off the ground.

So use the VSL when you’re first getting started and also use this opportunity to split test various VSLs with various different topics to see what your prospects actually respond to. So when you’re ready to scale with webinars, you know exactly what topic your target market will respond to.

And thirdly, if you got more time than money right now in your business, I would suggest that VSL funnels will be perfect for you as well, right?

So if you got a lot of time to meet one-on-one with prospects, then use A VSL. And if you do not have strong presentation skills, if you’re not trained in selling from the stage, then I would suggest start-off with a VSL funnel because here once again, we can hire professionals to do the videos for you so you don’t have to even lift the finger. And the next thing is if you don’t need a lot of clients, like for example in our business, all we’re looking to do is add one or two clients every month.

We’re not looking for dozens of clients every month. So a VSL is perfect for all types of business where there is a high value for each customer and where there is a strong repeat purchase for each customer. We’re looking for quality, not quantity here, and if you’re in the same boat, then maybe you should also consider using a VSL funnel. And finally, where you have a high ticket offer in the thousands of dollars and where the customer lifetime value to you is very high, where they come back and purchase over and over again, much like our business where clients will come back every single month to help so that we can help maintain their marketing and optimize the marketing.

This is where A VSL is most productive. So I hope that really helps you to see whether a VSL works for your business.

Using Webinars For Your Business

All right, so when should your business use Webinars then? So let’s look at it.

First of all, if you are trying to sell at scale, when you have a product, like an info product or software product when you don’t have to customize and you can sell it at scale to a mass audience.

So that is the number one thing, and second thing is when you want to grow really fast, right? A lot of my clients, they spent tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands each month on promoting their webinars and they are able to grow the business extremely fast because they have that amount of budget to do it.

And the third thing is you need to make sure you have a strong and tested offer before you spend lots of money and scale using webinars because that offer component, it is so important because, without it, you cannot scale and cannot be profitable with your webinars.

The fourth thing, sorry, is that you have money, but you have very little time. Now, many of the customers we serve, they are like in the top 1% of the coaches out there. They have lots of money, but they don’t have time to talk one-on-one with prospects, right?

So they want to grow their business at scale. And so they want to bring hundreds, thousands of people in the room at once because they have the money to do so, and they do not have the time to actually sell one on one. So webinars are ideal for these people.

The fifth one is that you need to have a strong ascension funnel, or you already have a strong ascension funnel.

What do I mean by this? Most of my most successful clients in the webinar business is that they have a really good, strong offer at the webinar at a very low ticket price, but then they have other upsells later on.

So, for instance, the first upsell may just be like a $100 product to a two-day boot camp, which is an incredible value. And once they get to this two-day boot camp, they are then offered a higher-end product, maybe 5000, maybe 10,000, but somewhere in the thousands, right? And then they might even have another product after that.

Okay? So that’s how they are able to make the webinar funnel very profitable for them because they have this strong ascension funnel with various offers in place. Now, the final thing is that with webinars, you need to have a low ticket front and offer that works very well for most of our clients. 

And it usually ranges actually from $100 or sometimes even less to $1,000. In fact, if you keep it below $500, that’s where we see the most sales and plus a strong ascension funnel afterwards.

That is where the money is made, right? So if you are considering using webinars, then look at these six criteria. And if you can take off most of these, then I think you are ready for webinars instead of using a VSL funnel.

Conclusion

Thank you so much for watching right to the end.

I really hope this video helped you to get clarity on whether a Webinar funnel or a VSL funnel is more suitable for your business right now. And if you need help with either one of them, feel free to reach out, talk to us, and we can see whether we can help you out with any of them as well.