Training seminars are a savvy marketing strategy. As a Solutions Provider they warrant serious consideration. Hosting a successful training seminar, however, requires a lot of work and planning. Last time we talked about some ideas for getting the most out of your training seminars. Here we present some more tips and tricks and some ideas on how to decide who to invite and how to invite them.

Make the content of the training seminar fun and entertaining. Try to get the audience involved. Ask questions, have people show their hands, have them volunteer information. Use as many participative learning techniques as possible.

Provide a handout at the training seminar with your company information all over it. Put some blanks the paper and have them fill in information as part of the participatory learning. This makes the attendees feel like they own the paper and are more likely to hold on to it.

Invite your best clients to the training seminars. This creates good will and chances are they will talk to other attendees about their experience with you. You may even be able to incorporate a few testimonials into your training seminar presentation.

Practice your delivery. If you are nervous about speaking, join Toastmasters and practice until you are comfortable leading a training seminar. Whether delivering a seminar or not, the more comfortable you are making group presentations the more successful you will be in most of your marketing activities.

Generate demand for your own training seminars by speaking at other peoples' events: Speak at a Chamber of Commerce breakfast, participate at a Rotary meeting, get on a panel at a user group meeting, etc..

Ask your clients whether they know of people who would be interested in attending your training seminar. These people will be predisposed to trusting you because they already know someone that you provide services to.

Invite everyone on your contact list to your training seminar. Use postcards, email, phone calls, etc...

Place inserts advertising your training seminar in newsletters that you send out.

Consider renting target lists for a direct mail campaign for your training seminar.

The Bottom Line on Training Seminars

Training seminars are a wonderful addition to your marketing strategy. They are labor intensive and the first few can be a little intimidating. If you keep your eye on the prize so to speak - the fact that training seminars reach more people and generate a lot of positive buzz, you should quickly conclude that the effort involved in putting on a training seminar more than pays for itself.

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