Your Retreat Topic & Benefits!

Hi, everyone! Hope you’re excited to get started on your mini workshop and clear about what you want to teach on your retreat! So here goes…

Oh, and if you forgot your worksheet, you can grab it here!

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Question 1: What is the topic or topics you would like to teach on your retreat?

It’s important to not cover more than three main teaching points on your retreat! The reason is because there needs to be time for relaxing, socializing, and integrating. Make sure the three points are something that people really need to solve a problem they have. Your retreat must be the solution to their issues!

Otherwise, folks are not going to sign up for your retreat unless it just happens to be in a location they want to go to or it just happens to be running during a time period that they have free. The key is to make your retreat so needed that they make the time to come, no matter when or where it is.

For example, one of my clients, Laura, was creating a spiritual retreat to Mexico, and she had a heck of a time trying to sell it. She was so excited about her event that she wanted to teach everything she knew in one five-day retreat! Well, people were overwhelmed by the list of 20-some odd things she was going to teach, and the list wasn’t focused on how they were going to benefit from those things. So, after four months of frustrating marketing, she came to me, and together we lasered in on exactly what her clients were going to come away with.

We got rid of the vague, spiritual “mumbo-jumbo” (for example, “You’re going to connect with yourself more deeply”), and instead we changed that to VERY specific benefits (for example, “You’re going gain the tools you need to connect with your inner compass so that you’re clear on the next steps you need to take in your life”).

Granted, personal-growth language is more difficult than the wording for a business retreat, but the same rules apply! Once that was done, her clients finally “got” what she was offering on the trip, and she finally made some serious money. First, because it totally filled and she hit her numbers, and second because she offered all the attendees an opportunity to join her year-long apprenticeship program at 10K a person! Now, wouldn’t YOU love to do the same for your retreat?

Question 2: Based on this, what are the three main benefits your clients will come away with by the end of your retreat?

You need to be really clear on this, because it’s going to be part of your marketing and it’s what you’re actually going to deliver to your clients! Too much material, as I just shared in my example with Laura, makes a terrible retreat, and too many promises just seems unrealistic to fulfill.

Also, keep in mind that a retreat is NOT a workshop in a pretty place — it’s an experiential event. Make sure that your material is taught less as a lecture and more as a full-immersion experience. Today, people are looking to FEEL something, to experience deeply when they’re learning — not just to look at something. When you teach experientially, the “ah-ha’s” and the “ohhhh, I get it!” moments are so much more profound — and your benefits will be fully embodied rather than just sitting in your clients’ minds as concepts.

Let’s say you you’re a healthy-eating coach. What would have more impact on your clients — telling them it’s better to eat meat from free-range, grazing cows or visiting a CAFO (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation) and having them see with their own eyes how unhappy and unhealthy the cows are? Right? I know that’s an extreme example, but you get the point.

So do spend some time dreaming about this, and write down your thoughts. Your juicy theme and promise are the foundation to your entire retreat – and promotional materials.

So once you finish today’s questions, come on over to the Facebook Group and post what you’ve come up with!