When to sell in your workshops

Hey there!

A few weeks ago, I worked with a product strategist to build out her workshop. She’d use it as a lightweight experience that demonstrated the value of her premium program.

As we pulled the last bits together and she was preparing to run the workshop for the first time, she asked me a really important question:

“How do I sell at the end of the workshop?”

I told her what I tell every other business owner that’s asked me that same question:
“If you’re waiting till the end of your workshop to start selling, it’s already too late.”

In today’s issue, I’m breaking that answer down into 4 tangible takeaways for you to implement in your next workshop or webinar.

Here’s the mistake most of us make when it comes to selling within our workshops...

We show up, teach for four hours, and then flip to a “Next Steps” slide… hoping a few people stick around long enough to hear the pitch.

Not only will this feel awkward, it’s not doing you or your attendees any favors.

If you wait till the end to introduce your offer, you’ve already lost the room… mentally, if not literally.

And so if you want people to buy, you’ll “sell” the whole way through. But I don’t mean pitching like a slimeball. I mean building tension, exposing gaps, and connecting dots.

I mean guiding people from vague awareness to sharp clarity, and showing them what still needs work.

There are four ways to do this inside your workshop.

1. Selling starts before the workshop

The sales process doesn’t begin when you say, “Let’s talk about what it looks like to keep working together.”

It begins when someone finds your content, clicks through to your workshop, reads the landing page, and thinks, “This is exactly the problem I’ve been stuck on.”

From that moment forward, you’re helping them reframe the problem. You’re guiding them into awareness. And you’re showing them that you understand the thing they’re wrestling with better than they do.

If they show up for your session already feeling seen, the job gets easier. You’re not convincing them to buy. You’re helping them realize you’re the best person to help them solve what’s already urgent.

2. Your job isn’t to fix everything

One of the biggest mistakes I made in my own workshops - even up until recently - was trying to solve the whole thing.

People would show up to my masterclass… I’d walk them through my frameworks, help them tighten up their thinking, give live feedback, and by the end they’d gush with praise: “This has been, hands down, one of the most valuable sessions I’ve ever sat in!” (real quote)

Then they’d leave to go do everything on their own, and promptly fall on their face.

They didn’t have the full picture - naturally. I couldn’t distill 15 years of expertise into a workshop - nor should I.

By trying to be a hero who solved everything, I not only set people up to fail, it killed my conversions.

And so your goal isn’t to prove how smart you are inside your workshops, aka your wedge offers. It’s to help people recognize how much more is possible, and where their current strategy, ideas, and approach fall short.

It’s to show them examples of the dream destination they’re after, without carrying everyone there on your shoulders.

3. Use your workshop to stretch the gap

You’re not just there to teach and inspire. You’re there to expose the real gaps in your prospective client’s thinking - gaps they couldn’t see, let alone resolve, before today.

I do this now in multiple parts of my masterclass. After I teach attendees my systems and they implement within their business, I ask a version of these questions:

• What feels clearer than it did before?

• What assumptions did you realize you’ve been making?

• Where are you still unclear?

• What are you second-guessing now that you weren’t before?

I ask questions that help people feel the friction. To help them internalize their progress, while acknowledging the gaps they’ve exposed, and the work ahead.

When you stretch the gap, people don’t just walk away with insight. They walk away with urgency and move themselves into taking the next steps - the right way.

4. Don’t save your offer for the last slide

Ironically, the very tactical question my client originally asked about selling was when and how to introduce her offer at the end of her workshop, “Where do I put my pitch slide?”

In addition to the points you hopefully gleaned above, the specific answer to her question is: Not at the very end.

If you wait until after Q&A, after the thank-you slide, or after the energy has already wound down, it’s too late. People start to mentally exit the session as soon as they hear “housekeeping” or “any final questions.”

Instead, once you’ve stretched the gap and made the value of the workshop clear, that’s your moment. You show them where they are, what’s now visible, and what’s left to figure out.

Then you say, “Here’s what it looks like to keep working together.”

You show them how your offer helps them fills in those missing pieces, and the dream outcome they’ll achieve - faster, with your help.

Then after that, go into Q&A. Because if you flip the order, you’ll lose 50% of the room before you ever make the invitation.

Your takeaways

Selling inside a workshop isn’t about finding the perfect pitch slide. It’s about guiding people through the right experience, so by the time you present the offer, they already see it as the obvious next step.

Here’s what to focus on:

• You’ve already started selling the moment someone discovers your workshop

• Your job is to surface problems and show them what good looks like, not solve everything for them

• Stretch the gap with questions that reveal where their thinking is incomplete

• Introduce your offer before the Q&A, when the room still has energy and attention

💡 What’s one question you can add to your workshop that helps your audience realize there’s more they need to figure out?

📌 Want your workshop to do the selling for you?

Come and watch how I do it, while building yours, inside the Offer Development Masterclass. You’ll leave with workshop ideas that lead straight to your signature offer, without the awkward pitch slide at the end.

🤘🏼