179: 7 Types of Bonuses That Can Make or Break Your Launch

Foreign welcome to the Creators MBA podcast, your go to resource for mastering the art and science of digital product entrepreneurship. My name is Dr. Destiny Kopp and I help business owners generate consistent revenue from their digital product business without the need to be glued to their desks, constantly live launching or worrying about the social media algorithms. I hope you enjoy our episode today. And my special guest today is Melody Decroce. Melody is a launch strategist in the brains behind the launch library. She helps women launch digital products like online courses, trainings and memberships so, so that they can grow a scalable and enjoyable online business that gives them more time, money and freedom. And Melody, I want you to let you know that you are absolutely speaking my language here and I know that everybody is listening. You know, that is the kind of business that they are interested in doing also. But before we get into all the questions I have for you today, can you tell the audience just a little bit more about you and how you help people?

Yes. So I'm Melody. Thank you for the lovely introduction. And I help, you know, like, like Destiny said, online business owners simplify their launches and make consistent sales on autopilot using like a clear, simple launch framework so that they have more personal and financial freedom. I think that's what we're all after, you know, and I do this through. I used to do like one on one work. I don't do that anymore. I'm transitioning more into like, I have the launch library, all access, which is like launch templates and, you know, kind of the things that are going to save people time, help them launch more easily. Because I know a lot of people, if it's their first launch or even, you know, their second or third launch, they just want to make launches easier because people get overwhelmed, they get in their heads. And so I try to make launches fun. I try to make them simple. And that is my goal for all business owners.

And I know a lot of us when we're out here and we're thinking about, oh, we got to do a launch, we're thinking about this big, huge, you know, production and every everything. But, you know, you say that you, your kind of specialty is keeping them simple. Can you tell us a little bit more about that?

Yeah. And you can still have like a big launch and still keep it simple. I think that people, especially when you first get into like the online space, you know, you see the people like the Amy Porter Fields, you know, these huge launches, which I know you've had her on your show before, and you think that you have to do all those things you think that you have to do like this whole month long ramp up or this two week car open period. And it doesn't have to be that way. I say, you know, start small. You know, if you want to do an email only launch, I know we've got a lot of introverts, you know, maybe that might be listening. I myself am one. I didn't, I did email only launches for like two years before I started implementing like webinars and challenges and things like that. So you don't have to do it any other way. I think the only failed launch is one that you're not doing. So if it needs to be an email only launch or a social media only launch, like try it, get your feet wet, you know, you know, don't feel like you have to do all the things.

And I love what you just said. The only failed launch is the one that you didn't do. And I think you just gave us a really good social media sound bite. Right? Yeah, that, that is great. I love that. And today we're really going to dig into one aspect of the launch and that are the launch bonuses that we include in the launch. And you can you tell us a little bit more about bonuses and how they can help drive more sales in our launch?

Yes. So one thing that I love about bonuses is because you can implement and offer bonuses no matter what style of launch that you're doing. So if you're doing a challenge launch, a webinar launch or an email only launch, you can still implement bonuses that are going to help sales. So again, like, if you're not wanting to do this huge, you know, mega launch, do an email launch, offer like really awesome bonuses and you'd be amazed at like how much more it can, you know, get people off the fence. And the reason I like bonuses is because, you know, with sales, I hear a lot of people, especially in like the early stages, they're like, well, how do I convince people to, you know, buy my course or buy my membership? And I think one thing to get clarity on is we're not trying to convince people to buy anything. What we want to do is give them enough information and clear information to help them like self select to make their own empowered decision on whether or not your offer is right for them. And where bonuses can come in is if you choose the right types of bonuses, it can enhance the product that you're already selling. And so those people that have already said, you know, yeah, I think I'm interested in this. But, you know, I just need more time to think about it. Then these expiring bonuses are going to help people make a decision more quickly on whether it's right for them. And it can be a yes or a no. And that's either one is fine. But the bonuses are definitely going to entice more yeses than nos. You know, they're going to get people off the fence a little bit quicker.

And I like that perspective that you brought to the table. And I think it's very important here is that these bonuses are helping people kind of determine and self select is this offer right for them. But let's talk about a little bit more about those examples of effective expiring bonuses that you just mentioned and walk us through kind of the timeline of when we would put those in during a launch.

So I like to say, and this always kind of scares people in the beginning because I say there's like seven types of launch bonuses. Now I want to just, you know, preface this in the beginning. I am not saying you should use all of these. You should not use all of these in every launch. You know, you want to pick the ones that feel right for you. But the seven types of launch bonuses that I've kind of come up with when working with people over the years, the first one is a wait list bonus. So if you have a new product and you're kind of teasing it and you have a wait list, which I highly encourage people to do, or if you have like a course or something that's like open and shut, you know, you close the doors in between launches, you can have that wait list. So a waitlist bonus is simply that it's like people who are on the wait list who join before you open the cart to the public, they get a special, you know, type of bonus. There's a webinar only bonus. So you've seen these if you've been on webinars. You know, sometimes like if you join before the end of the webinar, you want to offer that in between, you know, the webinar pitch and the Q and A. And so that gives them that whole Q and A time to think about it and decide if they want to buy and then they could get that webinar bonus. There's another one called the fast action bonus. This one is. And the next one I'm going to talk about is the early Bird bonus. And sometimes people get these confused. How I define the fast action bonus is one that's a limited quantity. So most of the Other ones are like expiring like time based bonuses. This is the one that I say like do a limited quantity and it's usually reserved for higher ticket programs or you know, higher ticket courses. And you can offer like one to one, you know, but you want to, you don't want to offer one to one to like let's say 50 people. So maybe you say like the first five people who join get you know, a 30 minute strategy call with me. So you definitely want to limit those to the first, you know, number of people who join. There's an early bird bonus which I just mentioned and that is usually reserved for like the first 24 or 48 hours of your card open. It's going to really help get those influx of sales in the beginning which is kind of like makes you feel good. It gets you pumped up to, you know, to continue through the rest of the launch. There's also a mid cart bonus and this I usually reserve only if you have like a cart that's open for like two weeks, you know, or something. You don't want to do it a mid cart bonus on like a five day launch. But that sometimes like in that middle period is usually where sales are really slow or non existent sometimes. And so that mid cart bonus can kind of get some excitement going again. And one thing to remember, these bonuses, with the exception of the fast action bonus, you want to make sure they're scalable. So you want to be able to deliver, you know, like a digital product. You want them to be something you can deliver at scale. And when you do like this mid cart bonus, you also want to offer it retroactively to anybody who joined prior to you, you know, unlocking that bonus. And then my favorite one is the one that I reserve usually for the very last day, I call it the mic drop bonus. And that's usually something that's like it's going to be valuable but it's also kind of fun, you know, and it's like boom. You know, all these people that are like waiting till the last day. The last day automatically pushes people to make a decision anyway. So this bonus is going to really like okay, got to have it, take my money, you know what I mean? And then the final bonus is a pay in full bonus. And this is if you have, you know, a payment plan versus a pay in full obviously payment plans, you know, sometimes then those can cost business owners money because you might have failed payments or you're collecting payments. And so that pay in full bonus is just to inspire more people to just get the whole thing out.

Right. You gave us so much there, and I love all of that.

I got out of breath talking. I was sitting here writing it all down.

Oh, that was such good information.

Now don't feel like you have to write it all down too, because, you know, just a little preview. I'm going to be giving something away at the end of this episode. You'll have it in the show notes, but it'll have all of this information in there.

Yeah, we will definitely make sure that your free gift is there. So I love the mic drop bonus one that you have. Can you give us some examples? A little bit more examples of that?

Those can be, you know, like I said, it can be anything. But I like to have a little bit of fun with those. So, like, for instance, let's say you have some sort of, like, fitness course or a workout challenge. You could have the mic drop bonus could be like, you know, a set of, like, pump you up playlists, you know, like a Spotify playlist, or just something kind of fun. I'm trying to think of some other ones. I know one time. Let's see. I'm not going to be able to think of this now that I'm like, on the spot.

I did put you on the spot there. I apologize.

No, it's totally fine. It might be like if you have like a personal finance course, you know, you could do a mic drop bonus at the end. It's like, you know, some budgeting spreadsheet templates or something that's gonna get them off the fence. It's gonna offer, like, value. It's gonna really, you know, we'll talk about this as we go to, like, what the best kinds of bonuses are. You know, it should enhance or help people take action on what they're purchasing and so. But usually, like, I just kind of like to make those fun and easy and people, you know, something that people haven't heard of before, get really creative with it. This is where if you have. I know a lot of us are like, full of ideas and short on time, you know, to like, implement them all. So maybe you have a really cool idea and you're like, well, I can't really, like, turn that into a course or I don't really want to sell that or it's a little, you know, whatever. If it fits in with your offer, like, you know, put it as a PDF and include that as a bonus. And that could be your mic drop bonus. You know, it could be literally anything.

And I'm curious As to what type of bonuses have you found to be most successful either in your own launches or the launches that you're, you know, helping clients with?

I think the thing to make sure to remember is that a good bonus, the best bonuses, are ones that enhance the product that they're already purchasing. And so it can either help them take action on it, you know. So let's say, let's say you have, you know, some sort of course on establishing a morning routine or, you know, productivity or something like that, then maybe you offer a bonus that is like a morning meditation that kind of helps get them in a good headspace for, to prepare them for the rest of their day, you know, so you want it to be aligned. I know for my signature offer, the launch library, all access. Then I included one time as an early bird bonus. It was a behind the scenes debrief of my launch. And people loved that, you know, because it was like it gave them. I mean, I shared the numbers, the good, the bad, the ugly, you know, like from start to finish on that particular launch. So the ones that they were like seeing in real time, they got to see the behind the scenes and how well it performed. People love that kind of stuff. Like the behind the scenes that nobody else gets to see. You could do, you know, some sort of audit. I have a client who she offers Instagram account audits, you know, for people who join her Reels course. So anything that's aligned, that helps people take action or helps them continue to take action, Accountability, you know, partner matching. Like if you have a group coaching program, then take the people that join and match them up as accountability partners, you know, that's going to help them take action. So those are the best kinds of bonuses and I love all of those examples there.

And one thing that kind of popped in my mind in where we're, you know, kind of communicating these bonuses and communicating them to our audience during the launch. One of the things that we need to, you know, kind of communicate in that process is the value of it. You know, what, you know, and kind of set the value of what is this bonus as it compares to the price of the course or the membership or whatever. How do you suggest we effectively do that?

Yeah, so just like, you know, I like to think of when you're communicating about your bonuses or the value of your bonuses, it's almost as if you're communicating it like a paid product that you're selling. You know, you want to be very clear on what the bonus is and why they should want it. Why it's valuable. So break it down in, you know, simple specific terms. So like as an example, instead of saying, you know, you get this free awesome ebook on Instagram growth, then you could say, you know, you'll receive our exclusive 50 page ebook filled with actionable daily tips to boost your Instagram engagement by up to 40 in 30 days. I mean, that's like super, super specific, you know, and then saying that's a 97 value, you know, so put a value on it, put a realistic, you know, dollar amount value on it, but you know, make sure that you are also communicating that value because it's going to increase the value of your overall offer. You also want to make sure that you're connecting in your messaging, connecting that bonus directly to that offer or their pain points or where they're trying to get with that. You know, you don't want to just like throw in the kitchen sink. You're not trying to just throw a bunch of bonuses at them. You want to make sure they're valuable and you want to communicate that value through your messaging, your emails on your sales page. I always say on the sales page have a dedicated section that's like, here's the bonuses you get. You know, lay them out, put the value so that people can really like digest them very easily. You want to make it very clear what they get, how much value you're offering and then that's just going to make buying your main offer a no brainer.

And I'm sure you've been, I know you've been doing this for a while, so can you kind of give us some insight into some creative bonus ideas that we may not have thought about that we could implement in our launches?

Yeah, so like one of the ones I talked about earlier. So the behind the scenes content, I think everybody is sort of a voyeur at heart and they want to know, you know, what everybody else's businesses are doing. So if you can think of something that is sort of a behind the scenes, like my launch debrief, you know, exclusive online events, sometimes we'll, you know, see things like that where it's a mini mastermind or a live workshop. So how can you put like a different spin on that to make it, you know, really enticing to your audience? Another one that I am actually talking one of my clients into trying. This is like branded merchandise because people love getting stuff in the mail. And I think when we are like in this digital world, we're so used to getting these digital bonuses and we're not always using them, you know, and so getting something in the mail, it doesn't even have to be, like, super elaborate. I know this wasn't specific to a launch, but I had sent out a survey earlier in the year to my audience and to entice people to take the survey, then I, you know, did a drawing of, like, three winners with, like, a little, you know, just a curated little gift basket. And it had like a favorite book of mine. It had like a little, you know, Stanley mug, you know, something like that. It wasn't, you know, it wasn't like a huge thing, but people just love getting physical things, stickers. Like, it could be anything. So that's a fun, creative bonus. Accountability partner matching. Again, I mentioned that earlier. So, like, if you have a group program, then doing something like that, a themed challenge. So I've seen people do this where, you know, you have a course that teaches somebody how to do a certain thing, and then afterward you take all the students of that course. This also increases the chance that they're going to take your course. So you say, hey, everybody who got this? Let's, you know, go through the course together in, like, 30 days. And whoever finishes and, you know, gets this whatever product or whatever. You know, if it's like a. Showing people how to run a challenge, you know, let's say that that's the thing. Then you could afterwards showcase the people to your own audience that finished your course. So it's kind of like showing them off but also promoting your own course again. So there's things like that, like challenges, accountability partners, physical things. You could, you know, just have fun with it.

And all of those that you've mentioned, I've actually seen them in practice, so I know that they're working. I really like the Brandon merchandise one. And I know that I have signed up for things and past where I've gotten that branded merchandise, and I was like, oh, this is so cool. I didn't even remember, you know, that this was included as a bonus.

Who doesn't love to get swag sometimes? I know.

I agree. So tell us about some mistakes that we can avoid. And I know that you've seen them. You've been doing this for a while, and I'm sure that I've made some of them in. In the past, too. But tell us about some of the mistakes that we can avoid when offering bonuses during a long.

I think we all have made these mistakes, you know, and that's how you lear. Right? But I think the biggest one is people try to overload people with bonuses. And so it's like, oh, you get this and you get this and you get this. And that can actually turn people off from buying. Because then it's like, well, when am I going to have time to implement all this and take all these bonuses? So you don't want to overload them with bonuses. Which is why I said, you know, the seven bonuses I talked about earlier, you don't want to have all of those. You just want to pick like two or three. You know, it's tempting. You think, oh, it's going to make it more valuable. But it actually kind of comes off as a little bit desperate if you have too many bonuses and also makes people feel overwhelmed. So we don't want to do that. Another one is irrelevant bonuses. So don't just think just because it's free doesn't mean it's valuable or doesn't mean that people are going to want it. So make sure it's tied into your offer, helps enhance it in some way, helps them take action on it. Obviously, we don't want to offer low quality bonuses. You know, you don't want to just have a bonus be like an afterthought, like, oh, gosh, I'm launching tomorrow, but I need a bonus. So let me just, just, you know, whip up something that's not high quality. You know, you want it to be good. You want it to be something that people are going to like, really want to take action on. Another one is, and I think this, I used to work in like qa, you know, and just seeing things that are like, too complex. We want to keep it simple. So if it's overly complex to like redeem a bonus, then that's going to turn people off. Like, you don't. And it's also a customer service nightmare. So keep it simple. You know, that's why I like the digital products as bonuses, because you. And automate it, you know, and automate the delivery of the bonuses. Failing to communicate the value. You know, you want to make sure that people understand, like, this is a bonus, this is high value. And then just not creating the urgency around it, you know, so make sure that you're. You clearly communicate. When is this bonus expiring? You know, what is the urgency behind it? Because that's going to, again, get them off the fence more quickly if that bonus is going to help, you know, be the thing that makes them decide whether or not to buy.

Melody, thank you so much for all of the great tips that you gave us today. I want to make sure that people know where they can find you and also tell us a little bit more about that free gift that you have.

Yes. So you can find me at my website, thelaunchlibrary.com or on Instagram at the launch library. And then for everybody listening today, I am excited to offer if you go to the launchlibrary.com MBA then you can download my launch bonus bank and that's going to show you it's going to walk through the seven unique bonus types that we talked about, when to use them and then it's going to give you 30 ready to apply ideas so you can boost your own launch.

So, Melody, thank you so much for joining me here today.

Thank you so much. I know it was a lot, so.

Hopefully there's a lot of great information.

Thank you so much. This is so much fun.

Thanks for listening all the way to the end. I hope you enjoyed this episode today. If you love the show, I'd appreciate a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast platform. Have a great rest of your day and bye for now.