How to Pick the Free Gift for Your Speaking Spot
Most free gifts at summits are whatever was already in the folder.
You built a checklist two years ago for a different promotion, it's still sitting there, and the contributor form is due tomorrow, so in it goes. I understand completely. I've also watched what happens next, which is that people opt in, get something that has nothing to do with the workshop they just watched, and quietly stop paying attention.
The gift is the handoff between the workshop and everything that comes after. When it's the wrong gift, the chain breaks right there, and every bit of goodwill you earned on stage gets spent on a download nobody uses.
This is part three of the Get Speaker Ready series. In part two we picked a workshop topic that sits one step upstream of your paid offer. Now the gift.
The gift picks up where the workshop ends
Here's the rule, and it's the only one that really matters. Your workshop taught somebody to decide something or see something. The gift helps them go do it.
If your workshop taught people how to tell which of their patterns would sell, the gift is the thing they use to run that check on their own patterns. If your workshop taught people how to size a launch to their list, the gift is the calculator or the worksheet that sizes theirs.
That's the connection. The gift is the workshop applied to their own business, and because it's applied to their own business, using it is what makes them notice what they're missing.
Can you finish this sentence without hesitating? "You just watched me show you how to do X, so here's the thing that helps you do X for your own business by Friday."
Four rules for a gift that actually gets used
It does one job
A gift that covers everything gets used for nothing. Pick the single next action and build for that. One template, one checklist, one worksheet, one short script.
It's usable in a day
Somebody is watching a summit, probably with three other tabs open, and they have maybe twenty minutes of attention for you. If your gift takes a weekend, it goes in the someday pile, and the someday pile is where your relationship with that person ends.
It produces something finished
The best gifts leave somebody holding a small completed thing. A filled-in worksheet, a written headline, a mapped-out page, a working prompt. People remember the person who got them a result, even a tiny one, and they don't remember the person who gave them information.
It's named after the outcome
Name it for what somebody walks away with. "The 20-Minute Offer Check" tells me what I get. "The Ultimate Guide to Offers" tells me I'm about to be given homework.
What to skip
A few formats that consistently underperform in this specific spot, and why.
The 47-page ebook
It looks generous and it reads like a chore. Length signals effort on your side and cost on theirs. Nobody opens it, so nobody gets a result, so nobody buys anything later.
The free discovery call
This works for a small number of high-ticket service providers and it works badly for everybody else. At summit volume you either get flooded with people who will never buy, or you get three bookings and no list growth. It also gives you nothing to sell at checkout, which is the next article.
The resource library
A folder of twelve things is a folder of twelve decisions. When somebody has to choose where to start, most of them choose to start later.
The recycled lead magnet
The one from a different promotion about a different topic. Even if it's good, it lands as a bait and switch, because they came for the thing you just taught and got something else.
The gift needs a page, not just a file
This is the part people skip and it costs them the most, so I want to be direct about it.
When somebody opts in for your gift, they should land on a page you control. Not an email with a file attached, and not a raw Google Drive link. A real page where the gift gets delivered.
Two reasons. First, that page is where you say the one extra thing that makes the gift work, which is usually a short "here's how to use this in the next twenty minutes" note. Second, that page is where the paid offer lives, and if there's no page, there's nowhere to put an offer, and you've just closed off the entire instant-customer path before you started.
"If the gift arrives as an attachment, there's nowhere to put anything else. The page is what turns a download into a next step."
Dr. Destini CoppWhat that page should have on it
Keep it simple. This is not a sales page and it shouldn't look like one.
- The gift itself, easy to grab, right at the top
- One or two lines on how to use it and how long it takes
- A short offer below it, which is the subject of part four
- Your name and face somewhere, because they just met you on video and you want the face to match
That's the whole page. If you're using ThriveCart, Kit, HTMLPub, Squarespace, or anything else you already have, build it there. The tool matters a lot less than the fact that the page exists.
Two ways speakers get this wrong at the last minute
The first is submitting the gift before the workshop is written. The contributor form asks for your gift and your session details at the same time, and it's tempting to fill in the gift field with something safe so you can move on. Then you write the workshop three weeks later and it goes somewhere else entirely, and now the two don't match.
Write the workshop outline first, even roughly. Ten minutes of outlining tells you what the gift needs to be.
And build the page before you record. At the end of your workshop you tell people where to go for the gift, so that URL has to be live and correct when you say it, and you can't fix it afterward without re-recording.
The second is making the gift too good. There's a fear that a small gift makes you look stingy, so people over-build, and then the gift does the job the paid offer was supposed to do. Small and finished beats big and unopened, every single time.
- Does the gift do the thing the workshop just taught?
- Can somebody finish it in under a day?
- Does it leave them holding something completed?
- Is it delivered on a page you control?
- Is there room on that page for a small paid offer?
Next up
Now that the gift has a home, we can put something to buy next to it. That's part four, and it's the one that turns a spot into money the same week.
- What a speaking spot is actually worth
- Pick a workshop topic that leads to your offer
- How to pick the free gift for your speaking spot (you're here)
- Put something to buy behind your free gift
- What to do with your leads after the event
Map the whole thing out in your first month.
Inside the Creator's MBA AI Mastermind you get a strategy session with me in your first month to map your gift, your offer path, and the follow-up behind them. $97 a month, cancel anytime.
Join the AI Mastermind →Frequently Asked Questions
Something that helps people act on the workshop you just taught. If your session taught somebody to decide or see something, the gift helps them go do it in their own business. One job, usable in under a day, and it should leave them holding something finished like a filled-in worksheet or a working template.
Only if it genuinely matches the workshop you are teaching. A recycled lead magnet about a different topic lands as a bait and switch, because people came for what you just taught and got something else. If the topics match, reuse it. If they do not, build a small new one.
For a small number of high-ticket service providers, sometimes. For most people it works badly at summit volume, because you either get flooded with people who will never buy, or you get three bookings and no list growth. It also leaves you nothing to sell at checkout.
Yes. Deliver the gift on a page you control rather than as an email attachment or a raw file link. That page is where you explain how to use the gift, and it is where your small paid offer lives. Without a page there is nowhere to put an offer, which closes off the whole instant-customer path.
Short enough to finish in a day, and ideally in about twenty minutes. Long guides look generous and read like a chore, so they sit unopened. Small and finished beats big and unused, because people remember whoever got them a result.
