One question I see often from my clients during Q&A calls about teleseminars is a concern about how expensive it must be to do your own teleseminars.

Today’s teleseminar formula lesson will put your fears at ease.

The costs of a complete teleseminar product can be broken down into these parts.

• Your connection to a “bridge line”
• Your listeners connection to a bridge line
• The conference call system
• The recording of the call
• The replay of the call
• The transcripts of the call
• The autoresponder service you use to build your list
• The editing of the audio recording (if necessary)
• The website hosting fees

As you can imagine, if you aren’t careful, your teleseminar can turn into a very expensive proposition. However, if you learn what I teach about teleseminars in my upcoming live teleseminar workshop, you’ll find your entire teleseminar business will not only be less than $100/month - you’ll learn how to be in profit before you even pick up the phone and spend a dime!

Your connection to a “bridge line”
Many of the conference calling systems used today are based in Iowa or some other mid-west US state. To dial in and host a teleseminar you will pay your traditional long distance rates per minute, just like you were calling Aunt Betty.

Of course, if you are using an unlimited calling plan at your home or home office (recommended for tax purposes!), or you have free nights and weekends, then it’s just a matter of using what your phone service gives you.

Total cost: whatever you are already paying for your phone bill, which now becomes a tax deductible expense (click here for more tax strategies). Do this correctly, and you are now saving money on your phone bill instead of spending money.

Your listeners connection to a bridge line
In order for your audience to participate on a live call, they will need to also make a long distance call. However you will not pay for this yourself. Although some people go as far as hosting toll-free calls, it’s not expected (although it is appreciated).

So I do not suggest you spend $0.02/minute/caller or whatever the rate is.

Total cost: Nothing out of your pocket

The conference call system
Believe it or not, there are plenty of services out there that do not charge you a dime to use their conference bridge services. In fact, you can host a teleseminar for up to 250 people (sometimes more) for free. These companies make their money from toll-free conference services or larger bridge lines.

The number one service for conference calls and teleseminars is InstantTeleseminar.com. This is not a free service - it costs $1 for 21 days, and then about $50/month. During my live workshop, I’ll teach you how to get this service for free as well.

Total cost: free, up to $47/month

The recording of the call
If you want to use your live teleseminar as a recorded product (highly recommended), then you need to be able to record the call.

At local electronics stores, you can find little adapters that plug into your phone in order to record the conversation. However, most conference calling systems include a recording function already, so this is not necessary.

You can also hire someone to record the call for you (and let them have all the equipment).

However, the free and premium services that I recommend and use both have recording features built in, so no additional fees are needed here.

Total cost: Included in conference systems above

The replay of the call
Once the call is complete, if you want new listeners to hear the call, you have to upload a replay to the internet.

You can do this by linking the raw mp3 file from your webhosting file manager to a web page or Squidoo lens (see DiscovercPanel.com for file manager lessons). Then your listeners need to click the link to download and open the file on their own computer.

Ideally though, you want to have a nifty play button on your website so people can listen to your call right there on the internet. You can either create this with a software program on your own computer, or use an online subscription service.

Many subscription services exist to upload a replay, and they range from free (for very limited replays) to inexpensive ($19.95/month), or pay as you go.

My top recommendation in this area is to use the replay feature already built into InstantTeleseminar so you do not have to incur any additional fees here. During the workshop, I’ll break down the other services and when each one is the best fit for the purposes you have in mind. These other services will be needed if you have to edit the recording for some reason.

Total cost: Already included above, up to $19.95/month additional if necessary

The transcripts of the call
Written transcripts of a teleseminar is totally optional, however many listeners appreciate the availability of this format of learning. This is simply a word-for-word (or close) document of the audio call.

Of course, you can spend the time to transcribe a call yourself if your budget is tight. Depending on your typing skills, this will take you about 5 times longer to transcribe than the actual audio length itself (consider 5 hours to transcribe a 1 hour call).

Transcription services and freelancers will typically charge you between $1-$2 per minute of recorded audio. Personally I budget about $100 for each hour of the recording.

This will be the most expensive part of a teleseminar - however, during my workshop I’ll make sure you know how to never pay out of pocket for transcriptions. And remember, this is an optional expense anyway.

Total cost: $100/hour of teleseminar - but not out of your pocket when you learn my teleseminar formula.

The autoresponder service you use to build your list
Another optional but recommended part of teleseminars is an autoresponder service. This is needed in order to register people for a call (recommended) so you can remind them an hour or two before the call begins.

Having an autoresponder service also allows you to follow up with listeners the next day to share the replay link, to offer them the same or a similar special deal as you did on the call, and to register their purchase of the teleseminar recording and/or transcripts.

Of course, if you already have an autoresponder service, you certainly do not need to go out and get a new one. So if you are already using Aweber, for example, you just make a new list. But if you are brand new to an online business, this will cost $19.95/month for unlimited lists and autoresponders.

Total cost: Already included, up to $19.95/month

The editing of the audio recording (if necessary)
You may feel the need to edit your teleseminar after the call. Perhaps there were some things said that shouldn’t be repeated, or an offer was made only for the live audience.

You may also want to add introductory music or a better introduction to the call.

Whatever your reason, editing your audio recording is something to consider and budget for. You’ll need audio editing software or an outsource vendor to take care of this for you.

The audio editing software I use is called Audacity, and it’s free. There are other programs out there that cost a lot of money and add some fancy bells and whistles. But for teleseminars, this is an easy choice. During my workshop, I’ll be showing you how to use Audacity to edit your own MP3 recordings.

If you outsource your editing to someone else, you’ll likely spend $50 - $100 depending on how much you need done.

Since these are live events, most audiences are not expecting professional-studio level recordings. So you’ll likely need less than $50 (or nothing at all) for editing.

Total cost: Free up to $100 (optional)

The website hosting fees
Finally, you need to host your recordings online for replay and download. If you already have a good hosting account, like the Swamp plan over at Hostgator for example, then this is already taken care of for you.

If not, add $10/month to your budget.

However, with InstantTeleseminar, the hosting of the replay and download is already included. It’s also included with the free service I reveal during the workshop.

Total cost: No additional cost up to $10/month

Summary
So what does all this add up to?

To host your own teleseminars, you should budget $100/month or less. The way I teach it in Teleseminar Formula, however, you should never pay out of pocket for your teleseminars.

And if you do, you’ll quickly recover the investment (this is a business after all) with the selling methods you’ll learn during this workshop.

For me, every teleseminar I do can be turned into a permanent money-making machine. And I’ll teach you the same strategies during this 4-day virtual workshop.

Looking forward to teaching you more!

Bob Jenkins

p.s. The dates of this workshop have changed - the 2008 Success With Teleseminars Workshop will now be March 28, 29, April 4, 5. For full details, and access to next week’s 7 Secrets To Success With Teleseminars training, go now to 2008SuccessWorkshop.com.

p.p.s. Do you still have something holding you back from doing teleseminars? Tell me about it with a comment below (ah-ha moments are also welcome, of course!)

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