A live workshop is one of the best products for anyone who teaches, because you can sell it before you've made a single slide. People aren't just buying information they could find later — they're buying a specific time, a real room, the chance to ask you directly, and the pressure of a date that makes them actually show up.
Sell the room, not just the lesson
A recording can be paused forever, which is exactly why people never finish it. A live session has energy: everyone's there at once, questions get answered on the spot, and there's momentum. Lean into what only live can offer.
- Promise live Q&A — the thing a recording can't give.
- Keep the group small enough that people feel seen.
- Include a working session so they leave with something done.
- Offer the replay as a bonus, not the main event.
Use the date to drive urgency
A fixed date is a built-in reason to buy now. Unlike an evergreen download that people bookmark and forget, a workshop closes registration and starts without them. That deadline does a lot of your selling, so put it front and center.
Price it above a recording
Live access, your attention, and a small room are worth more than a passive video, so price accordingly. You can always repackage the recording as a cheaper product later, giving you two income streams from one afternoon of teaching.
Collect signups and payment in one place
You need a page that explains the workshop, takes registration, collects payment, and captures emails so you can send the joining link and reminders. You can run all of that from one link at onesol.io — set the date, take the payments, and keep the attendee list to invite to your next one.
Fill the Room Before You Worry About the Content
A live workshop sells on a specific, believable outcome and a firm date, so lead with both. 'Build a working Notion client tracker in 90 minutes, live, Thursday the 12th at 7pm' outsells 'An Introduction to Productivity Systems' every time, because the first tells the buyer precisely what they'll walk away with and when. Name the thing they'll have finished by the end, not the topic they'll have heard about.
Open sales two to three weeks out and use the date itself as your natural urgency — you don't need a fake countdown when there are genuinely only so many days until the doors close. Post the workshop once when it opens, once mid-way with a detail or a common question you'll answer, and once in the final 48 hours; that last reminder consistently produces a disproportionate share of sign-ups because live events run on last-minute deciders.
Cap the seats, or appear to, even if your video call could technically hold hundreds. A limit of 30 makes the event feel like a room rather than a broadcast, justifies a higher price, and gives you a real reason for a waitlist. If it sells out, the waitlist is your warm audience for the next run — you've effectively pre-sold the repeat before you've even delivered the first.
Design the Ticket Tiers Around What People Actually Want
Most workshop buyers fall into two groups: those who want to show up and learn, and those who want the outcome without the live commitment. Sell to both. A standard live ticket, and a slightly higher tier that adds the recording, the templates you used, and perhaps a follow-up Q&A, lets each buyer choose their level without you building two products. The premium tier often outsells the basic one because the people most likely to pay are the ones who want everything.
Add a small-numbers, high-touch tier if your topic warrants it — 'live workshop plus a 20-minute one-to-one afterwards, five spots only'. Those five can be priced at several times the standard ticket and frequently sell first, because the buyers who need personal help self-identify immediately. You've done barely any extra work and meaningfully raised the average order value.
Take payment to your own Stripe at the point of booking, and send the join link on payment rather than collecting emails to 'send details later'. Every manual step between paying and being confirmed is a chance for someone to feel unsure whether they're actually in. When the confirmation carries the date, the link, and a calendar note immediately, the buyer relaxes and you've one less person emailing to check they're registered.
Cut the No-Show Rate You Haven't Planned For
Free events lose half their sign-ups to no-shows; paid ones lose far fewer, which is itself a good reason to charge even a modest amount. But even paid attendees forget, so build a short reminder rhythm: a confirmation at booking, a nudge the day before with the exact time in their own words ('7pm UK time'), and a final one an hour before with nothing but the link. The hour-before message is the one that actually gets people into the room.
Tell buyers in advance whether there's a replay, because it changes behaviour in a way you can use. If you say 'the recording goes only to premium tickets', more people attend live; if you promise a replay to everyone, attendance drops but refunds do too, since a buyer who missed it still got what they paid for. Pick deliberately — don't let it happen by accident and then be surprised at an empty room or a pile of refund requests.
Have a plan for the person who paid and genuinely couldn't make it. A simple, stated policy — 'can't attend live? You'll get the recording' — turns a potential refund and a bad feeling into a satisfied customer, and it costs you a link you were sending anyway. The workshop that people remember fondly is the one where even the person who missed it felt looked after, and that goodwill is what fills the next one.
- Open sales 2–3 weeks out; lean on the real date for urgency
- Offer a live tier and a recording-plus-extras tier
- Send reminders at booking, day before, and one hour before
- Decide the replay policy on purpose — it changes attendance