2d • Share Your Wins
First Auction Autopsy
Two weeks ago, Flame hit me up cold in the DMs and gave me a smooth pitch about getting tons of engagement on a post, and offered a Loom. Between that and a short call afterward, he really opened my mind to what was possible. Thanks, Honey!
I considered hiring him to help, but I've been around the block enough to know the bulk of the learning experience is best done by just jumping in, failing fast, learning, and going again.
So I'm sharing a breakdown of my first auction, in hopes the good, bad, and ugly of what I tried (and why) is instructive for others in the community.
I coach intermediate-level screenwriters to hit the pro level ASAP. I can generally increase screenplay development speed by 10x and had a client get nominated for an Oscar this year.
I've sold 35+ coaching packages from $10K-$20K, 20+ masterminds at $1,500, and I'm running a low-ticket Skool community with about 75 members: Screenwriter Marketing
I have 68K followers on X (it was 75K until Musk came along)
11K on LinkedIn
20K on IG for my community.
I have almost 2K on my email list with an average of 250 opens. But they've been milked too much recently, so trust is a bit down.
I first ran a test campaign with the list ("Crazy idea. Would you bid or watch an auction for my $10K coaching package, with bids starting at $1K?") and only 3 said they'd watch, one of whom said he MIGHT bid.
With that tepid response, I first thought I'd call it off.
BUT... then figured it was probably worth a shot - if I also reached out to about 30 warmer leads I'd spoken to earlier in the summer, and I lean in to my socials, and most importantly - if I could land at least one promotion partner. And... who knows?
One partner signed on. I gave him the option of sending 1, 2, or 3 emails to his list for the 24-hour auction. I wrote the emails for him. He has maybe 1K good fit screenwriters on his list and holds a pretty engaged monthly meetup online for them. That community already knows me, and I've previously had a premium client come from it.
I estimated that with my list, my socials, my Skool, those warmer leads, and a $50 ad spend on X, I might find a handful of bidders.
With my promo partner, I thought his community was likely to bring a handful more.
I was generally thinking if there were 11 bidders:
- 1 would win (maybe at $3K)
- 1 in 10 might go for the same package on a payment plan ($10K)
- Maybe 3 of the other 9 might do the $1,500 mastermind ($4,500)
That would be a $17,500 haul
RESULTS
- Somebody bid $1,250 right when it opened
- Then crickets for 23 hours
- With five minutes left, a 2nd bidder jumped in, and they went back and forth
- Winning bid closed at $1,500
I'm following up with the non-winning bidder to give him the bonus stuff for bidders and to see if he wants to buy something else. And another prospect who didn't bid has surfaced as a potential client.
So... it wasn't a total bust. I'm happy to give the winning client an insane deal on my coaching package, (he's thrilled) and if one or two of the other guys close, it would become a great payday.
My partner only sent one email, so that's definitely a lesson for next time. I'll require partners to do more than that. But one bidder did come from his community, so I appreciate it.
Most of all, I'm proud of myself for jumping in, enjoying the hell out of the experience, learned a lot, and would now love to know how to run these even better. For my own community and others.
I'm open to advice or thoughts about anything, especially what you think the biggest constraints were, and what you'd suggest I experiment with next.
Here's the link to the auction page:
Here are a few videos I made during the auction period, 2 of which I ran the $50 ads on:
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First Auction Autopsy
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