“Seriously, what are the proactive things that speakers do to get engagements?” – A NSA Mountainwest Presentation

On March 21st, the Mountainwest Chapter of the National Speakers Association will be having their 2018 event titled: Paid to Speak.  As I will be presenting I thought it would save attendees some time if they could just listen and not have to take notes.  So the following are the points that I will be making.  To all you attendees.  Enjoy.

  • Do they, the Customers, have money? (If no . . . Start over, i.e. – see Association, Government, Education, and/or Corporation) 

 There are so many speakers who want to talk to mothers who have experience being single and falling in love with balding men . . . or . . .I want to share my story with guys who love growing bamboo shoots.   The problem is there is not market for these presentations.   How do you find them?  How would you connect with them?  When asked why he robbed banks, the famous criminal answered, “because that is where the money is.”   If you are not going after customer that have money, go find a good day job.   Think corporations, associations, government or education.  Can you find them on a map?   A good chunk of speakers target associations, so they can then present to THEIR customers, who are corporations.  

  • What is their Pain, Passion, or Priorities?

They do NOT want to know about YOUR pain, passion, and priorities.  Not unless they can see a benefit to their world.  If you can translate your experience into how it will lift and improve the world of the customer then you stand a chance.  If you want to share the stories of your youth, or how great your parents were, or how you overcame being dead . . . those may be motivational, and there is a market for that.  But for every motivational/entertaining speaker, there are hundreds who really make money providing content to help customer overcome their pain, grow their passions, or improve and achieve their priorities.  And all those motivational/entertaining speakers.  They wish they could do more content that would help the customers with their pain, passions and priorities.  

  • Describe how you can help them in the future get a more favorable result.

We do not buy tires for our cars to show off our tires.  We buy tires so we can go somewhere (in the future).  We go to college so IN THE FUTURE we can make more money.  The customer is future oriented.  When you can translate your expertise into ways to help the customer improve THEIR future (think “money”)  . . . home run.  

  • Respect Time (theirs) and the Delete Button (the 3/10ths of a second rule)

They are overworked and understaffed.  Everyone have too many emails, to many texts, phone calls, meetings, and demands on their time.  Today the delete button dominates our lives.  You have got to get them to spend more than 3 tenths of a second considering you.  Your emails MUST be targeted with subject lines that engage.  Your presentations better have a story in the first 3 seconds, or you are hosed.  That voice mail better get to the point in the first sentence, or you will NEVER get called back.  This is the reason for the next point of  . . . . 

  • No more Cold Calls . . .Warm Yes (The Power of Name Dropping and Testimonials   or   Have a Killer Presentation!!!!!)

Mark Hunter’s book: High-Profit Prospecting, or Sam Richters’ “Take the Cold Out of Cold Calling” are a great start.  Or the book “Dig your Well Before You Are Thirsty” or “Never Eat Alone” or Jeffrey Gittomer’s little Black Book.   There is an art to warming people up.   

  • Pick a CRM and USE IT!!!! (FusionSoft, SalesForce, ACT, Insightly, KarmaCRM)
  • Put the CRM to work
  • Email Subject-Line specific to their organization
  • Conference Date + 2 months = Perfect Time to Connect
  • Get Your You-Can’s Down

I know this is a rotten thing to do, but I am not going to go into great detail on this.  In my opinion, this is the most important thing you could do to grow your speaking business.  Last year I spoke on this, and if I get a next year, I will again speak on this.   But consider learning about Features versus Benefits.   Learn how to communicate your value so it connects with the customer.  

Bonus Stuff to Do   (Do the Stuff that makes it easy to work with you. )

Have the following ready to send electronically to meeting planners.  If they have to ask, then you are making their jobs harder.  

  • Titles with Descriptions of your presentations
  • Introduction
  • Bio  (remember this will show up in their program)
  • Head Shots (consider a white background and pic’s of you facing either direction so they can put it in their program)
  • Articles (to be used prior to your presentation to get people interested in coming to see/hear you speak)
  • Links to referals, testimonials, clients, your presentation titles and descriptions,  your Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube AND VIDEO of you speaking.  Not video of you on the stage with someone talking over your video track.   This is the one thing EVERY meeting planner wants.  They want to see and hear YOU in front of an audience.  If you do not have this, you will not ever get anywhere.  

 

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