I’ve attended roughly a gazillion presentations that began with an executive summary, or a brief statement along the lines of, “Here’s what I’m going to tell you.”
Don’t do it. If you have, stop now. Promise me you’ll never do it again.
Why? Because if you begin with your conclusion, you invite disagreement. Without the benefit of the logic of your argument, you’re simply asking your audience to take issue with what you’re saying. That move derails your talk at the very beginning and means that a goodly percentage of the audience is no longer listening to you with anything like an open mind.
What should you do instead? Give a high-level teaser, a statement of purpose, something like, “Today I’m going to show you why a small change in your thinking can yield big profits down the road.”
Or start with a brief story, and then give the high-level framing statement.
Then lead your audience on the decision-making journey that will lead inevitably to your amazing conclusion. The only reason to give a speech is to change the world. That means changing the minds of your audience. To do that, you have to respect their need to go through the decision-making process. You don’t allow them to do that if you start at the conclusion.
Never start with an executive summary. You’re just asking for trouble.
I get questions all the time from speakers and wannabe-speakers about the infamous speaker DVD. I’m beginning to think that somewhere an angel loses its wings every time I answer the question, because the speakers usually look so crestfallen. So in an effort to save a few angels, here’s the lowdown on the speaker DVD.
If you want to be a paid speaker and get hired by meeting planners and through speakers bureaus, you must have a speaker DVD. What does it look like? Let’s say what it’s not first. It’s not a series of clips of you on TV shows sounding witty and looking great. It’s not a hand-held, back-of-the-room, lousy-sound DVD your brother-in-law shoots with his camcorder. It’s not a film of you talking straight into the camera in a studio (or a hotel room).
It is a 20- to 30-minute excerpt from a real speech given by you in front of a good audience, in a similar setting to what you’re hoping to get hired to do. The DVD is done with 2 or 3 cameras, professional sound, good lighting, and audience reaction shots. The look and feel should be like a presidential news conference, or state of the union address, with most of the camera attention on you, but with occasional cutaways to the audience. That’s why you need the second camera – to catch the question, the laugh, the audience clearly engaged in your brilliant insights.
The camera shouldn’t simply focus on your head and shoulders and leave it there for the 20 -30 minutes. That’s what your brother in law would do, and it looks bush league. Instead, it should close in occasionally, but stay wide, or at a 3/4 shot most of the time. We want a sense of the room, and the magnitude of the occasion. But no waiters walking in front of the cameras! And, in spite of the fact that most highly paid speeches are given in ballrooms to people sitting at rounds, (a format that is deadly dull and which I particularly loathe), what shows up best is the auditorium style. That’s because rounds always make the room look empty and the crowd sparse.
Of course, the hard thing about all this is that if you haven't yet been hired to give these kinds of speeches, how do you get a DVD of one? It’s a Catch-22.
The good news is that we’ve worked out a solution. Our Public Words Speaker Forum 2010 conference has a couple of slots left on Day Two for speakers who want to record their speeches and get a DVD. We’ll got a two-camera film crew on hand, with professional sound, good lighting, and an audience, and we’ll edit the DVD for you afterward to the specs that work best for meeting planners and speakers bureaus. All you have to do is show up with a great speech. Register here so no more angels have to lose their wings!
How do you close a speech? Think about whom you’re talking to: an audience full of people who are paid to be active. You’ve asked them to be passive for an hour or so. The best way to close a speech, then, is to allow them to be active. Give them something to do.
If you’re the typical speaker, two questions have immediately sprung to mind. First, what do I get them to do? And second, won’t I be starting something chaotic? How do I keep control?
You get them to do something that would follow naturally from the point of your talk. Think of it in the following way. Supposing you have given a great speech, and the audience troops out, back to their workspaces. But their lives have been changed – you have changed the world for them. What do they do back at their desks? What’s the first action they take?
The action you get them to do at the end of the speech should be the first step toward that change, that different way of looking at the world, that new way of thinking. Have you been telling them about new ways to organize their lives and get more done with less? Then get them organizing, or making out a new to-do list, or deciding what they’re not going to do. Have you been inspiring them to make new resolutions, set new goals, find new horizons to reach toward? Then get them to commit to something new there in the room – perhaps to their neighbors. Have you been helping them to lose bad habits and make new, better ones? Then have them start a support group right there in the room.
You get the idea. The point is to get them started in some small, simple way, on the larger journey you want them to go on. If there is no larger journey, what were you talking about? You were wasting their time and yours.
OK. What about control? Speakers experience that burst of energy when you set an audience to a task as a loss of control, but what it actually means is that the audience is getting back into their active groove, having been passive for an hour. That’s a compliment to you, the speaker, that they want to be up and doing. A far worse sign is lethargy at the end of the speech. That means they’ve checked out and you haven’t changed the world or moved the audience to action. That’s bad.
But energy is good. Here’s how you deal with it. Let it run for a few minutes, longer or shorter depending on how complex the task is you set them to. Then, save a bit of your speech for the very end. Signal with your body language that it’s time to gather back again. (You’ve sat down, say, when you turned them loose. Now get back up again.) Ask them how it went. They’ll want to report back. Validate with the whole group what they’ve done individually or in small groups.. And wrap it up with some stirring words of action and encouragement.
For my blog today, I’m linking to a couple of great people: Maureen Anderson, of the Career Clinic -- http://bit.ly/dyEpaq -- and Steve Farber, author of several cool books -- http://amzn.to/aaQ9xb -- on leadership, and a wonderful speaker. Here’s Steve speaking recently at a massive venue in Vegas: http://bit.ly/9AWXwW. Note that he’s working a (nearly) 360-degree audience, and doing it with aplomb. To make everyone in a theatre-in-the-round or thrust stage feel loved, a speaker has to put out more energy than usual, and keep moving to face each aspect of the audience. Steve accomplishes this well in the clip.
Maureen blogs about the Public Words Speaker Forum, and Steve will be the keynote speaker at our June 11-12 event, giving you two reasons to put it on your calendar. Register before May 15 and avoid the price increase!
Mena Trott, together with her husband, founded Six Apart, the company that created TypePad, the blogging platform this blog and many others are carried on. That makes her the “founding mother of the blog revolution,” as TED.com put it, so she’s a natural person to invite to speak about the importance of blogging. The importance of blogging? Come on, blogging has revolutionized communications! TED can be forgiven for thinking that Mena would be a sure-fire bet.
And let’s say right away that she’s not a bad speaker. She’s lively, intelligent, and only a little nervous. That puts her right on a par with thousands of other speakers. What went wrong was not her delivery, but rather the speech itself.
For all that I write about speech delivery, and non-verbal communications, it’s good to remember that the reason we give speeches is to communicate about something. At the end of the day and the speech, we learn all we can about public speaking because content matters. We humans need to cajole, persuade, enlighten, lead, threaten, encourage, narrate, testify, reconcile – we need to communicate – with each other. About a topic, an issue, a subject, a dream we care about.
And sometimes the content is terrible and the moment is missed. In this case, Mena’s speech takes an inherently fascinating subject and misses the opportunity by a country mile. What goes wrong? Here are the pitfalls that Mena falls into and that the rest of us can avoid, thanks to her horrible example. Here’s the speech, so you can follow along: http://bit.ly/VGww9.
1. She talks about herself too much. What audiences care about is what’s in it for them, not the speaker’s intimate biography – unless you give us a reason to care. Mena doesn’t give us a reason beyond telling us that blogs are personal. In fact, most of the examples she cites are about people doing good things for the world, not sharing personal stories. Her own personal blog is what gets her into trouble.
2. She’s not trying to persuade the audience of anything. Mena’s speech has no point beyond the idea that blogs are interesting and are changing the world somehow. But that’s the premise for bringing her to TED, the starting point. It’s not an idea worthy of a speech. She needs to ask herself questions like the following: Why are they changing the world? Why now? What’s going to happen to them? What key trends are you seeing? And so on. The announcement that blogs are here and that lots of people read them is not itself sufficient. The best reason to give a speech is to persuade the audience of something. Take a point of view!
3. The speech has no arc. When you ask people to follow a speech, you’re asking them to do a lot of mental work. It’s your job to help them by providing a clear structure – a story in three acts, a problem-solution speech (one of my personal favorites), a chronological account of an issue – there are many ways to structure a speech, but the point is to pick one. Mena’s speech starts out with a series of funny asides, and then peters out with more asides, that aren’t funny. The audience stops laughing, it checks out, and the speech dies. It goes nowhere, and ultimately the audience won’t forgive that. In the end, Mena wastes everyone's time because she hasn't taken the trouble to figure out something real to say, and how to say it in a clear, compelling way.
Iqbal Quadir, microcredit pioneer with GrameenBank to create GrameenPhone, had a great idea. He’s brought hope and prosperity to 80 million rural Bangladeshi with his wireless phone services, which allow women in villages to start small businesses selling phone calls to their neighbors. Many other services follow from there, and this kind of bottom-up thinking has not only transformed life in Bangladesh, but also thinking about how to help the poor worldwide.
Plainly, a great man with a great idea. But as a speaker, he leaves a lot to be desired. The kind of mistakes he makes are very typical of a passionate nerd, so they’re worth pointing out.
You can see him speaking here: http://bit.ly/OuM5o. What makes him a weak speaker? Three main flaws.
1. He talks to his slides, not the audience. Iqbal spends a surprising amount of time peering up at his slides, with his back or shoulder to the audience. The result is highly disengaging for the poor audience, and it leaves Iqbal looking uncertain about his material. More than that, audiences tend to follow a speaker’s lead. So if you look at your slides, the audience will too – and it won’t look at you. You become secondary to the slides, and that’s not a good thing.
2. He talks about the history of the idea rather than what’s in it for the audience. This temptation is hard for many speakers to resist. They talk about how the idea occurred to them, or developed through time, or evolved. That’s natural, because that’s the way it happened to them, but it’s not particularly interesting to the audience. What audiences care about is what’s in it for them. So cut to the chase, make a long story short, and give us the gist. We want to know why the idea matters to us, and how we can use it. We don’t care about its history.
3. He talks about mastery but his body language speaks uncertainty. This is a man who has accomplished extraordinary things, in the face of steep odds, but his body language betrays the enormous uncertainty of an unpracticed, uncomfortable speaker. The adrenaline has overtaken him, so he gasps for breath; the result it to make him – and the audience – more nervous. He rarely makes eye contact with the audience, so he doesn’t get a chance to form a relationship with that audience. And he shifts uncomfortably on happy feet from his computer to his slides and back again without connecting with the audience. The result is that his enormous accomplishments are undercut and we begin to doubt the message, because the messenger is so weak.
All kudos to Iqbal Quadir for his wonderful work in benefiting an entire country with bold thinking – and indeed the world. If only his public speaking were as wonderful.
Jamie Oliver burst onto the world scene as a celebrity chef thanks to his “Naked Chef” TV series in the late 1990s, followed by other TV shows, successful books, endorsement deals with supermarkets, and an assault on school lunches, first in the UK and then in the US.
In late 2009, he won the 2010 TED Prize for his efforts to start a healthy food and eating revolution. His TED talk is here: http://bit.ly/cod9o3. In it, he makes a wish: that everyone will help him build a “strong, sustainable movement to educate every child about food, inspire families to cook again, and to fight obesity.” That wish brings him a standing ovation.
How does he get the standing ovation, and more importantly, how does he make the speech memorable?
First, passion. Oliver sells his message with intensity from the very start. It shows up in bad ways as well as good. He’s got a bad case of happy feet, wasting too much energy wandering around the stage. His impact would be even greater if he choreographed himself more intelligently. And he oversells at the beginning, starting with a high pitch of outrage, rather than allowing himself to create an arc of emotion throughout his talk.
But he’s doing so much else well that we forgive him these faults. His passion is genuine and comes through in his body language, his voice, and his message. He begins with a great framing statistic: “In the length of time that it takes me to give this talk, 4 people will die from obesity.” That gets our attention, and from there he’s off to the races. Our children will live 10 years less than we will thanks to the lousy food we give them. Ouch. Diet-related disease is the biggest killer in the US in spite of the fact that it’s murder and mayhem that get the headlines. Ouch. Ten percent of our health expenditures right now are for obesity-related items, and that’s set to double in ten years. Ouch.
Second, the speech is a textbook example of a well-constructed persuasive speech in the problem-solution format. He begins with the hook, the compelling statistic, and then spends the next 12 minutes or so in the problem, showing clips, citing stats, and making arguments about how big a problem obesity is and how it’s killing our children. Then, it’s on to the solution in the remaining 8 minutes or so. And his prescriptions are specific. Supermarkets should put a ‘food ambassador’ in each store to help promote healthy alternatives. Schools should serve proper fresh food for lunch. And kids should be taught 10 recipes that will save their lives before they graduate. And so on.
This is persuasive speaking at its finest, in spite of Oliver’s very human flaws. He deserves the prize, and we should pay attention – on our feet.
You know you want one – a standing ovation. Speakers don’t like to admit that they’re so needy, but let’s be honest. You put yourself and your ideas on the line; who wouldn’t want to close on a roar of approval and an audience that surges to its feet to express its love and admiration?
So here’s how to get one, in 5 easy steps.
1. Begin with a compelling framing story. This is not an anecdote about your trip to the venue, or a story about your kids. It’s a compelling, brief narrative making concrete and interesting the general problem you’re talking about. If you’re talking to an internal audience about declining customer satisfaction, say, then you want a story about a specific customer who was unhappy because of something an employee did or didn’t do. Make the narrative more than one and less than three minutes long.
2. Then talk about a problem the audience has. The guts of any “Standing O” talk is not information, it is sharing your perspective on a problem the audience has. It’s all about the audience! That’s so crucial, I’ll say it again: it’s about the audience, not about you. You want to delve deep into the problem, on both intellectual and emotional levels. To get that Standing O, you’re going to have to focus on the emotional response of the audience to the problem.
3. Involve the audience in analyzing the problem. This is a crucial step. You want to get the audience participating in the discussion of the problem. Ask for their input, their stories, their understanding. Break them up into small groups if necessary, but figure out some way to get them doing some of the work.
4. Then show the audience how they can solve the problem. This is where you get to be most didactic – and helpful. Share your expertise with the audience to solve the problem. But just as crucially, figure out a way for the audience to get involved here too. Set the broad outline of the solution, and then let them fill in some details.
5. Close with a call to action that involves the audience. The trick here is to finish strong, using the magic word “you” where “you” is the audience. “Together, we can do this, and you will be the first team to achieve XXXX in the history of YYYY. Is that not worth a few long nights? Let’s get started!”
And they’re on their feet. A Standing O comes about because the audience wants to give energy back, because it’s inspired by the speaker. Applauding is the first way to do that, but standing is a more energetic way, and therefore more satisfying – for the audience. All you have to do is make it about them, let them get involved – and get your own ego out of the way.
Based on actual events. Don’t try these on your audiences. Please feel free to nominate the worst cases of audience abuse you have witnessed.
10. The speaker who comes out on stage and says, “Good Morning. . . . GOOD MORNING!. . . . I can’t hear you!. . . . GOOD MORNING!!!!. . . . Until the audience responds with a sufficiently loud form of that banal salutation to satisfy the speaker.
9. The speaker who buries his head in a text, reading behind the podium, never once looking up to connect with the audience, for 10….30…..60 minutes.
8. The speaker who presents a dense slide of data to the audience, saying, “You can’t read this, but what this slide shows is…..”
7. The speaker who begins her talk with, “But first, let me tell you a little bit about me, my company, and how we got to this point….”
6. The (male) speaker who spends the entire 60 minutes talking to the attractive woman in the third row. (Or vice-versa.)
5. The speaker who talks down to the audience, saying, “You don’t need to understand this; suffice it to say that….”
4. The speaker who is so fascinated with his subject, say, the low-light hydroculture of Paeonia lactiflora, that he tells the audience everything he knows about it, believing that the audience is just as interested.
3. The speaker who begins her talk saying “I have 235 slides and only 30 minutes, so I’m going to move very fast. But don’t worry, I’m e-mailing the deck to everyone at the conference.”
2. The speaker who presents the results of the multi-year study….in total, on several hundred illegible slides, including the assumptions and statistical models used to analyze the data – and insists on going over every single slide.
Bjarke Ingels is a Danish architect on a quest to prove to the world that sustainable building doesn’t need to be boring or self-denying. With cool irony and sly humor, Ingels grounds a discussion of three extraordinary building complexes in a bigger argument for thinking way, way, way out of the box architecturally speaking.
Ingels is also a great example of how a nerd (at least, an architectural nerd) can succeed as a speaker: by accepting his own imperfections and having fun with his talk anyway. Because Ingels clearly enjoys himself and is passionate about his subject, his talk is entertaining to watch despite some of the clumsiness of his speaking style. You can see him giving a TED.com talk here: http://bit.ly/opzjG.
The first project he discusses is the Danish entry in an international exposition in China. Ingels and his colleagues actually talked the Danish government into shipping the famous little mermaid statue to Shanghai for the Expo. You have to see the building to believe it; it’s a brilliant combination of water, outside space, and bicycles.
The second project is an extraordinarily innovative apartment building that manages to integrate parking space in a way that’s innovative, energy efficient, and even beautiful.
The final architectural panel in Ingels’ triptych is the transformation of an entire island in central Asia from a desert space into a sustainable, carbon neutral wonderland of seven building-mountains and a central park. You’ve never seen buildings quite like these before; let’s hope that they become inspirations for a lot more building like them. When you put the typical modern city next to Ingels’ vision, the city looks drab indeed.
I’m very excited to announce our first annual Public Words Speaker Forum (2010) for June 11-12, 2010. The professional speaking world is changing rapidly, the book business (speakers need published books) is changing even more rapidly, and we need to get some smart minds together to sort it all out. The event will be held in conjunction with The Center for Public Leadership at Harvard’s Kennedy School, in the historic Taubman building on the Kennedy School campus in Cambridge, MA. We’re also going to give a select number of speakers a chance to show their stuff in talks that will be recorded so that we can create professional-quality DVDs for them.
The Forum will begin with a day devoted to exploring the current state of the public speaking world with some of the smartest minds in the business. In a series of discussions and talks, we’ll hear from a successful speaker, marketing and content experts, a social media expert, literary agents, publishers, speakers’ bureau representatives, and meeting planners. There will be opportunities throughout the day for networking and detailed discussions with experts in the public speaking business, as well speakers themselves. We’ll close the day with what we hope will become a Speaker Forum tradition: an improv demonstration and contest that will encourage all speakers present to develop their ability to respond in the moment to whatever an audience sends their way!
The second day will feature a showcase of some of the most interesting speakers currently on the circuit. David Meerman Scott is our first headliner who’s signed up. These presentations will be taped, and a panel of industry experts will review the speeches afterward. Participants will receive professional-quality DVDs of their speeches to use in their marketing. In addition, for those who don’t want to attempt an entire speech, we’ll be recording 3-minute clips for promotional use on the Web.
Attendees will gain an insider’s knowledge of the speaking business and an understanding of what it takes to establish and sustain a successful public speaking career.
The day will showcase some of the current top speakers and each speaker will be reviewed by an expert panel of industry insiders. (Lunch and refreshment breaks included.)
Shai Agassi’s plan for electric, zero-emission vehicles makes so much sense and is such a radical departure from the old thinking on the subject of powering cars that I’m afraid it won’t get the hearing that it deserves. People resist new ideas – truly new ideas – more fiercely than even obviously bad old ideas, and for a long, long time. It’s why doctors still resist having to wash their hands before operating. Still!
Agassi figured out that the way to get people over the fear of the dead electric car battery was to separate the ownership of the car and the battery. So you’ll buy an electric car, but you’ll go to a station like a gas station where your battery is swapped for a fresh one in less than 2 minutes. The whole range problem of the electric car solved in one flash of insight.
Since cars and trucks emit roughly 25% of the world’s human-made carbon dioxide, Agassi’s idea could have a large, beneficial effect on climate change. Not to mention that we wouldn’t have to depend as much in volatile parts of the world for imported energy.
So what’s the catch? Obviously that we need a whole network of battery stations set up before we can all start driving electric cars with confidence. So Agassi has begun to tour the world trying to persuade countries to go along. So far, Israel, Australia, Denmark and Hawaii have signed up.
How effective a speaker is Agassi? You can see him speaking here: http://bit.ly/2XO6C.
He’s quite practiced, but he suffers from the intellectual’s speaking problem – he’s too smart for his own good. To be successful, a speaker must establish trust with the audience. There are a variety of ways to do that, but we don’t trust intellectuals, so dazzling people with your intellect doesn’t do it. We are impressed by Agassi, but we don’t immediately trust him, and the result is that we’re not moved emotionally to go along. And it’s through the emotions that people are moved to action.
Agassi needs to work on trust rather than intellectual argument, and his brilliant idea will spread much faster. And because his idea is so important, I hereby offer to work with him for free in order to help the cause. Next time you’re in the US, Shai, look us up.
Why is Tom Peters cool now? He’s just come out with a new book, The Little Big Things:163 Ways to Pursue EXCELLENCE, which is a compendium of over a hundred bright ideas for making your business better, from clean rest rooms to sending flowers to nudging people to (of course) excellence to green businesses to connecting and making it personal – you get the idea. The book is like one of Peters’ rants; there’s no plot, just loads of great ideas one after another spilling out of the book like they spill out of the man when he’s speaking. You can study him here: http://www.tompeters.com/. The site has all things Tom and includes plenty of video. As a speaker, of course, Tom's passion shows up as a high-energy rant; I don't recommend trying to imitate him, because only he gets it right. He is, and should be, unique.
What makes Peters keep going is his passion for getting it right, and that passion seems unabated a generation on from the publication of his defining classic, In Search of Excellence, still a great read and still relevant. The guy is a phenom and well worth the price of admission, whether it’s for the books, or a speech, or just a visit to the website. Peters should be on everyone’s guru short list – and a source of inspiration in your day-to-day work.
I’m going to write a blog series on cool speakers that have different messages from the usual leadership one, or a new book out, or some other reason to pay attention to them. I’m starting with a most unusual individual who is just launching his public persona. Glenn Llopis is one to watch; he’s got a number of ventures going, so stay tuned to see which one (or ones) generates the most buzz.
You can get to know Glenn here: http://www.glennllopis.com/. He’s a confident, energetic speaker who connects well with his audiences: http://www.glennllopis.com/digital-speaking.php . (Scroll down to the video.) Audiences want to engage with him, and that’s a very good sign. Glenn is passionate and fun to watch as a speaker. A speaker truly starts to grow in stature as soon as he or she realizes that a speech isn’t about the speaker, but rather the audience. Glenn’s right on that cusp.
His book, released in 2009, is called Earning Serendipity: 4 Skills for Creating and Sustaining Good Fortune in Your Work (http://bit.ly/9sBQU0). Employing an agricultural metaphor, the book discusses how entrepreneurs make their own luck by first seeing an opportunity, then ‘sowing’ the seeds of success with hard work, ‘growing’ the business with attention to detail and focusing on the best aspects of the venture, and finally ‘harvesting’ the results.
Glenn’s parents were refugees from Castro’s Cuba, and his father became a highly successful musician, as well known as the Beatles throughout Central and South America. Glenn himself has been a successful executive in the food industry, and as a consultant, and is now heading up both the Center for Hispanic Leadership (http://glennllopis.com/hispanic.php) and the Center for Innovation and Humanity (http://glennllopis.com/CIH.php), as well as his own consulting firm. I attended the CIH’s first summit in January, and found it a most interesting and inspiring mix of entrepreneurial not-for-profit thinkers and socially minded business people.
Whether it’s developing Hispanic leadership, innovation in the workplace, or entrepreneurial passion, Glenn Llopis is a speaker to watch in 2010 and beyond.
I’m closing out this series on your paid public speaking career with some FAQs.
1. So I need a book – can I self-publish?
The answer is no. At this point, self-publishing just doesn’t measure up in the eyes of the speakers bureaus and meeting planners who will be hiring you. There’s a pecking order; at the top are certified New York Times bestselling authors. Then there are writers of popular and influential books. Then there are writers of books. Then there are self-published authors. At the bottom of the heap, and it’s a very big heap. Don’t put yourself there.
2. How much money can I make public speaking?
The folks at the top make as much as $100,000 and more per speech. If that seems like a lot, it is. But remember, those folks got there by being really successful doing something else. So they’re busy, and they can’t be speaking all the time. For the rest of us, NY Times bestsellers make $40K and up per speech. Authors of popular books make in the $20-40K range. Other authors make $10-20K. And everyone else makes….expenses.
3. I’m retired; can I make this my second career and earn a little money while I’m at it?
No. It’s not a part-time pursuit. It’s too demanding. Think of it as a full-time job, with a lot of travel, and then decide if that's what you want.
4. What should I speak about?
Something you’re very, very passionate about. Something you’re prepared to repeat up to 100 times a year.
5. Should I go with an ‘exclusive’ speakers’ bureau?
No. Get to know as many bureaus as you can – well. For most people, that means a half-dozen or so. The idea is to keep yourself top of mind with them.
6. How do I get started getting paid for speaking?
Start by speaking for free. Speak to small groups, volunteer groups, Toastmasters – anything to get some practice and to find out how good you are. Then, work your network to get a paid invitation. Perhaps at an association of which you are a member. Perhaps at an industry convention where you’ve helped in some way. Start out with a breakout session, and work your way up. To be a keynoter, you need a book. See #1.
7. Is it a good idea to have as many speaking topics as possible?
No. See my earlier posting on the importance of a brand. You should become known for speaking on a few, related topics. The world simply won’t believe that you can be expert on 20 things. Even if you actually are.
8. Do I need a website?
Of course. It’s the second place a meeting planner looks (after your DVD) to see what kind of speaker you are and how much you should be paid. A cheesy looking website will limit your earning potential absolutely.
9. Why should I blog – isn’t that just giving it away for free?
It’s all about building up a platform and a community – what used to be called a reputation. Blogging is a whole lot more effective in today’s world than trying to get an article in HBR or an appearance on the Today Show. You can control how often and how well you blog. You have very little control over Harvard or NBC.
10. Do I need a manager?
Not until the calls and emails are coming in faster than you can handle them. Then, maybe, depending on how well organized you are. Managers will take anywhere from a small (5) percent of your earning to a lot (30%). Think it through before you decide you need one. That said, it is far more effective in the long run to have someone else negotiating on your behalf than doing it yourself. Most people tend to ask for too little on their own behalf, and cave in too easily.
It’s difficult to imagine maintaining a public speaking career these days without a social media presence, a blog, or YouTube videos, but some do. The range of comfort, expertise, and experience with online marketing is enormous amongst public speakers. But the truth is that the world is moving too fast today to rely on (even) FedEx and marketing materials that only exist on paper.
So focus on the social media you understand best – perhaps creating a Facebook fan page, for example – start your blog and contribute regularly to it, post some YouTube videos in your channel, put your slides on line, create a pdf version of your press kit – just get started. If you don’t have a least some of this kind of marketing going on, you’re going to look like a troglodyte, and they don’t get hired much.
The real purpose of all this social media and online marketing is to create or join a community of people, developing and extending a platform of your area of interest and your brand that like-minded people can respond to, comment on, and generally help you get the message out.
It’s important to understand that it’s not really about you. It’s about the message. That’s why people will respond, comment, and help – because they care about the same thing or things. So get the word out, and create ways for the world to join you in the cause you care about. If you do that passionately and well, the world will invite you to speak about it, and you will be able to sustain a public speaking career.
I’ll conclude this series next time with a roundup of most frequently asked questions about the business of public speaking.
